Market-awareness in service-based systems

Service-based systems are applications built by composing pre-existing services. During design time and according to the specifications, a set of services is selected. Both, service providers and consumers exist in a service market that is constantly changing. Service providers continuously change their quality of services (QoS), and service consumers can update their specifications according to what the market is offering. Therefore, during runtime, the services are periodically and manually checked to verify if they still satisfy the specifications. Unfortunately, humans are overwhelmed with the degree of changes exhibited by the service market. Consequently, verification of the compliance specification and execution of the corresponding adaptations when deviations are detected cannot be carried out in a manual fashion. In this work, we propose a framework to enable online awareness of changes in the service market in both consumers and providers by representing them as active software agents. At runtime, consumer agents concretize QoS specifications according to the available market knowledge. Services agents are collectively aware of themselves and of the consumers' requests. Moreover, they can create and maintain virtual organizations to react actively to demands that come from the market. In this paper we show preliminary results that allow us to conclude that the creation and adaptation of service-based systems can be carried out by a self-organized service market system

Learning in a Disruptive Customer Engagement Platform: An Empirical Analysis in the Banking Industry

The shift in enterprise applications to disruptive mobile platforms calls for research to better understand the mechanisms and factors behind success in these new platforms. In this paper, we empirically study the learning dynamics of sales officers and factors associated with business value, measured as account- opening efficiency in a tablet-based banking application at a large private bank in an emerging market. Our model allows us to study individual learning patterns, and our results show that although high performers in the traditional systems continue to maintain their edge in the new mobile platform, the gap between high and low performers is reduced significantly over time. Our results also reveal that customers’ awareness of the tablet banking service, their digital literacy, and external environmental factors such as mobile infrastructure and market maturity can affect sales officers’ account-opening performance in the tablet-based system.http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/133524/1/1331_Huang.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/133524/4/1331_Huang.pdfDescription of 1331_Huang.pdf : fixed July 2016 revisio

An Online Learning and Optimization Approach for Competitor-Aware Management of Shared Mobility Systems

An important trend in mobility is the consumption of mobility as-a-service heralding in the age of freefloating vehicle sharing (FFVS) systems. In many markets such fleets compete. We investigate how realtime competitor information can create value for operators in this context. We focus on the vehicle supply decision which is a large operational concern. We show empirically that local market shares directly depend on the share of available vehicles in a location, which underlines the value potential of competitor awareness. We leverage this insight by proposing a novel decision support system for optimal management of FFVS systems under competition. We proceed in two phases, (1) a predictive phase and (2) a prescriptive phase. In phase (1), we compile a spatio-temporal dataset based on Car2Go and DriveNow transactions in Berlin, which we supplement with temporal, geographical and weather data. We partition the city into hexagonal tiles and observe vehicle supply per tile at the start of each period. We train machine learning models to predict vehicle inflows and vehicle outflows during the next period to derive total supply and demand. We find that inflows and outflows can be predicted with high accuracy using similar models. We test different temporal and spatial resolutions and find that spatial resolution incurs larger performance penalties. In phase (2), we formulate a myopic mixed integer non-linear programming model with a margin-maximizing objective function. The model trades off additional market share gains against the cost of re-locating vehicles, which enables operators to assign vehicles optimally across the service network. Our numerical studies on the case of Car2Go and DriveNow demonstrate that this competitor-aware model is capable of profitably improving market share by up to 1.4% or 3.4% for human-based and autonomous relocation respectively in a prefect foresight scenario and by up to 0.8% and 1.8% respectively when using predicted values

The Business Case for a Journey Planning and Ticketing App—Comparison between a Simulation Analysis and Real-World Data

Successful development of “Mobility-as-a-Service” (MaaS) schemes could be transformative to our transport systems and critical for achieving sustainable cities. There are high hopes for mobile phone applications that offer both journey planning and ticketing across all the available transport modes, but these are in their infancy, with little understanding of the correct approach to business models and governance. In this study, we develop a system dynamics diffusion model that represents the uptake of such an app, based on one developed and released in West Yorkshire, UK. We perform sensitivity and uncertainty tests on user uptake and app operating profitability, and analyse these in three key areas of marketing, competition, and costs. Comparison to early uptake data is included to demonstrate accuracy of model behaviour and would suggest market failure by month 12 without stronger marketing, even if additional tickets and functions are offered. In response to this, we offer further insights on the need for direct targeted marketing to ensure mass market adoption, the importance of understanding a realistic potential adopter pool, the awareness of competing apps, and the high uncertainty that exists in this market

