The Adoption of ICT in Small And Medium-sized Family Business. The Role of Younger Generation

The aim of this paper is to understand if the involvement of younger generation in small and medium-sized family firms can encourage a process of technological innovation, realized through the introduction and use of Information and Communication Technology. Younger entrepreneurs, that we call digital successors, compared to their predecessors, has a higher level of education and, living in an era dominated by electronics and digital information, should be able to exploit the new technologies in business organization and management. The new generation has skills, energy and innovative spirit necessary to start the process of technological innovation. From the methodological point of view, this work is based on a qualitative research involving two case studies. In both the family firms analyzed the involvement of the younger generation promoted the adoption of ICTs. This study is proposed as an initial moment of reflection to better identify some hypothesis to be tested with further investigations and a quantitative analysis.ICT, digital entrepreneur, family business, small and medium enterprises, technological innovation, generational change

Digital Ecosystems: Ecosystem-Oriented Architectures

We view Digital Ecosystems to be the digital counterparts of biological ecosystems. Here, we are concerned with the creation of these Digital Ecosystems, exploiting the self-organising properties of biological ecosystems to evolve high-level software applications. Therefore, we created the Digital Ecosystem, a novel optimisation technique inspired by biological ecosystems, where the optimisation works at two levels: a first optimisation, migration of agents which are distributed in a decentralised peer-to-peer network, operating continuously in time; this process feeds a second optimisation based on evolutionary computing that operates locally on single peers and is aimed at finding solutions to satisfy locally relevant constraints. The Digital Ecosystem was then measured experimentally through simulations, with measures originating from theoretical ecology, evaluating its likeness to biological ecosystems. This included its responsiveness to requests for applications from the user base, as a measure of the ecological succession (ecosystem maturity). Overall, we have advanced the understanding of Digital Ecosystems, creating Ecosystem-Oriented Architectures where the word ecosystem is more than just a metaphor.Comment: 39 pages, 26 figures, journa

Accelerating entrepreneurial development in South Africa - Recommendations from a practical application

The worldwide trend towards outsourcing non-core, company-specific activities has a number of positive macroeconomic implications. The most notable of these is the contribution that this trend will have in promoting the growth of small, micro- and medium-sized enterprises. This, in turn, should stimulate the socioeconomic development of the environment by adding value at the lower levels of production. This paper sets out to document how the successful implementation of an outsourcing project was achieved in a developing economy and makes recommendations as to its successful replication in other developing economies. </jats:p

Biology of Applied Digital Ecosystems

A primary motivation for our research in Digital Ecosystems is the desire to exploit the self-organising properties of biological ecosystems. Ecosystems are thought to be robust, scalable architectures that can automatically solve complex, dynamic problems. However, the biological processes that contribute to these properties have not been made explicit in Digital Ecosystems research. Here, we discuss how biological properties contribute to the self-organising features of biological ecosystems, including population dynamics, evolution, a complex dynamic environment, and spatial distributions for generating local interactions. The potential for exploiting these properties in artificial systems is then considered. We suggest that several key features of biological ecosystems have not been fully explored in existing digital ecosystems, and discuss how mimicking these features may assist in developing robust, scalable self-organising architectures. An example architecture, the Digital Ecosystem, is considered in detail. The Digital Ecosystem is then measured experimentally through simulations, with measures originating from theoretical ecology, to confirm its likeness to a biological ecosystem. Including the responsiveness to requests for applications from the user base, as a measure of the 'ecological succession' (development).Comment: 9 pages, 4 figure, conferenc

