Job Satisfaction of the Employees in the Mobile Phone Corporates in Bangladesh: A Case Study

Optimizing employee satisfaction is a key to the success of any business that relies on a variety of organizational and psycho-economic factors. This study was conducted to identify that sort of key factors, which are responsible to influence on the overall job satisfaction in the growing mobile phone corporate in Bangladesh. The phone corporates, which are included here in the study, are Grameen Phone (GP), Bangla Link and Aktel. The factors included in the investigation as independent variables are Compensation Package, Supervision, Career Growth, Training and Development, Working atmosphere, Company Loyalty and Performance Appraisal. The result indicates that training and performance appraisal, work atmosphere, compensation package, supervision, and company loyalty are the key factors that impact on employees’ job satisfaction in these corporations. The study also finds that the employees of these three corporations possessed above of the moderate level and positive attitude towards job satisfaction, which could be nudged up to excellent status of employee satisfaction if the management takes those identified factors with a little more rigorous weight into their considerations and acts further accordingly.

Venture capital on a shoestring: Bioventures’ pioneering life sciences fund in South Africa

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Since 2000, R&D financing for global health has increased significantly, with innovative proposals for further increases. However, although venture capital (VC) funding has fostered life sciences businesses across the developed world, its application in the developing world and particularly in Africa is relatively new. Is VC feasible in the African context, to foster the development and application of local health innovation?</p> <p>As the most industrially advanced African nation, South Africa serves as a test case for life sciences venture funding. This paper analyzes Bioventures, the first VC company focused on life sciences investment in sub-Saharan Africa. The case study method was used to analyze the formation, operation, and investment support of Bioventures, and to suggest lessons for future health venture funds in Africa that aim to develop health-oriented innovations.</p> <p>Discussion</p> <p>The modest financial success of Bioventures in challenging circumstances has demonstrated a proof of concept that life sciences VC can work in the region. Beyond providing funds, support given to investees included board participation, contacts, and strategic services. Bioventures had to be proactive in finding and supporting good health R&D.</p> <p>Due to the fund’s small size, overhead and management expenses were tightly constrained. Bioventures was at times unable to make follow-on investments, being forced instead to give up equity to raise additional capital, and to sell health investments earlier than might have been optimal. With the benefit of hindsight, the CFO of Bioventures felt that partnering with a larger fund might benefit similar future funds. Being better linked to market intelligence and other entrepreneurial investors was also seen as an unmet need.</p> <p>Summary</p> <p>BioVentures has learned lessons about how the traditional VC model might evolve to tackle health challenges facing Africa, including how to raise funds and educate investors; how to select, value, and support investments; and how to understand the balance between financial and social returns. The experience of the fund suggests that future health funds targeting ailments of the poor might require investors that accept health benefits as part of their overall “return.” Learning from Bioventures may help develop health innovation funding for sub-Saharan African that has combined health, financial, and economic development impacts.</p

Advancing Drug Innovation for Neglected Diseases—Criteria for Lead Progression

The current drug R&D pipeline for most neglected diseases remains weak, and unlikely to support registration of novel drug classes that meet desired target product profiles in the short term. This calls for sustained investment as well as greater emphasis in the risky upstream drug discovery. Access to technologies, resources, and strong management as well as clear compound progression criteria are factors in the successful implementation of any collaborative drug discovery effort. We discuss how some of these factors have impacted drug discovery for tropical diseases within the past four decades, and highlight new opportunities and challenges through the virtual North–South drug discovery network as well as the rationale for greater participation of institutions in developing countries in product innovation. A set of criteria designed to facilitate compound progression from screening hits to drug candidate selection is presented to guide ongoing efforts

Effects of self-lubricant coating and motion on reduction of friction and wear of mild steel and data analysis from machine learning approach