Effectiveness of ICTs in Dissemination of Agricultural Information among Farmers in Cauvery Delta, Thanjavur

The role of ICT in Agriculture plays a new modern paradigm that facilitates and improves the agricultural sector. The ICT had rendered service to farmers for market access, announcement of weather condition, awareness of crop diseases etc. There are several types of the ICT tools used in agriculture sector such as Radio, Television, Mobile phones, Internet, Electronic money transfer etc. The ICT helps the farmers to understand the gap between productivity and market demand. The ICT, particularly the mobile technology has helped the farm producers in knowing internal commodity prices like agriculture produce. Thus ICT has been a big platform to the farm producer for their empowerment and enhancement. The ICTs assist the farmers to provide and manage the efficient supply chain of the agricultural products. This study attempted to known the impact various ICTs on productivity. The research also determines the factors influencing to refer the ICTs in agriculture. The study focused on to identify the problems faced by the farmers while access the ICTs. The research was conducted in Cauvery Delta Region, Thanjavur District. The data survey collected from 264 respondents by using simple random sampling technique. Regression, Descriptive Statistics and Factor analysis statistical tools were used to evaluate the data. The research findings have provided useful direction for the researcher and Practitioners for to develop future ICT based dissemination systems. Keywords - Agriculture, Awareness, ICT, Farmers, Preference, Retention

Agricultural information dissemination using ICTs: a review and analysis of information dissemination models in China

Open Access funded by China Agricultural UniversityOver the last three decades, China’s agriculture sector has been transformed from the traditional to modern practice through the effective deployment of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs). Information processing and dissemination have played a critical role in this transformation process. Many studies in relation to agriculture information services have been conducted in China, but few of them have attempted to provide a comprehensive review and analysis of different information dissemination models and their applications. This paper aims to review and identify the ICT based information dissemination models in China and to share the knowledge and experience in applying emerging ICTs in disseminating agriculture information to farmers and farm communities to improve productivity and economic, social and environmental sustainability. The paper reviews and analyzes the development stages of China’s agricultural information dissemination systems and different mechanisms for agricultural information service development and operations. Seven ICT-based information dissemination models are identified and discussed. Success cases are presented. The findings provide a useful direction for researchers and practitioners in developing future ICT based information dissemination systems. It is hoped that this paper will also help other developing countries to learn from China’s experience and best practice in their endeavor of applying emerging ICTs in agriculture information dissemination and knowledge transfer

Requirements Engineering for Pervasive Services

Developing pervasive mobile services for a mass market of end customers entails large up-front investments and therefore a good understanding of customer requirements is of paramount importance. This paper presents an approach for developing requirements engineering method that takes distinguishing features of pervasive services into account and that is based on fundamental insights in design methodology

Sustainable innovation: key conclusions from Sustainable Innovation Conferences 2003–2006 organised by The Centre for Sustainable Design

The following is taken directly from the introduction. This booklet summarises the key conclusions from the 2003–2006 conferences on Sustainable Innovation organised by The Centre for Sustainable Design (www.cfsd.org.uk). The conclusions are drawn from the respective conference presentations, papers and discussions. The publication has been sponsored as part of a ‘Centre of Excellence in Sustainable Innovation & Design’ project awarded to The Centre for Sustainable Design by the South-East England Development Agency (SEEDA)

Identify successful marketing communication strategies that apply to a small hair salon

A selected organisation provides hair dressing services and hair products to customers. The aim of this report is to analyse how the small hair salon could improve their marketing communication strategies in order to attract more customers and enhance the relationship between customers and the organisation. The approach to collecting information was to use a questionnaire with 50 participants, to gather primary information and to conduct a secondary research study. The result of this research was to decide that the role of a successful marketing communication strategy is to attract the customer to consume. In order to make the marketing communication strategy successful, it needs to choose a suitable channel that enables it to connect with the customer. New media is an effective channel that can promote the business to the customer and interact with them. New media is also suitable for a small business to use. A recommendation for the organisation is they create their own website page, Facebook page, YouTube video and WeChat group to promote themselves and interact with customers. Those channels are popular in New Zealand, with a high number of active users. Most the organisation customers like to use those channels too, so if the organisation applies those channels to their marketing communication strategy they will be able to attract customers and persuade them to consume more products