On the performance of online and offline green path establishment techniques

© 2015, Ruiz-Rivera et al. To date, significant effort has gone into designing green traffic engineering (TE) techniques that consolidate traffic onto the minimal number of links/switches/routers during off-peak periods. However, little works exist that aim to green Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS) capable networks. Critically, no work has studied the performance of green label switched paths (LSPs) establishment methods in terms of energy savings and acceptance rates. Henceforth, we add to the current state-of-the-art by studying green online and offline (LSP) establishment methods. Online methods rely only on past and current LSP requests while offline ones act as a theoretical benchmark whereby they also have available to them future LSP requests. We introduce a novel metric that takes into account both energy savings and acceptance rates. We also identify a new simpler heuristic that minimizes energy use by routing source–destination demands over paths that contain established links and require the fewest number of new links. Our evaluation of two offline and four online LSP establishment methods over the Abilene and AT&T topologies with random LSP setup requests show that energy savings beyond 20 % are achievable with LSP acceptance rates above 90 %

Synergetic value-driven innovation in business model of organic agriculture in China: a case study of IGARDEN

The innovation of business model is an important way for enterprises to gain competitive advantages and achieve sustainable development. With the rapid development of organic agriculture, an increasing number of scholars started to pay more attention to the research on the business model innovation of organic agriculture in recent years. However, most of the studies took the western developed countries as research objects, while research on cases of China’s local entrepreneurs are not often to be found. In order to develop Chinese organic agriculture’s business model innovation theory and to guide the practice, this thesis selects IGARDEN as the research object, and with a value-created perspective we explore the innovation process, path and essential characteristics of its business model by a case study method. Through the case study of IGARDEN, the result shows that: (1) The business model of IGARDEN follows the evolution from product-based to platform-based; (2) IGARDEN’s business model innovation follows the logic of value creation, and the core of value creation is the expression of product value, the increase of platform value and the accumulation of sustainable value; (3) The emergence of synergistic value expands the border of value creation activities, promoting the innovation process of business model. Driven by Synergetic Value, the value creation carrier of IGARDEN has thus facilitated the emergence of new business models; (4) The process of business model innovation in IGARDEN is essentially an iterative process based on value creation, value synergy and value upgrading. The research result has contributed to the potential enrichment of theories related to business model innovation through a specific scope of the business model innovation within the organic agriculture industry of China, and it can be a guide of forming business model innovation strategy for entrepreneurs facing similar business environment as described in the case.A inovação do modelo de negócios é um método importante para as empresas obterem vantagens competitivas e alcançarem o desenvolvimento sustentável. Com o rápido desenvolvimento da agricultura orgânica, um número crescente de estudiosos começou a prestar mais atenção à pesquisa sobre o modelo de negócios da agricultura orgânica nos últimos anos. No entanto, a maioria dos estudos levaram esses países ocidentais desenvolvidos como objetos de pesquisa, enquanto a pesquisa sobre casos de empreendedores locais chineses não costuma ser encontrada. Para desenvolver a teoria da inovação do modelo de negócio da agricultura orgânica chinesa e orientar a prática, esta tese seleciona o IGARDEN como objeto de pesquisa e, com uma perspectiva de valor, exploramos o processo, caminho de inovação e as características essenciais de seu modelo de negócio. Através do estudo de caso do IGARDEN, o resultado mostra que: (1) O modelo de negócio do IGARDEN segue a evolução de baseada em produto para baseada em plataforma; (2) A inovação do modelo de negócios do IGARDEN segue a lógica da criação de valor, e o núcleo da criação de valor é a expressão do valor do produto， o aumento do valor da plataforma e o acúmulo de valor sustentável; (3) O surgimento de valor sinérgico expande a fronteira das atividades de criação de valor, promovendo o processo de inovação do modelo de negócio. Impulsionado pelo Valor Sinérgico, o portador de criação de valor do IGARDEN facilitou o surgimento de novos modelos de negócios; (4) O processo de inovação do modelo de negócios no IGARDEN é essencialmente um processo iterativo baseado na criação de valor, na sinergia de valor e na atualização de valor. O resultado da pesquisa contribuiu para o potencial enriquecimento de teorias relacionadas à inovação do modelo de negócios através de um escopo específico da inovação do modelo de negócios dentro da agricultura orgânica da China, e pode ser um guia de formação de estratégia de inovação de modelo de negócios para empreendedores que enfrentam negócios semelhantes ambiente descrito neste caso