Broadacre farmers adapting to a changing climate

Abstract&nbsp;Data on the financial performance of a diverse set of 249 farm businesses in south-western Australia over the period 2002 to 2011 was collated and analysed. &nbsp;These 10 years were a period of challenging weather years, underpinned by a warming and drying trend in the region’s climate, frost events and marked price volatility.Based on a range of metrics, almost two-thirds (64%) of the farms in the sample were classed as growing or strong. A less secure group of farms that are at some potential financial risk formed 15% of the farm sample. Over the study period farm profitability, on average, improved, supported by productivity growth, in spite of no underlying improvement in the farmers’ terms of trade. &nbsp;Productivity improvement allowed most farm businesses, especially crop and mixed enterprise farm businesses, to prosper. &nbsp;The pathway to their profitability was not so much by investing in new technologies that may have shifted outwards farms’ production possibilities, but rather through better use of existing technologies, including technologies that offered scale economies. Also farmers’ shift into greater dependence on cropping, especially wheat production, was shown to be a sensible and successful adaptation strategy in many regions of south-western Australia, particularly the northern grainbelt.The unique and particular characteristics of each farm business were the main determinant of their business success. &nbsp;However, a few generalisations apply. &nbsp;Due to seasonal and market conditions during the study period more farms in the northern parts of the grainbelt in south-western Australia fared better. &nbsp;Also farmers whose businesses grew strongly over the study period on average displayed superior management capabilities and choices in many areas of farm management. &nbsp;In addition, these farmers were often more connected to their local community and achieved greater work-life balance.We conclude that as long as broadacre farmers in south-western Australia have on-going access to improved crop varieties and technologies that support the profitable growing of crops, especially wheat; and that they have access to farm management and business education then farmers are likely to be able to adapt to projected climate change. &nbsp;Provided that a farmer’s terms of trade does not become unduly adverse, and that farmers sensibly manage farm debt, then it seems highly likely that farmers who continue to rely on crop production, mostly wheat-growing, will persist as financially sound businesses in most parts of the study region, even in the face of projected climate change.Please cite this report as:Kingwell, R, Anderton, L, Islam, N, Xayavong, V, Wardell-Johnson, A, Feldman, D, Speijers, J 2013 Broadacre farmers adapting to a changing climate, National Climate Change Adaptation Research Facility, Gold Coast. pp.171.Data on the financial performance of a diverse set of 249 farm businesses in south-western Australia over the period 2002 to 2011 was collated and analysed. &nbsp;These 10 years were a period of challenging weather years, underpinned by a warming and drying trend in the region’s climate, frost events and marked price volatility.Based on a range of metrics, almost two-thirds (64%) of the farms in the sample were classed as growing or strong. A less secure group of farms that are at some potential financial risk formed 15% of the farm sample. Over the study period farm profitability, on average, improved, supported by productivity growth, in spite of no underlying improvement in the farmers’ terms of trade. &nbsp;Productivity improvement allowed most farm businesses, especially crop and mixed enterprise farm businesses, to prosper. &nbsp;The pathway to their profitability was not so much by investing in new technologies that may have shifted outwards farms’ production possibilities, but rather through better use of existing technologies, including technologies that offered scale economies. Also farmers’ shift into greater dependence on cropping, especially wheat production, was shown to be a sensible and successful adaptation strategy in many regions of south-western Australia, particularly the northern grainbelt.The unique and particular characteristics of each farm business were the main determinant of their business success. &nbsp;However, a few generalisations apply. &nbsp;Due to seasonal and market conditions during the study period more farms in the northern parts of the grainbelt in south-western Australia fared better. &nbsp;Also farmers whose businesses grew strongly over the study period on average displayed superior management capabilities and choices in many areas of farm management. &nbsp;In addition, these farmers were often more connected to their local community and achieved greater work-life balance.We conclude that as long as broadacre farmers in south-western Australia have on-going access to improved crop varieties and technologies that support the profitable growing of crops, especially wheat; and that they have access to farm management and business education then farmers are likely to be able to adapt to projected climate change. &nbsp;Provided that a farmer’s terms of trade does not become unduly adverse, and that farmers sensibly manage farm debt, then it seems highly likely that farmers who continue to rely on crop production, mostly wheat-growing, will persist as financially sound businesses in most parts of the study region, even in the face of projected climate change

Information Outlook, July 2006

Volume 10, Issue 7https://scholarworks.sjsu.edu/sla_io_2006/1006/thumbnail.jp

Enabling Entrepreneurial Ecosystems

Inspired by research on the importance of entrepreneurship for sustained economic growth and improved wellbeing, many governments and non-governmental grantmaking organizations have sought over the past decade to implement policies and programs intended to support entrepreneurs. Over this interval, growing appreciation of the limits of strategies focused narrowly on financing or training entrepreneurs has prompted a number of such entities to shift their efforts toward more broadbased strategies aimed at enabling "entrepreneurial ecosystems" at the city or sub-national regional scale.This paper takes the metaphor of the "ecosystem" seriously, seeking to draw lessons from evolutionary biology and ecology to inform policy for entrepreneurship. In so doing, the paper provides a framework for data gathering and analysis of practical value in assessing the vibrancy of entrepreneurial ecosystems

Knowledge Transfer Needs and Methods

INE/AUTC 12.3

Convergence: How Five Trends Will Reshape the Social Sector

This report highlights five key trends and how their coming together will shape the social sector of the future. Based on extensive review of existing research and in-depth interviews with thought leaders and nonprofit leaders and activists, it explores the trends (Demographic Shifts; Technological Advances; Networks Enabling Work to be Organized in New Ways; Rising Interest in Civic Engagement and Volunteerism; and Blurring of Sector Boundaries) and looks at the ways nonprofits can successfully navigate the changes. The monograph is by La Piana Consulting, a national firm dedicated to strengthening nonprofits and foundations

Knowledge management and history

Capitalisation of the history of a technology, a technique or a concept within an industrial company is relevant to historians. However it largely exceeds the historical problems from a Knowledge Management point of view. In this context, it can be the subject of specific approaches especially Knowledge Engineering. However, it faces two types of difficulties: - The techniques in History have few modelling tools, and are even rather reticent with the use of such tools. - Knowledge Engineering doesn't often address historical knowledge modelling, for tracing knowledge evolution. It is however possible to develop robust and validated methods, tools and techniques which take into account these two approaches, which, if they function in synergy, appear rich and fertile.History, MASK, Knowledge management, Knowledge engineering, History of techniques