Internal report cluster 1: Urban freight innovations and solutions for sustainable deliveries (3/4)

Technical report about sustainable urban freight solutions, part 3 of

Horizontal Fusion: Enabling Net-Centric Operations and Warfare

the ability to access real-time information at the right time to make the right decisions

Task 4.1 European sizing survey. White Paper: manual for conducting standardised 3D body scan surveys as basis for international anthropomentic database. EU and DTI project report

This document has been prepared as an additional outcome of the E-Tailor Project [IST-1999-10549]. It incorporates the lessons learned from the various pilot sizing surveys carried out as part of the project in France, Germany, Greece and Britain. Much of the information has been informed from previous experiences of two of Europe's leading exponents of size surveys, namely Hohenstein Institute (Germany), and Nottingham Trent University (UK). It involved the experiences for organisation, recruitment and realisation of the first survey with 3D laser scanner technology in Germany in 1999 and 2002 (3,000 female and male persons). It also takes advantage of the experiences of NTU researchers as part of the SizeUK Project in 2001/02, a survey which involved nearly 11,000 adults across the UK

Informedness and Customer-Centric Revenue management

The recent pervasive adoption of modern IT in the marketplace has profoundly changed information availability to customers and firms. This improved information endowment results in changes in consumer behavior and corporate strategy. This dissertation proposes new theoretical perspectives – firm informedness, customer informedness, and informedness through learning – to re-conceptualize the decision making process of customer-centric revenue management. It consists of three studies. First, using multiple cases in which firms adopt smart cards and mobile technologies in America, Europe, and Asia, we examine the value creation process of the firm using the explanation of firm informedness and investigate how it advances revenue management. Second, we test the theory of consumer informedness and examine heterogeneity in consumer preferences using stated choice experiments. We find the evidence for trading down and trading out behavior and show that the use of mobile ticketing technologies can help firms to build a hyper-differentiated transport market. Finally, using a computational simulation, we explore the opportunity for devising service offerings to capture profitable consumer responses, considering demand-driven revenue and capacity-management. Overall, this research introduces methods, models, and guidelines for organizations to strategize the informational challenge, make informed decisions, and create transformational values to win in today’s competitive network environment

ICE-B 2010:proceedings of the International Conference on e-Business

The International Conference on e-Business, ICE-B 2010, aims at bringing together researchers and practitioners who are interested in e-Business technology and its current applications. The mentioned technology relates not only to more low-level technological issues, such as technology platforms and web services, but also to some higher-level issues, such as context awareness and enterprise models, and also the peculiarities of different possible applications of such technology. These are all areas of theoretical and practical importance within the broad scope of e-Business, whose growing importance can be seen from the increasing interest of the IT research community. The areas of the current conference are: (i) e-Business applications; (ii) Enterprise engineering; (iii) Mobility; (iv) Business collaboration and e-Services; (v) Technology platforms. Contributions vary from research-driven to being more practical oriented, reflecting innovative results in the mentioned areas. ICE-B 2010 received 66 submissions, of which 9% were accepted as full papers. Additionally, 27% were presented as short papers and 17% as posters. All papers presented at the conference venue were included in the SciTePress Digital Library. Revised best papers are published by Springer-Verlag in a CCIS Series book

