Harnessing Information Systems & Technology with Supply Chain Management for Performance Excellence in Retail Sector

Purpose: Retailers are revolutionizing the ways they manage their operations and supply chains to meet customer's ever changing needs. Advancements in Information Technology (IT) and Information System (IS) are supporting the companies to achieve this goal. Core activities of a retailer; stock management, category & space management, forecasting, negotiation and tracking all depends upon efficient supply chain management (SCM). These tasks cannot be executed without the proper implementation of IT/IS solutions at various levels of organizations. The purpose of this paper is to focus on critical SCM performances and to highlight how IT/IS system can help the retailers to overcome the challenges of modern day retail business

Capital Structure Theories and Speed of Capital Adjustment towards Target Capital Structure along Life Cycle Stages of Asian Manufacturing Firms

Purpose: Firms have different costs and benefits and asymmetric information across their life cycle stages and hence each stage has different financial pattern and speed of adjustment towards target capital. Methodology: We use System GMM to test the hypotheses. We use market leverages proxies for the capital structure, life cycle proxies: introduction, growth, mature, shakeout and decline and the control determinants of capital structure such as profitability, tangibility, firm size and growth opportunities. We estimate the financial pattern and speed of adjustment along life cycle stages of manufacturing firms from eleven Asian economies over the period of 2010-2018. Findings: The results show that firms in earlier stages have more long term debt than mature stage. The speed of adjustment towards target capital structure is highest in mature stage than the other stages. The control determinants significantly affect market leverages. Implications: The findings suggest that management has to consider life cycle stages of their firms in order to adjust capital structure. Stockholders should consider stage of firm with relation to profitability and capital structure for long term prospects

Efficient QRS complex detection algorithm implementation on SOC-based embedded system

This paper studies two different Electrocardiography ( ECG ) preprocessing algorithms , namely Pan and Tompkins (PT) and Derivative Based (DB) algorithm, which is crucial of QRS complex detection in cardiovascular disease detection . Both algorithms are compared in terms of QRS detection accuracy and computation timing performance , with implementation on System - on - C hip (SoC) based embedded system that prototype on Altera DE2 - 115 Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) platform as embedded software . Both algorithm s are tested with 30 minutes ECG data from each of 48 different patient records obtain from MIT - BIH arrhythmia database. Results show that PT algorithm achieve 98.15% accuracy with 56. 33 seconds computation while DB algorithm achieve 96.74% with only 22. 14 seconds processing time. Based on the study, an optimized PT algorithm with improvement on Moving Windows Integrator (MWI) has been proposed to accelerate its computation. Result show s that the proposed optimized Moving Windows Integrator algorithm achieve s 9.5 times speed up than original MWI while retaining its QRS detection accuracy

Khazanah Food Enterprise / Ahmad Sayuti Yahya Muhammad… [et al.]

Khazanah Food Industry is the new business entity that formed under the Partnership agreement. The company have been registered in 5th january 2010 with the purpose to introduce and popularized the Malaysian traditional food in the different form that can suit everyone's preference nowadays, and at the same time earning the business profits. Our company will operate the business officially in 5th October 2010. Faced with fast-paced modern life, consumers will continue to seek convenience and simplicity. The demand for the ready-to-eat form food nowadays become increase as the people nowadays tend to buy the product that doesn't provide them complexity, especially for food product. The demand for the junk food is increasing nowadays especially for children and teenagers. But there's an issues that relates the junk food that can effects someone's health as the junk food perceived to have little or no nutritional value, or to products with nutritional value but which also have ingredients considered unhealthy when regularly eaten, or to those considered unhealthy to consume at all. Apart from this issues, we found that this is the opportunity to sell the healthy food in form of snack, that usually represented by the junk food. The existence of our product in the market can give the alternatives to the consumer when it comes to the selection of helthy and delicious snack. Our company is located at bandar Baru perda, Pulau Pinang. We chose Bandar Perda because there is less competitor that will compete will our company in selling the product to the customer. Apart from that, the location is located at the urban area, where the potential buyer will always surround the place. The supplier for the rawa materal situated near to our business location thus reducing the cost on dealing with the process to obtain the raw materials. Other than that, our company also situated near to the distribution area which turn our business' location into the strategic place to produce our product at maximum effort. With the goal to become the well- known brand that become a leader in the snack producing industry, we are striving to satisfied the customer's needs and wants by producing the good quality product that consistent with it's value

A New Computational Method Based on Integral Transform for Solving Linear and Nonlinear Fractional Systems

In this article, the Elzaki homotopy perturbation method is applied to solve fractional stiff systems. The Elzaki homotopy perturbation method (EHPM) is a combination of a modified Laplace integral transform called the Elzaki transform and the homotopy perturbation method. The proposed method is applied for some examples of linear and nonlinear fractional stiff systems. The results obtained by the current method were compared with the results obtained by the kernel Hilbert space KHSM method. The obtained result reveals that the Elzaki homotopy perturbation method is an effective and accurate technique to solve the systems of differential equations of fractional order

