Supply chain decision making supported by an Open books policy

Based on a study of a buyer–seller relationship in the automotive industry, this article identifies 17 different decision-making processes where openly sharing cost data—a so-called open books policy—plays an important supporting role. These processes relate to supplier selection, various activities that occur prior to production, and the full-speed production stage of the exchange process. Overall, open books plays the greatest role in the pre-production stage, although it is found to support decision-making relating to supplier selection and decision-making during full-speed production to a greater extent than the literature recognizes

Generation of human and structural capital: lessons from knowledge management

Interorganizational and social relationships can be seen as part of the intellectual capital of a firm. Existing frameworks of intellectual capital, however, fail to address how relationships should be managed to generate more intellectual capital. Drawing on the interaction approach and the fields of intellectual capital and knowledge management, this paper develops a framework for managing relationships. The framework is illustrated with a case study. It is also noted that firms can improve relationship management and thus generate more intellectual capital

Stationary Bianchi type II perfect fluid models

Einstein's field equations for stationary Bianchi type II models with a perfect fluid source are investigated. The field equations are rewritten as a system of autonomous first order differential equations. Dimensionless variables are subsequently introduced for which the reduced phase space is compact. The system is then studied qualitatively using the theory of dynamical systems. It is shown that the locally rotationally symmetric models are not asymptotically self-similar for small values of the independent , tovariable. A new exact solution is also given.Comment: 6 pages, 1 figure LaTeX. To appear in JM

On relating multiple M2 and D2-branes

Due to the difficulties of finding superconformal Lagrangian theories for multiple M2-branes, we will in this paper instead focus on the field equations. By relaxing the requirement of a Lagrangian formulation we can explore the possibility of having structure constants $f^{ABC}{}_D$ satisfying the fundamental identity but which are not totally antisymmetric. We exemplify this discussion by making use of an explicit choice of a non-antisymmetric $f^{ABC}{}_D$ constructed from the Lie algebra structure constants $f^{ab}{}_c$ of an arbitrary gauge group. Although this choice of $f^{ABC}{}_D$ does not admit an obvious Lagrangian description, it does reproduce the correct SYM theory for a stack of $N$ D2-branes to leading order in $g_{YM}^{-1}$ upon reduction and, moreover, it sheds new light on the centre of mass coordinates for multiple M2-branes.Comment: 9 pages, references added and statements concerning the fundamental identity revise

Taboo, the Game: Patent Office Edition—The New Preissuance Submissions Under the America Invents Act

Thorough patent examination ensures that issued patents confer constitutionally granted incentives to innovate but do not create inappropriately broad monopolies. Examiners at the United States Patent and Trademark Office are alone tasked with striking this proper balance, in part by searching the universe of existing published knowledge to determine the originality of the applied-for invention. In 2011, Congress enacted the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act, which included a provision allowing the public to present examiners with relevant publications that the examiners’ own searches might not otherwise uncover. However, this “preissuance submissions” provision and its related administrative rule are tempered by 35 U.S.C. § 122(c) (2006), which prohibits any third-party, pre-grant “protest or other form of [preissuance] opposition” to an application. Thus, although a party may describe to an examiner how its submission is relevant to an application, that party is prohibited from arguing how the submission renders that application unpatentable. This Note argues that Congress should amend § 122(c) to permit preissuance third-party argumentation for two reasons. First, the current scheme arguably violates that law already. Second, a rule allowing submitter argumentation would better incentivize participation by competitive parties who fear that examiners might not recognize their submitted publications\u27 full invalidating potential

Off-shell structure of twisted (2,0) theory

A $Q$-exact off-shell action is constructed for twisted abelian (2,0) theory on a Lorentzian six-manifold of the form $M_{1,5} = C\times M_4$, where $C$ is a flat two-manifold and $M_4$ is a general Euclidean four-manifold. The properties of this formulation, which is obtained by introducing two auxiliary fields, can be summarised by a commutative diagram where the Lagrangian and its stress-tensor arise from the $Q$-variation of two fermionic quantities $V$ and $\lambda^{\mu\nu}$. This completes and extends the analysis in [arXiv:1311.3300].Comment: 15 pages, 2 figure

Manifestly supersymmetric M-theory

In this paper, the low-energy effective dynamics of M-theory, eleven-dimensional supergravity, is taken off-shell in a manifestly supersymmetric formulation. We show that a previously proposed relaxation of the superspace torsion constraints does indeed accommodate a current supermultiplet which lifts the equations of motion corresponding to the ordinary second order derivative supergravity lagrangian. Whether the auxiliary fields obtained this way can be used to construct an off-shell lagrangian is not yet known. We comment on the relation and application of this completely general formalism to higher-derivative (R^4) corrections. Some details of the calculation are saved for a later publication.Comment: 13 pages, plain tex. v2: minor changes, one ref. adde

