Experiment on consumer behaviour in fashion E-commerce – experience and insights

As e-commerce continues to grow, so do the competition and expectations from consumers. To meet these challenges, e-tailers need to become more streamlined and understand the behaviour of their customers. An experiment was performed to gain knowledge about the impact of delivery and returns policies on consumer buying behaviour. Realistic and trustworthy results were generated by using a random sample strategy in performing a real-life experiment with actual consumers and products. Neither fictive products nor fictive consumers were used. This paper shares experiences and insights from conducting this experiment

On Aligning Returns Management with the Ecommerce Strategy to Increase Effectiveness

The returns management (RM) process has traditionally been seen as a value recovery process, which has resulted in an efficiency focus in the returns flow. This thesis present, the effects on a fashion e-commerce organisation, which is underprioritising or neglecting RM in general and consumer returns specifically. In the reported and described single-case study and through a real-life experiment, performed with the case organisation nelly.com, it is shown that the consumer returns rates are not only influenced by the product itself. They represent a complex problem that has its reasons and causes, whereby the product (size, fit, quality, et cetera) together with consumer buying and returning behaviour ultimately have a combined effect on the organisation. The results from the thesis are based on previous research and rest heavily on the research performed since the start of the research journey. Consumer returns form part of the value creation in e-commerce and therefore returns management is a strategic part of the business as such. Handling consumer returns in a traditional or efficient returns system without knowing the reason for return and the state of the returned item is nothing other than gambling with resources. The proposed returns information system (RIS) framework in the thesis addresses this issue and facilitates the downstream application of the gatekeeping activity, near or at the end-user location; managerial attention is required at the strategic process level to build a proper returns system that is partly, and quite likely, decentralised. Products, suppliers, customers and internal processes cause consumer returns and therefore a returns manager needs to address these with other functions and SC partners. This result is partly new and the proposed alignment of RM as a strategic process is new in the sense that RM is part of value creation. This thesis empirically supports the conclusion that “one size fits all” is outdated and does not fit with ecommerce business. The results imply that managers need to gain a profound understanding of consumers’ buying behaviour and also to create differentiated delivery and returns processes to be able to grow within the existing customer segments and possibly to attract new or non-customers who are out of reach at present. Seeing the RM process as strategic in e-commerce, as proposed in the thesis, facilitates the development of the process to become both effective and efficient. Returns management has the potential for revenue creation and cost reduction

Self-transport and self-alignment of microchips using microscopic rain

Alignment of microchips with receptors is an important process step in the construction of integrated micro- and nanosystems for emerging technologies, and facilitating alignment by spontaneous self-assembly processes is highly desired. Previously, capillary self-alignment of microchips driven by surface tension effects on patterned surfaces has been reported, where it was essential for microchips to have sufficient overlap with receptor sites. Here we demonstrate for the first time capillary self-transport and self-alignment of microchips, where microchips are initially placed outside the corresponding receptor sites and can be self-transported by capillary force to the receptor sites followed by self-alignment. The surface consists of hydrophilic silicon receptor sites surrounded by superhydrophobic black silicon. Rain-induced microscopic droplets are used to form the meniscus for the self-transport and self-alignment. The boundary conditions for the self-transport have been explored by modeling and confirmed experimentally. The maximum permitted gap between a microchip and a receptor site is determined by the volume of the liquid and by the wetting contrast between receptor site and substrate. Microscopic rain applied on hydrophilic-superhydrophobic patterned surfaces greatly improves the capability, reliability and error-tolerance of the process, avoiding the need for accurate initial placement of microchips, and thereby greatly simplifying the alignment process.Peer reviewe

Влияние тирона и его сочетания с блокатором синтеза монооксида азота 1-name на коронарный поток и сократительную функцию миокарда на фоне нормального и измененного редокс-состояния

МИОКАРДА СОКРАЩЕНИЕМЫШЕЧНОЕ СОКРАЩЕНИЕСЕРДЕЧНО-СОСУДИСТОЙ СИСТЕМЫ ФИЗИОЛОГИЧЕСКИЕ ПРОЦЕССЫТИРОНБЕНЗОЛСУЛЬФОНАТЫАЗОТА ОКИСЬКОРОНАРНОЕ КРОВООБРАЩЕНИЕРЕДОКС-СТАТУ

Simplifying the Standard of Review in North Carolina Administrative Appeals

The use of supercritical carbon dioxide (scCO2) as an apolar solvent has been known for decades. It offers a greener approach than, e.g., hexane or chloroform, when such solvents are needed. The use of scCO2 in microsystems, however, has only recently started to attract attention. In microfluidics, the flow characteristics need to be known to be able to successfully design such components and systems. As supercritical fluids exhibit the exciting combination of low viscosity, high density, and high diffusion rates, the fluidic behavior is not directly transferrable from aqueous systems. In this paper, three flow regimes in the scCO2–liquid water two-phase microfluidic system have been mapped. The effect of both total flow rate and relative flow rate on the flow regime is evaluated. Furthermore, the droplet dynamics at the bifurcating exit channel are analyzed at different flow rates. Due to the low viscosity of scCO2, segmented flows were observed even at fairly high flow rates. Furthermore, the carbon dioxide droplet behavior exhibited a clear dependence on both flow rate and droplet length

Комп’ютерне опрацювання фонокардіографічного сигналу синфазним методом для задач виявлення патології серця

Soft micro devices and stretchable electronics have attracted great interest for their potential applications in sensory skins and wearable bio-integrated devices. One of the most important steps in building printed circuits is the alignment of assembled micro objects. Previously, the capillary self-alignment of microchips driven by surface tension effects has been shown to be able to achieve high-throughput and high-precision in the integration of micro parts on rigid hydrophilic/superhydrophobic patterned surfaces. In this paper, the self-alignment of microchips on a patterned soft and stretchable substrate, which consists of hydrophilic pads surrounded by a superhydrophobic polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) background, is demonstrated for the first time. A simple process has been developed for making superhydrophobic soft surface by replicating nanostructures of black silicon onto a PDMS surface. Different kinds of PDMS have been investigated, and the parameters for fabricating superhydrophobic PDMS have been optimized. A self-alignment strategy has been proposed that can result in reliable self-alignment on a soft PDMS substrate. Our results show that capillary self-alignment has great potential for building soft printed circuits

Electrodeposition of cobalt based ferro-magnetic metal nanowires in polycarbonate films with cylindrical nanochannels fabricated by heavy-ion-track etching

Polycarbonate films of thickness 30 μm were irradiated with heavy ions by applying a flux of 108 ions cm-2 to produce straight tracks perpendicular to the film surface. The tracks were preferentially etched in 6 M aqueous solution of sodium hydroxide to prepare cylindrical nanochannels. The channel diameters were tuned between 200 and 600 nm by varying the etching time. Co81Cu19 alloy nanowires were electrodeposited potentiostatically, while Co/Cu multilayered nanowires, consisting of alternating Co and Cu layers with thickness 10 nm, were synthesized by means of a pulse plating technique in channels of length 30 μm and diameter 200 nm. Co81Cu19 alloy nanowires showed an anisotropic magnetoresistance effect of 0.6%, and the giant magnetoresistance of Co/Cu multilayered nanowires reached up to 8.0%

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E-commerce is a complex societal challenge with an enormous potential to contribute to sustainable development. In order to capture this potential and transform e-commerce into a sustainable system requires radical change. But which areas are in need of change in order to achieve a grand effect and what key issues must addressed