Narrative Review: Food Image Use for Machine Learnings’ Function in Dietary Assessment and Real Time Nutrition Feedback and Education

Technology has played a key role in advancing the health and agriculture sectors to improve obesity rates, diseasecontrol, food waste, and overall health disparities. However, these health and lifestyle determinants continue to plague theUnited States population. While new technologies have been and are currently being developed to address these concerns, they may not be practical for the general population. Utilizing machine learning advancement in food recognition using smartphone technology may be a means to improve the dietary component of nutrition assessments while providing valuable nutrition feedback. This narrative review was conducted to assess the current state of the literature on nutrition technology using image recognition for practical applications, while also proposing theoretical uses for the technology to improve quality of life through dietary feedback

Tap it again, Sam: Harmonizing personal environments towards lifelong learning

The increasing number of mobile vendors releas- ing NFC-enabled devices to the market and their prominent adoption has moved this technology from a niche product to a product with a large market-share. NFC facilitates natural interactions between digital world and physical learning environments. The scaffolding of learning ecologies is a key aspect for lifelong learners in their challenge to integrate learning activities into busy daily life. The contribution of this manuscript is twofold: first, a review of scientific litera- ture in which NFC has been used with a direct or indirect purpose to learn is presented, and potential uses for learners are classified according to their type of interaction; based on these findings the NFC MediaPlayer is presented as an instantiation of an ecology of resources (EoR) in a lifelong learning context. Finally, shortcomings and best practices are highlighted in the conclusions, and future work is discussed

CHORUS Deliverable 2.1: State of the Art on Multimedia Search Engines

Based on the information provided by European projects and national initiatives related to multimedia search as well as domains experts that participated in the CHORUS Think-thanks and workshops, this document reports on the state of the art related to multimedia content search from, a technical, and socio-economic perspective. The technical perspective includes an up to date view on content based indexing and retrieval technologies, multimedia search in the context of mobile devices and peer-to-peer networks, and an overview of current evaluation and benchmark inititiatives to measure the performance of multimedia search engines. From a socio-economic perspective we inventorize the impact and legal consequences of these technical advances and point out future directions of research

New Card Technologies in Retail Banking: Competition and Collaboration in the 1990s

This thesis examines the alternative bank card technologies being considered for retail banking in the UK in the 1990s. Influential organisations suggest that this technology needs updating, and various new technologies are being developed. The thesis identifies the most influential organisations within four groups considered key for retail banking technology: the technology supply industry, the adopting industry, the market and other key players. The observations and analysis in this thesis are based on information provided by each of these four key groups, through written Surveys, face-to-face and telephone interviews, and from a range of written sources. A selection of past and present bank card trials are also described, with particular focus on the introduction of smart card technology. Results confirm that the innovation process in the retail banking industry accords with a highly interactive model, with feedback loops throughout the innovation process. The adopting industry is seen to follow the innovation process in the opposite direction to that experienced in manufacturing industry. Thus, smaller incremental innovations eventually lead to more radical changes which effect complete systems change on a national basis - a ‘reverse cycle’ model of innovation. The thesis analyses the evolution of competitive and cooperative strategies, particularly between banks and their collective organisations, building societies and retailers. The thesis concludes that the dominant institutions driving card technology innovation and standards globally are the international debit and credit card corporations Mastercard, VISA and Europay, operating through their organisation EMV. In the UK, the major clearing banks, and their ABACS organisation, and the large retailers are also key actors. The thesis suggests that smart card is the most likely to be adopted

Smartphone Apps for Food Purchase Choices: Scoping Review of Designs, Opportunities, and Challenges

