3,344 research outputs found
Utilizing e-business technologies in supply chains: The impact of firm characteristics and teams
This paper presents findings from an exploratory study that analyzes the drivers and outcomes of e-business technology use in the supply chain. Using a combination of case studies and survey data from a diverse sample of industries, the research examines how industry context, firm characteristics and firm-level strategic resources, such as purchasing teams, influence the exploitation of e-business technologies and the relationship between e-business technology use and firm performance. Based on a synthesis of related literatures from transaction cost economics and the relational view of the supply chain, a two-dimensional framework for e-business technology is proposed with transactional and relational dimensions. However, empirical analysis indicated that transactional technologies can be further subdivided into two factors: dyadic cooperation and price determination. Significant differences were found between the two dimensions in terms of their overall levels of adoption, with dyadic coordination being the most widely adopted. In addition, the development of strategic resources expanded, in particular internal and customer teams, the use of e-business technologies expanded. Purchasing organizational structure and firm size also were positively related to the adoption of transactional e-business technologies. Finally, of particular importance to practitioners, e-business technologies targeted at reducing dyadic coordination costs lead to improved financial performance
Selection of planned supply initiatives: the role of senior management expertise
Purpose
â The purpose of this paper is to assess the selection of planned supply initiatives and the role of senior management expertise. The drivers that influence the selection of particular supply initiatives by firms are of major interest to both practitioners and academics, as choices indicate priorities for resources, potential performance gaps and needs for future research. Moreover, theory indicates that senior management expertise and firmâlevel resources might influence the likelihood of selecting particular initiatives.
Design/methodology/approach
â A synthesis of the literature supported the development of a fiveâdimensional framework of major supply initiatives. Logistic regression was conducted with data from a survey of chief purchasing officers at large North American firms. The impact of firmâlevel resources and senior management expertise, including background and experience, was assessed for the selection of supply initiatives.
Findings
â After controlling for general industryâlevel factors, both firm resources and senior management expertise were found to systematically affect the likelihood of a firm planning to pursue particular initiatives. First, hiring senior management from outside the firm decreased the likelihood that networkâbased initiatives were planned, while senior management who last worked in supply were found to be negatively related to planned supply strategy initiatives. Second, firms with greater use of eâbusiness technologies favored additional investment in supply networks.
Research limitations/implications
â This research focused on large firms in developed countries, and additional research is needed to explore the generalizability to small and mediumâsized enterprises and lessâdeveloped countries. Moreover, additional work is needed to explore tradeâoffs between planned and emergent initiatives, as only the former were empirically assessed.
Originality/value
â Senior management expertise has received relatively little attention in prior research, yet was found to be a significant factor influencing strategic, process and networkârelated supply initiatives. Moreover, the framework of supply initiatives provides a basis for assessing and benchmarking firmâlevel supply chain strategy and investment patterns. Finally, empirical evidence emerged that both firm and individualâlevel factors influenced the probability of selecting particular initiatives
Heavy Quarks on Anisotropic Lattices: The Charmonium Spectrum
We present results for the mass spectrum of mesons simulated on
anisotropic lattices where the temporal spacing is only half of the
spatial spacing . The lattice QCD action is the Wilson gauge action plus
the clover-improved Wilson fermion action. The two clover coefficients on an
anisotropic lattice are estimated using mean links in Landau gauge. The bare
velocity of light has been tuned to keep the anisotropic, heavy-quark
Wilson action relativistic. Local meson operators and three box sources are
used in obtaining clear statistics for the lowest lying and first excited
charmonium states of , , , and . The
continuum limit is discussed by extrapolating from quenched simulations at four
lattice spacings in the range 0.1 - 0.3 fm. Results are compared with the
observed values in nature and other lattice approaches. Finite volume effects
and dispersion relations are checked.Comment: 36 pages, 6 figur
Equivalent bosonic theory for the massive Thirring model with non-local interaction
We study, through path-integral methods, an extension of the massive Thirring
model in which the interaction between currents is non-local. By examining the
mass-expansion of the partition function we show that this non-local massive
Thirring model is equivalent to a certain non-local extension of the
sine-Gordon theory. Thus, we establish a non-local generalization of the famous
Coleman's equivalence. We also discuss some possible applications of this
result in the context of one-dimensional strongly correlated systems and
finite-size Quantum Field Theories.Comment: 15 pages, latex, no figure
Realization of Haldane's Exclusion Statistics in a Model of Electron-Phonon Interactions
We discuss an integrable model describing one-dimensional electrons
interacting with two-dimensional anharmonic phonons. In the low temperature
limit it is possible to decouple phonons and consider one-dimensional
excitations separately. They have a trivial two-body scattering matrix and obey
fractional statistics. As far as we know the original model presents the first
example of a model with local bare interactions generating purely statistical
interactions between renormalized particles. As a by-product we obtain
non-trivial thermodynamic equations for the interacting system of
two-dimensional phonons.Comment: 4 page
Lattice study on kaon nucleon scattering length in the I=1 channel
Using the tadpole improved clover Wilson quark action on small, coarse and
anisotropic lattices, scattering length in the I=1 channel is calculated
within quenched approximation. The results are extrapolated towards the chiral
and physical kaon mass region. Finite volume and finite lattice spacing errors
are also analyzed and a result in the infinite volume and continuum limit is
obtained which is compatible with the experiment and the results from Chiral
Perturbation Theory.Comment: 15 pages, 4 figures, typeset by latex using elsart.cls,minor change
Entropic C-theorems in free and interacting two-dimensional field theories
The relative entropy in two-dimensional field theory is studied on a cylinder
geometry, interpreted as finite-temperature field theory. The width of the
cylinder provides an infrared scale that allows us to define a dimensionless
relative entropy analogous to Zamolodchikov's function. The one-dimensional
quantum thermodynamic entropy gives rise to another monotonic dimensionless
quantity. I illustrate these monotonicity theorems with examples ranging from
free field theories to interacting models soluble with the thermodynamic Bethe
ansatz. Both dimensionless entropies are explicitly shown to be monotonic in
the examples that we analyze.Comment: 34 pages, 3 figures (8 EPS files), Latex2e file, continuation of
hep-th/9710241; rigorous analysis of sufficient conditions for universality
of the dimensionless relative entropy, more detailed discussion of the
relation with Zamolodchikov's theorem, references added; to appear in Phys.
Rev.
Applications of quantum integrable systems
We present two applications of quantum integrable systems. First, we predict
that it is possible to generate high harmonics from solid state devices by
demostrating that the emission spectrum for a minimally coupled laser field of
frequency to an impurity system of a quantum wire, contains multiples
of the incoming frequency. Second, evaluating expressions for the conductance
in the high temperature regime we show that the caracteristic filling fractions
of the Jain sequence, which occur in the fractional quantum Hall effect, can be
obtained from quantum wires which are described by minimal affine Toda field
theories.Comment: 25 pages of LaTex, 4 figures, based on talk at the 6-th international
workshop on conformal field theories and integrable models, (Chernogolovka,
September 2002
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