AUGMENTATIVE AND ALTERNATIVE COMMUNICATION METHOD BASED ON TONGUE CLICKING FOR MUTE DISABILITIES

This paper presents a pilot study for a novel application of converting tongue clicking sound to words for people with the inability to speak. 15 features of speech that are related to speech timing patterns, amplitude modulation, zero crossing and peak detection were extracted. The experiments were conducted with three different patterns using binary Support Vector Machine (SVM) classification with 10 recordings as training data and 10 recordings as development data. Peak size outperformed all features with 85% classification rate for pattern P1-P3 whereas multiple features produced 100% classification rate for P1-P2 and P2-P3. A GUI based system was developed to validate the trained classifier. Multiclass SVM were constructed based on the best features obtained from binary SVM classification outcome, namely peak size and skewness amplitude modulation, and then tested on 15 recordings. The GUI based multiclass SVM obtained a satisfying performance of 67% correct classification of the test data set. ABSTRAK: Kertas ini membentangkan panduan kajian kepada aplikasi terkini dalam menukar bunyi klik pada lidah kepada perkataan untuk orang yang mempunyai kehilangan upaya dalam bertutur. 15 ciri khas berkaitan pertuturan adalah pola masa, modulasi nilai tertinggi, tiada titik persilangan dan nilai terpilih yang dikesan. Eksperimen telah dijalankan dengan tiga corak berlainan menggunakan perduaan Mesin Vektor Sokongan  (SVM) klasifikasi dengan 10 rakaman sebagai data terlatih dan 10 rakaman sebagai data yang dibina. Saiz tertinggi yang melebihi semua ciri-ciri pada 85% kadar klasifikasi dilihat pada corak P1-P3, sedangkan ciri-ciri pelbagai telah terhasil pada 100% kadar klasifikasi P1-P2 dan P2-P3. Sistem berdasarkan GUI telah dibina bagi menilai ciri terlatih. Kelas pelbagai SVM telah dibina berdasarkan ciri-ciri terbaik dan dihasilkan daripada klasifikasi perduaan SVM, iaitu saiz tertinggi dan modulasi saiz tertinggi tidak linear, dan telah diuji dengan 15 rakaman. Kelas pelbagai SVM yang didapati melalui GUI ini adalah memberangsangkan iaitu 67% klasifikasi adalah tepat pada set data yang diuji

Tinjauan ke atas hubungan di antara motivasi dengan transformasi budaya kehidupan dalam kalangan pelajar baharu di institut pengajian tinggi (IPT)

Pelajar-pelajar peringkat universiti khususnya pelajar tahun pertama yang baru menyambung pengajian di universiti cenderung untuk mempunyai masalah dalam menjalani kehidupan baharu mereka. Hal ini mempunyai perkaitan dengan tahap motivasi pelajar yang berkait dengan perubahan dalam gaya kehidupan seharian mereka

Enhancing life effectiveness skills: Impacts of length of program in outdoor education camp / Muhammad Wafi A. Rahman … [et al.]

The objective of this study was to examine the effects of length of outdoor education program on life effectiveness skills among two public universities students in Malaysia. Life Effectiveness Questionnaire (LEQ-H) was administrated among 256 participants who were chosen as a sample by using purposive sampling. The data were analysed using MANOVA analysis. The result showed that there was a statistically significant difference for overall psychological factor of life effectiveness on length of program for both universities outdoor education program. The implication of the findings provides evidence on the effectiveness duration of outdoor education program in improving students’ life effectiveness. This study provides useful input for Ministry of Higher Education, universities and outdoor. education practitioners. This study also provides an empirical data for future study in this field

Human amniotic membrane as a matrix for endothelial differentiation of VEGF-treated dental stem cells

Introduction—Endothelial cells cover the surface of the capillary wall and literature review has cemented its angiogenic roles in wound healing and tissue regeneration. However, the angiogenic in vitro models available are inadequate to understand the endothelial differentiation process. Methods—A construct was made using human amniotic membrane (HAM) as a matrix to assist the dental stem cells to differentiate into endothelial-like cells. This study aimed to assess the biological interaction between stem cells from human exfoliated deciduous teeth (SHED) and the stromal side (SS) of the glycerol-preserved HAM in angiogenic induced environment media using VEGF. The changes were evaluated through cell morphology, migration, as well as gene expression level. Results—There were morphological changes observed in SHED in angiogenic-induced media. SHED appeared to be differentiated from fibroblast-like cells to a new structure, mimicking endothelial-like structure through microscopy analysis. Besides, the cross-section of the construct revealed that the cells seeded on the matrix were able to maintain its monolayer structure at day 1, 7 and 14 but infiltrated into the HAM at day 21, suggesting cell migration. The cells were also able to maintain its stemness (Nestin, Nanog and CD29) and at the same time express the angiogenic markers (IL-8, VEGF and MMP-2). Conclusion—HAM promotes SHED proliferation, migration and has the potential as a differentiating matrix for endothelial-like cells