Background: Smartphone apps can aid consumers in making healthier and more sustainable food purchases. However, there is still a limited understanding of the different app design approaches and their impact on food purchase choices. An overview of existing food purchase choice apps and an understanding of common challenges can help speed up effective future developments.Objective: We examined the academic literature on food purchase choice apps and provided an overview of the design characteristics, opportunities, and challenges for effective implementation. Thus, we contribute to an understanding of how technologies can effectively improve food purchase choice behavior and provide recommendations for future design efforts.Methods: Following the PRISMA-ScR (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses extension for Scoping Reviews) guidelines, we considered peer-reviewed literature on food purchase choice apps within IEEE Xplore, PubMed, Scopus, and ScienceDirect. We inductively coded and summarized design characteristics. Opportunities and challenges were addressed from both quantitative and qualitative perspectives. From the quantitative perspective, we coded and summarized outcomes of comparative evaluation trials. From the qualitative perspective, we performed a qualitative content analysis of commonly discussed opportunities and challenges.Results: We retrieved 55 articles, identified 46 unique apps, and grouped them into 5 distinct app types. Each app type supports a specific purchase choice stage and shares a common functional design. Most apps support the product selection stage (selection apps; 27/46, 59%), commonly by scanning the barcode and displaying a nutritional rating. In total, 73% (8/11) of the evaluation trials reported significant findings and indicated the potential of food purchase choice apps to support behavior change. However, relatively few evaluations covered the selection app type, and these studies showed mixed results. We found a common opportunity in apps contributing to learning (knowledge gain), whereas infrequent engagement presents a common challenge. The latter was associated with perceived burden of use, trust, and performance as well as with learning. In addition, there were technical challenges in establishing comprehensive product information databases or achieving performance accuracy with advanced identification methods such as image recognition.Conclusions: Our findings suggest that designs of food purchase choice apps do not encourage repeated use or long-term adoption, compromising the effectiveness of behavior change through nudging. However, we found that smartphone apps can enhance learning, which plays an important role in behavior change. Compared with nudging as a mechanism for behavior change, this mechanism is less dependent on continued use. We argue that designs that optimize for learning within each interaction have a better chance of achieving behavior change. This review concludes with design recommendations, suggesting that food purchase choice app designers anticipate the possibility of early abandonment as part of their design process and design apps that optimize the learning experience

Geographic Information Systems and Risk Assessment

This report presents projects developed by the Unit IPSC/SERAC regarding the use of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) for supporting the study of critical infrastructures and the security/defence industry. It also discusses how risk assessment can benefit from geographical representations. Risk assessments have an important spatial component and GIS can be central to risk identification, quantification, and evaluation. Furthermore it presents a wide-ranging description of different GIS techniques and web-technologies, and its potential application to supporting the European Program for Critical Infrastructure Protection, and the mapping of the European Defence industry.JRC.G.6-Sensors, radar technologies and cybersecurit

Modelling of Information Flow and Resource Utilization in the EDGE Distributed Web System

The adoption of Distributed Web Systems (DWS) into modern engineering design process has dramatically increased in recent years. The Engineering Design Guide and Environment (EDGE) is one such DWS, intended to provide an integrated set of tools for use in the development of new products and services. Previous attempts to improve the efficiency and scalability of DWS focused largely on hardware utilization (i.e. multithreading and virtualization) and software scalability (i.e. load balancing and cloud services). However, these techniques are often limited to analysis of the computational complexity of the algorithms implemented. This work seeks to improve the understanding of efficiency and scalability of DWS by modelling the dynamics of information flow and resource utilization by characterizing DWS workloads through historical usage data (i.e. request type, frequency, access time). The design and implementation of EDGE is described. A DWS model of an EDGE system is developed and validated against theoretical limiting cases. The DWS model is used to predict the throughput of an EDGE system given a resource allocation and workflow. Results of the simulation suggest that proposed DWS designs can be evaluated according to the usage requirements of an engineering firm, ultimately guiding an informed decision for the selection and deployment of a DWS in an enterprise environment. Recommendations for future work related to the continued development of EDGE, DWS modelling of EDGE installation environments, and the extension of DWS modelling to new product development processes are presented

Digital transformation and business model innovation : a multiple case study of retail chains in Germany