EVALUATING ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE FOR OPERATIONS IN THE INFORMATION ENVIRONMENT

Recent advances in artificial intelligence (AI) portend a future of accelerated information cycles and intensified technology diffusion. As AI applications become increasingly prevalent and complex, Special Operations Forces (SOF) face the challenge of discerning which tools most effectively address operational needs and generate an advantage in the information environment. Yet, SOF currently lack an end user–focused evaluation framework that could assist information practitioners in determining the operational value of an AI tool. This thesis proposes a practitioner’s evaluation framework (PEF) to address the question of how SOF should evaluate AI technologies to conduct operations in the information environment (OIE). The PEF evaluates AI technologies through the perspective of the information practitioner who is familiar with the mission, the operational requirements, and OIE processes but has limited to no technical knowledge of AI. The PEF consists of a four-phased approach—prepare, design, conduct, recommend—that assesses nine evaluation domains: mission/task alignment; data; system/model performance; user experience; sustainability; scalability; affordability; ethical, legal, and policy considerations; and vendor assessment. By evaluating AI through a more structured, methodical approach, the PEF enables SOF to identify, assess, and prioritize AI-enabled tools for OIE.Outstanding ThesisMajor, United States ArmyApproved for public release. Distribution is unlimited

Strategies for Implementing Successful IT Security Systems in Small Businesses

Owners of small businesses who do not adequately protect business data are at high risk for a cyber attack. As data breaches against small businesses have increased, it has become a growing source of concern for consumers who rely on owners of small businesses to protect their data from data breaches. Grounded in general systems theory and routine activity approach, the focus of this qualitative multiple case study was to explore strategies used by owners of small businesses to protect confidential company data from cyber attacks. The process used for collecting data involved semistructured face-to-face interviews with 5 owners of small businesses in Florida, as well as a review of company documents that were relevant to strategies used by owners of small businesses to protect confidential company data from cyber attacks. The thematic analysis of the interview transcripts revealed 4 themes for protecting business data against cyber attacks, which are security information management strategy, organizational strategy, consistent security policy, and cybersecurity risk management strategy. A key finding is that owners of small businesses could develop an organizational strategy by incorporating procedures used to protect from and respond to cyber attacks. The implications for positive social change include the potential to increase customers’ confidence and businesses’ economic growth, as well as stimulate the socioeconomic lifecycle, resulting in potential employment gains for residents within the communities

Digital transformation: an analysis of opportunities for retailers

In this study, the opportunities and challenges for retailers in the course of the digital transformation were examined from three perspectives: the retailer perspective, the customer perspective, and the platform perspective. The first chapter provides a historical overview of the development of retail, followed by a definition of key terms and a characterisation of the study's subject. Furthermore, the first chapter also derives the guiding research questions for the subsequent chapters. Chapter two presents a survey of 243 LOORO owners from 26 cities in Germany, aimed at understanding why the LOOROs are hesitant about their digital transformation. For the analysis, the study applied a structural equation modelling approach and used the Stimulus-Organism-Response model as a theoretical framework. In the third chapter, the perspective shifts from the retailer to the customer. For this purpose, 1,139 customers were surveyed in four studies on various technologies (e.g. mobile payment, live stream shopping) and their willingness to use or continue using them. The two studies on mobile payment, in particular, expand the existing research to include comparative analyses with existing payment alternatives. From a theoretical perspective, the Technology Threat Avoidance Theory is also used to shift the theoretical perspective from almost exclusively negative feedback loops to positive ones. The third study in Chapter 3, Self-Service Technology, is the first to examine trust in self-service technologies and the different perceptions based on the level of experience. The fourth study in Chapter 3 on live-stream shopping is the first study in Europe on this new service and provides the first theoretical and practical implications for existing research from a European or German perspective. All studies in Chapter 3 were analysed using a structural equation model and other statistical methods for group comparisons (e.g. age, gender, experience). In the fourth chapter, there is another change of perspective. In this case, platforms are analysed as intermediaries or service hubs between the connected retailers and customers. The focus here is particularly on so-called local shopping platforms. These were examined by means of content analysis and telephone interviews. Regarding the content analysis, 149 websites were analysed. In addition, 26 local shopping platform operators were interviewed during the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic to understand the impact of this pandemic on the platforms. The final study in the fourth chapter compares the results of German LSPs with Chinese LSPs. The results were analysed using Hofstede's cultural dimensions. This study also extends the existing findings in the area of the platform economy with regard to the influence of culture on the service offering. The empirical results were used to derive strategic recommendations for retailers in Chapter 5