The applications of coated mild steels are gaining significant attention in versatile industrial areas because of their better mechanical properties, anticorrosive behavior, and reproducibility. The life period of this steel reduces significantly under relative motion in the presence of friction, which is associated with the loss of billion-dollar every year in industry. Productivity is hampered, and economic growth is declined. Several pieces of research have been conducted throughout the industries to seeking the processes of frictional reduction. This study is attributed to the tribological behavior of electroplated mild steel under various operating parameters. The efficiency of commercial lubricant and self-lubrication characteristics of coated layer plays a significant role in the reduction of friction. The reciprocating and simultaneous motion in relation to pin as well as disc are considered during experimentation. The lubricating effects in conjunction with motions are responsible for compensating the friction and wear at the desired level. During frictional tests, the sliding velocity and loads are changed differently. The changes in roughness after frictional tests are observed. The coated and rubbing surfaces are characterized using SEM (Scanning Electron Microscopy) analysis. The coating characteristics are analyzed by EDS (Energy Disperse Spectroscopy), FTIR (Fourier-transform Infrared Spectroscopy), and XRD (X-ray diffraction analysis) methods. The lubrication, reciprocating motion, and low velocity result in low friction and wear. The larger the imposed loads, the smaller the frictional force, and the larger the wear rate. The machine learning (ML) concept is incorporated in this study to identify the patterns of datasets spontaneously and generate a prediction model for forecasting the data, which are out of the experimental range. It can be desired that the outcomes of this research will contribute to the improvement in versatile engineering fields, such as automotive, robotics, and complex motion-based mechanisms where multidimensional motion cannot be ignored

Geochemical modelling of hydrogen gas migration in an unsaturated bentonite buffer

This paper presents an investigation of the transport and fate of hydrogen gas through compacted bentonite buffer. Various geochemical reactions that may occur in the multiphase and multicomponent system of the unsaturated bentonite buffer are considered. A reactive gas transport model, developed within an established coupled thermal, hydraulic, chemical and mechanical (THCM) framework, is presented. The reactive transport module of the model considers the transport of multicomponent chemicals both in liquid and gas phases, together with an advanced geochemical reaction model. The results of a series of numerical simulations of the reactive transport of hydrogen in unsaturated bentonite are presented in which hydrogen gas, because of the corrosion of a steel canister, has been injected at a realistic rate into a partially saturated bentonite buffer. Gas pressure development and the fate of the hydrogen gas with respect to the geochemical reactions are studied. The results show the high buffering capacity of unsaturated bentonite, when considering a steel canister, over a period of 10 000 years. The presence of accessory minerals is shown to have an important role in mitigating excess hydrogen ions, thus increasing the dissolution capacity of the system to gas. The development of various forms of aqueous complexations between the inorganic components and the hydrogen ions were also found to be important in buffering the excess hydrogen that evolved. Based on the results obtained, it is postulated that the presence of various chemical components in the clay buffer may influence the transport and fate of the hydrogen gas.Geoscience & EngineeringCivil Engineering and Geoscience

Effects of different stocking density of Nile tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) and common carp (Cyprinus carpio) on the growth performance and rice yield in rice-fish farming system

A 105 day investigation was conducted to measure the impacts of stocking densities at different ratios of Nile tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) and common carp (Cyprinus carpio)on their growth and rice yields in rice-fish farming systems. The experiment was conducted by randomized complete block design with three replications. The plot size was 6×3 m, 50 cm height with ditch (3×1 m) for fish. Mean initial weight of O. niloticus was 12.2±1.92 g using three different fish stocking densities (4, 6 and 8 fish m-2) in five different ratios (1:1, 1:0, 0:1, 1:2, 2:1) of O. niloticus and C. carpio. At the end of the investigation specific growth rate, total length (cm), final weight (g), and survival rate (%) for fish were estimated. Plant height and tiller number were also calculated. The study showed that fish growth performance, fish survival rate, plant height, number of tiller, and abundance of plankton were significantly affected by culture system (p<0.05). The final weight was higher in 4 fish m-2, followed by 6 fish m-2 while the 8 fish m-2 treatment recorded the lowest growth performance. The survival showed the same trend, the highest survival rate was found in C. carpio - O. niloticus ratio of 1:1 (66.67±9.31%) with 6 fish m-2 followed by 4 fish m-2 then by 8 fish m-2 55.36 ±6.11%, and 49.78±4.17% respectively. The highest rice yield, were found in 6 fish m-2 (5.43) that was significantly (p<0.05) higher than in 4 fish m-2 and 8 fish m-2 treatment. The present study revealed that the suitable stocking density was 6 m-2 with 1:1 for C. carpio and O. niloticus for better growth, survival and maximum rice production