This thesis examines how the digital revolution has affected German grocery stores in particular and the country's retail sector as a whole. This study illuminates the connection between digital transformation and business model innovation in the retail industry using various qualitative research techniques, including expert interviews with Company A and Company B and a thorough literature analysis. The findings draw attention to the enabling elements, which include strong leadership commitment, successful change management, engagement with external partners, availability of resources and competencies, and a customer-centric emphasis. Legacy systems, talent shortages, poor IT infrastructure, and cultural barriers are a few of the reported difficulties. By evaluating these elements, the study offers valuable perceptions and suggestions for retail businesses seeking to negotiate the challenges and take advantage of the advantages of digital transformation and business model innovation. The study adds to the body of knowledge by providing actual data and case studies that deepen the comprehension of how business model innovation in the retail sector interacts with digital transformation. This thesis offers concrete solutions to improve operations and preserve competitiveness in the constantly changing consumer products industry. It is an invaluable resource for retail organizations looking to stimulate business model innovation and drive digital transformation.Esta tese analisa a forma como a revolução digital afectou as mercearias alemãs, em particular, e o sector retalhista do país como um todo. Este estudo ilustra a ligação entre a transformação digital e a inovação do modelo empresarial no sector do retalho, utilizando várias técnicas de investigação qualitativa, incluindo entrevistas a especialistas da Empresa A e da Empresa B e uma análise exaustiva da literatura. As conclusões chamam a atenção para os elementos facilitadores, que incluem um forte empenhamento da liderança, uma gestão da mudança bem sucedida, o envolvimento com parceiros externos, a disponibilidade de recursos e competências e uma ênfase centrada no cliente. Os sistemas herdados, a escassez de talentos, as deficientes infra-estruturas de TI e as barreiras culturais são algumas das dificuldades comunicadas. Ao avaliar estes elementos, o estudo oferece percepções e sugestões valiosas para as empresas de retalho que procuram enfrentar os desafios e tirar partido das vantagens da transformação digital e da inovação do modelo empresarial. O estudo contribui para o corpo de conhecimento ao fornecer dados reais e estudos de caso que aprofundam a compreensão de como a inovação do modelo de negócio no sector do retalho interage com a transformação digital. Esta tese oferece soluções concretas para melhorar as operações e preservar a competitividade na indústria de produtos de consumo em constante mudança. É um recurso inestimável para as organizações de retalho que procuram estimular a inovação do modelo empresarial e impulsionar a transformação digital

Mobile payment as a multi-sided platform : Success factors and IT governance practices

The aim of this research was to discover factors that lead to mobile payment platform’s success in the Finnish market. Mobile payment research has been ongoing for the past 20 years but no solution has made a clear breakthrough. Research has focused on technological factors, factors concerning consumers and adoption of mobile payment solutions and the majority has been exploratory, early research. Because of the rise of mobile technology and popularity of mobile content, flexible use of mobile phones and growing amount of non-cash transactions is a turning point now possible for mobile payment solutions. Along the success factors this research aimed to consider governance practices and to examine the perceived roles of the ecosystem participants. This is a qualitative study based on a case, MobilePay, a mobile payment platform provided by Danske Bank. Eleven semi-structured interviews (conducted in January 2017) with mobile payment ecosystem participants, industry experts, served as the research data, along with literature and publicly available information. The importance of nine success factors (choice of technology, choice of features, size of the ecosystem and openness, security, service pricing, reliable platform provider, guidance, training and support, successful implementation of service changes and sales and marketing of the platform) was evaluated. Because IT governance has been considered successful in the field of IT, two structures, three processes and three relational mechanisms were chosen to be evaluated to see their suitability in a mobile payment ecosystem. To create a better picture of the ecosystem, the perceived roles and responsibilities of the ecosystem participants were examined. All nine success factors were considered greatly significant for the success of a mobile payment platform. The successful implementation of service changes, the choice of technology and marketing of the platform were seen as the most important factors. User support was perceived the least important. Four success factors, user experience, ease of implementation, ability to use in all channels and loose competition and authoritative control, were added by the interviewees. Both cooperation between the ecosystem participants and clearly defined roles and responsibilities were perceived as critical for success. Solutions should also be based on existing standards. Identified contact persons in the participants’ organizations and a defined development plan were considered well-suitable for governing the mobile payment ecosystem