Carboxylic acids in the hindgut of rats fed highly soluble inulin and Bifidobacterium lactis (Bb-12), Lactobacillus salivarius (UCC500) or Lactobacillus rhamnosus (GG)

Background: Propionic and butyric acids are important nutrients for the mucosal cells and may therefore increase the nutritional status and reduce the permeability of the colonic mucosa. These acids have also been suggested to counteract diseases in the colon, e.g. ulcerative colitis and colon cancer. Different substrates lead to different amounts and patterns of carboxylic acids (CAs). Objective: To study the effect of probiotics on CA formation in the hindgut of rats given inulin. Design: The rats were given inulin, marketed as highly soluble by the producer, together with the probiotic bacteria Bifidobacterium lactis (Bb-12), Lactobacillus salivarius (UCC500) or Lactobacillus rhamnosus (GG), or a mixture of all three. Results: Rats fed inulin only had comparatively high proportions of propionic and butyric acids throughout the hindgut. When diets were supplemented with Bb-12 and UCC500, the caecal pool of CAs increased compared with inulin only. In the caecum the proportion of butyric acid generally decreased when the rats were fed probiotics. In the distal colon the proportion of propionic and butyric acid was lower, while that of lactic acid was generally higher. The caecal pH in rats fed GG and Bb-12 was lower than expected from the concentration of CAs. Further, rats fed GG had the lowest weight gain and highest caecal tissue weight. Conclusions: It is possible to modify the formation of CAs by combining inulin with probiotics. Different probiotics had different effects

Changed Supply Chain Disruption Risks through Installation of a Pasteurizer – the case of Brämhults Juice AB

Brämhults Juice AB is a Swedish company producing fresh juice for the Scandinavian market. Fresh juice is rich in taste but has limited durability and must be treated with special care throughout the whole supply chain. Not only will the quality of the product be affected if mistreated, but there are also contamination risks meaning that people actually could get sick, although the risk is very small. There are also other kinds of flow-related risks like single-sourced packages. To reduce the risk of spoiled juice, Brämhults installed a pasteurizer in their production process during spring 2005. An interesting question is how this affected the risks in the supply chain flow. One of the authors (Paulsson 2007) has in another study developed a model, called the DRISC (Disruption Risks In Supply Chains) model, for the structuring, evaluation and handling of risks related to disruptions in the product flow in the supply chain. The DRISC model, seen from the angle of an individual (focal) company in the supply chain, covers all product flow-related disruption risks in the total supply chain from natural resources to the delivered final product, and makes it possible to classify them into 15 different risk exposure boxes, of which 3 boxes have “known result impact” and 12 have “expected result impact”, and also to summarize them in a figure for the total negative result impact. The risk analysis phase of the model is applied in the project to Brämhults juice before and after the installation of the pasteurizer in order to see the effects on the risk "picture". The analysis showed that there was an increase in two of the three “known result impact boxes” and a decrease in the third one. There was also a decrease in eight of the “expected result impact boxes”, and the remaining four were unchanged. Especially interesting is that the three risks linked to market confidence, which before were high or very high, were now all medium. There has also been a change towards comparatively more known result impacts and fewer expected result impacts. The investment in the pasteurizer was about 2 million SEK, and there was a minor increase in the operating costs by 800.000 SEK annually. Since the costs for returns and withdrawals caused by spoiled juice, which before the pasteurizer were about 6 million SEK annually, dropped by about 90 %, the investment has had a payback time of about 5 months. But the pasteurizer also prolonged durability from 10 to 18 days, thereby making it possible for Brämhults to change from distribution by the company’s own drivers and lorries to all the different shops over to transporting to a limited number of DCs (distribution centres) belonging to different food chains. If we split the pasteurizer investment 50/50 on risk and on distribution, we will get a payback time concerning the risk part of the investment of only 2 to 3 months, indicating that it was a very profitable investment. In the costs for returns and withdrawals, only the direct, immediate costs are included. If the negative effects of disruptions on future sales are also considered, the payback time will be even shorter

Goldstone Tensor Modes

In the context of brane solutions of supergravity, we discuss a general method to introduce collective modes of any spin by exploiting a particular way of breaking symmetries. The method is applied to the D3, M2 and M5 branes and we derive explicit expressions for how the zero-modes enter the target space fields, verify normalisability in the transverse directions and derive the corresponding field equations on the brane. In particular, the method provides a clear understanding of scalar, spinor, and rank r tensorial Goldstone modes, chiral as well as non-chiral, and how they arise from the gravity, Rarita-Schwinger, and rank r+1 Kalb-Ramond tensor gauge fields, respectively. Some additional observations concerning the chiral tensor modes on the M5 brane are discussed.Comment: 21 pp, plain tex. A sign corrected for agreement with convention