Resource allocation in hybrid access control femtocell network targeting inter-cell interference reduction

Inter-cell interference is the most challenging issue in femtocell deployment within the coverage of Macro base station (MBS). In this paper, we have explored the role of femtocell in LTE network and proposed a Dynamic Resource allocation management algorithm (DRAMA) for hybrid access control in spectrum shared OFDMA network to optimize the interference and increase the quality of service (QoS). The user gets the privilege to assign the femtocell service level ensuring a minimum level of QoS. A simulation setting is developed to study the performance of DRAMA in hybrid access control femtocell network and compared it to closed and open access control

Fertilization effects on the growth of common carp (Cyprinus carpio) and Nile tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) and rice yields in an integrated rice-fish farming system

An investigation was accompanied in the rice field plots with developing an infrastructure of 30 m2 to ascertain the felicitous fertilization effects of the Nile tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) and the common carp (Cyrpinus carpio) cultured along with the rice fish farming system in the plots. There were setting up three systems to assess the effect of fish species on tiller yield, regarding for fish species i.e. no fish stocking with rice (C), O. niloticus with rice (FT) and C. carpio with rice (FC). Each treatment of fish species cultured with different doses of fertilizer such as (T0) control: without any fertilization; (T1) with 100% recommended fertilizer (RF); (T2) with 75% recommended fertilizer (RF); (T3) with 10 ton compost fertilizer; (T4) with 5 ton compost fertilizer+75% RF, and rice culture with 5 ton compost fertilizer+50% RF. The maximum number of plant in the tiller were found in C. carpio (FC) species (7.02 no/tiller and 82.95 cm/tiller) whereas lowest in FT (6.40 no/tiller and 81.65 cm/tiller) during 75 DAT. In regards of fertilizer application, the highest values were observed in FC with an average of 31.71, 53.28 and 73.06 cm/tiller during 30, 40 and 60 DAT respectively, followed by F0 (31.92, 52.43 and 72.31 cm/tiller at 30, 45 and 60 DAT) and FT (30.28, 49.76 and 67.25 cm/tiller at 30, 45 and 60 DAT) respectively, in which there was found negative significant differences (P>0.05) among different treatments. The rice production in C. carpio fertilizer treatment T4 (7.30±1.86 kg/m2) was significantly higher than those of other treatments (7.16±2.78, 6.83±2.88, 6.67±1.44, 6.17±1.84 and 4.06±1.76 kg/m2 in treatments T5, T3, T2, T1, and T0 respectively). The yields of fish were significantly higher (P<0.05) in treatments T4, (11.70±3.86 kg/m2) than other fertilizer treatments T5 (11.25±3.56 kg/m2), T3 (10.85±5.76 kg/m2), T2 (10.80±5.55 kg/m2), T1 (9.90±4.66 kg/m2), T0 (4.78±3.48 kg/m2) and in FC and also compared to all other fertilizer treatments in FT. In regards of straw, the yields were significantly higher (P<0.05) in treatments T4, (13.76±6.24 kg/m2) and followed by T5 (13.55±4.42 kg/m2), T3 (12.88±6.24 kg/m2), T2 (10.75±4.65 kg/m2), T1 (10.65±3.36 kg/m2), T0 (4.28±3.86 kg/m2) and in FC and also compared to all other fertilizer treatments in FT. The outcome in T4 provided the maximum yields amongst all treatments, followed by treatments T5, T3, T2, T1 and T0 representing that the amalgamation of basal fertilization and compost fertilizer are the furthermost suitable nutrient input regime aimed at the rice-carpi fish integrated culture scheme

Techniques and results of stapedial surgery

Objective: To evaluate the improvement of hearing after stapedial surgery, to record the problems during surgery and to assess the complications of the same