Three Essays on New Challenges and Opportunities for Marketing in an Evolving Technological Environment

Ongoing advancements in technology have significantly shaped the marketing landscape over the course of the last decades. Consequently, new technology-driven opportunities and challenges for marketing research and practice emerge. Those urge the need to redefine firm-based value propositions, to adapt business models, to place significant emphasis on topics such as innovation, design and strategy, but also to develop new knowledge and skill sets. In response to those changes, this dissertation addresses two major developments and related opportunities and challenges – namely, digitized retail environments and innovative, complex business models – in three different essays. Thereby, this dissertation contributes to a better understanding of the evolving relationship between marketing and technology. Essay 1 and Essay 2 address the increasing digitization of physical retail environments. Retailers embrace a plethora of retail technologies to facilitate activities and processes for creating, communicating and delivering value to consumers and to consequently improving physical retail stores. Essay 1 provides an integrated literature review on digital retail technologies’ impact on consumer behavior at physical retail stores. Thereby, Essay 1 adopts a shopping cycle based framework structured around distinct phases of consumer behavior to delineate and summarize findings from existing literature on the behavioral effects of retail technologies embraced by retailers. With the applied shopping cycle based framework, Essay 1 identifies specific gaps in extant literature relative to currently embraced practices of retail technology, but furthermore on emerging trends, which have the potential to reshape the retailing environment. Subsequently, an extensive research agenda is proposed to advance the next generation of knowledge development. With its integrated literature review and research agenda, Essay 1 contributes to research in the retail area, such as research on customer experience, shopper marketing and specifically on the role of technology in retailing. Essay 2 analyzes consumers’ response to one particular innovative retail technology and thus replies to future questions of the research agenda developed in Essay 1. Essay 2 analyzes the perceptions and consequences of attribute-based personalized advertising in physical retail stores, where other people are present and can see the personalized content. Essay 2 shows when and how social presence of others impacts consumers’ attitudes and behavioral intentions, as well as emotions, when exposed to personalized advertising. The findings of two experimental studies provide evidence, that the presence of others does not influence consumer response per se, but it interacts with personalization. Further, the results show that consumers’ negative response to personalized ads in the social presence of others is mediated by embarrassment and moderated by consumers’ congruity state (the extent to which the ad is consistent with the consumer’s self-concept). These findings offer new theoretical insights into how consumers respond to personalized advertising in the social presence of others, and thus advance marketing research on personalized advertising, digital displays, shopper marketing as well as research on customer experience. Further, the results disclose meaningful managerial implications for the application of new consumer tracking technology. Essay 3 addresses opportunities and challenges related to innovative, complex business models resulting from technological advancements. With customer orientation in free e-services, Essay 3 analyzes a strategically highly relevant phenomenon, which thus far has been neglected by prior research. Free e-services are characterized by the superiority of free costumers and interdependencies between free and paying customers. Essay 3 investigates how free e-service providers respond to those particularities in their customer orientation activities. Results from one qualitative and one quantitative study uncover, that only free-born providers, that from the outset strategically committed themselves to the free business model, possess customer orientation capabilities that match the particularities of free e-services. They use customer orientation toward one customer group to increase the satisfaction of the other simultaneously and, thus, are reaching their financial goals. Contrastively, laggards, that started with a non-free business model before launching their free e-service, do not exploit the full potential of customer orientation, as they focus too much on the paying customer group. These findings offer new theoretical insights for research on customer orientation, research on two-sided markets as well as on stakeholder marketing. Moreover, Essay 3 provides valuable and actionable insights for managers of free e-services. Taking a broader perspective, this dissertation advances marketing knowledge on technological innovation, new types of consumer data, strategy shifts, as well as new firm capabilities and managerial skill sets required in an age of disruption within the virtual, but also the physical world. By using a variety of methods including conceptual work, experiments, qualitative interviews as well as survey research, and furthermore by ensuring high practical relevance, this dissertation adds important perspectives to the evolving relationship between marketing and technology