Factors influencing branchless banking for microfinance in Sudan: Theoretical perspectives and future directions

In Sudan more than 40% live below the poverty line and getting basic financial service poses a challenge to financial institutions. Most of these unserved populations live in far-flung areas that make it difficult for microfinance institutions to reach them. But the enormous growth of mobile technology industry has created new opportunity to expand financial services to this unserved population. Branchless banking is one of the latest technologies that have been employed in different developing countries to expand financial services to the unbanked poor. Despite the potential benefits and relevance of Branchless banking to Sudan, there are still very few studies on Branchless banking in Sudan. To address this gap in the literature, this study aims to investigate the factors that are essential to the development of branchless banking in Sudan using mobile technology. This is a research-in-progress paper, the critical review of the literature so far revealed that there are essential factors for the success of branchless banking in Sudan e.g. the identification of the industry key players and their roles, the enabling regulatory environment, the infrastructure readiness and Sudanese cultural values. The paper will provide regulators and policy makers in Sudan a way forward to expedite the development of suitable Branchless banking for microfinance in Sudan

The future design direction of smart clothing development

Literature indicates that Smart Clothing applications, the next generation of clothing and electronic products, have been struggling to enter the mass market because the consumers’ latent needs have not been recognised. Moreover, the design direction of Smart Clothes remains unclear and unfocused. Nevertheless, a clear design direction is necessary for all product development. Therefore, this research aims to identify the design directions of the emerging Smart Clothes industry by conducting a questionnaire survey and focus groups with its major design contributors. The results reveal that the current strategy of embedding a wide range of electronic functions in a garment is not suitable. This is primarily because it does not match the users’ requirements, purchasing criteria and lifestyle. The results highlight the respondents’ preference for personal healthcare and sportswear applications that suit their lifestyle, are aesthetically attractive, and provide a practical function

Cooperation for Innovation in Payment Systems: The Case of Mobile Payments

In this paper, we provide a definition of mobile payments and we analyze the markets that could be targeted by mobile payment service providers, both in developed and in developing countries. Focusing on the case of developed countries, we introduce five cooperation models that have emerged or could emerge between banks, mobile network operators, and payment systems, for the development of this payment method.mobile payments; payment systems; mobile banking; mobile commerce.

Factors influencing the adoption of mobile services consumers' preferences using analytic hierarchy process

The rapid and widespread development of innovations in mobile services is changing societies and improving lives around the world. Due to lagging adoption, many of these new innovations have yet failed to generate revenue that was expected by mobile network operators, application and content developers. There are several factors which are affecting the service adoption by consumers. This paper aims to provide practitioners and academics, an insight on what consumers' preferences are by using an Analytic Hierarchy Approach (AHP). The objective of this paper is to identify factors influencing the adoption of the mobile services. In this study we have considered Payment Mode, Functionality, Added Value and PQCP (perceived quality, cost and performance) as the main service adoption factors. The survey results indicate that Functionality is the most important influencing factor for the respondents, followed by Added Value, PQCP and Payment Mode.Adoption,AHP,Mobile Value Services,Consumer's Preferences

Semantic discovery and reuse of business process patterns

Patterns currently play an important role in modern information systems (IS) development and their use has mainly been restricted to the design and implementation phases of the development lifecycle. Given the increasing significance of business modelling in IS development, patterns have the potential of providing a viable solution for promoting reusability of recurrent generalized models in the very early stages of development. As a statement of research-in-progress this paper focuses on business process patterns and proposes an initial methodological framework for the discovery and reuse of business process patterns within the IS development lifecycle. The framework borrows ideas from the domain engineering literature and proposes the use of semantics to drive both the discovery of patterns as well as their reuse

Developing a model of the behavioural intentions of older adults towards internet service providers : a UK perspective

Copyright and all rights therein are retained by the authors. All persons copying this information are expected to adhere to the terms and conditions invoked by each author's copyright. These works may not be re-posted without the explicit permission of the copyright holdersCountries around the globe have an ageing population that faces problems such as cognition, memory and visual difficulties. Mobile devices and products are part of daily life and to utilise them the role of internet service providers is essential. This research-in-progress paper aims to identify and evaluate factors that influence the older population’s (over 50 years) selection of an internet service provider (ISP) as well as their continuous intention and behaviour to remain with the ISP. The outcomes of this research study are aimed at policymakers, academia and industryFinal Published versio

Factors influencing students' acceptance of m-learning: An investigation in higher education

M-learning will play an increasingly significant role in the development of teaching and learning methods for higher education. However, the successful implementation of m-learning in higher education will be based on users' acceptance of this technology. Thus, the purpose of this paper is to study the factors that affect university students' intentions to accept m-learning. Based on the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT) (Venkatesh et al., 2003), this study proposes a model to identify the factors that influence the acceptance of m-learning in higher education and to investigate if prior experience of mobile devices affects the acceptance of m-learning. A structural equation model was used to analyse the data collected from 174 participants. The results indicate that performance expectancy, effort expectancy, influence of lecturers, quality of service, and personal innovativeness were all significant factors that affect behavioural intention to use m-learning. Prior experience of mobile devices was also found to moderate the effect of these constructs on behavioural intention. The results of this research extend the UTAUT in the context of m-learning acceptance by adding quality of service and personal innovativeness to the structure of UTAUT and provide practitioners and educators with useful guidelines for designing a successful m-learning system

Alcuni abstract di articoli che trattano argomenti relativi all'eHealth

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