Emerging Perspectives on Self Service Technologies in Retail Banking

This paper attempts to critically examine the available literature on the subject, discuss a model that provides a managerial framework for analyzing the variables associated with customer value, and to identify potential research areas. The discussion draws conceptual impetus from new technologies in banking services through self service technologies in banking as a tool for optimizing profit. The discussion in the paper also analyzes the main criteria for successful internet-banking strategy and brings out benefits of e-banking from the point of view of banks, their technology and customer values and tentatively concludes that there is increasing returns to scale in the bank services in relation to the banking products, new technology and customer value.Self service technology, retail banking, customer value, profit optimization

Brand Metrics: A Tool to Measure Performance

An increasing interest in the continuous evaluation of brand performance has been observed in both managers and academics over recent past using metrics approach. This paper discusses the essential components of a brand metrics strategy and application of brand scorecard as an integrated approach to measure the overall performance of brands. The discussion delineates the process as how different constituents of metrics can be linked to business performance. It has also been argued in the paper that brand management is not just a marketing issue; it also directly affects corporate profitability. Effective brand portfolio management starts by creating a fact base about the equity in each brand and the brand's economic contribution.Brand performance, brand measurement, brand scorecard, performance metrics, brand variability, risk management, brand experience

Dissipative quantum theory: Implications for quantum entanglement

Three inter-related topics are discussed here. One, the Lindblad dynamics of quantum dissipative systems; two, quantum entanglement in composite systems and its quantification based on the Tsallis entropy; and three, robustness of entanglement under dissipation. After a brief review of the Lindblad theory of quantum dissipative systems and the idea of quantum entanglement in composite quantum systems illustrated by describing the three particle systems, the behavior of entanglement under the influence of dissipative processes is discussed. These issues are of importance in the discussion of quantum nanometric systems of current research.Comment: 12 pages, 1 Tabl

The Phases of QCD in Heavy Ion Collisions and Compact Stars

I review arguments for the existence of a critical point in the QCD phase diagram as a function of temperature and baryon chemical potential. I describe how heavy ion collision experiments at the SPS and RHIC can discover the tell-tale signatures of such a critical point, thus mapping this region of the QCD phase diagram. I then review the phenomena expected in cold dense quark matter: color superconductivity and color-flavor locking. I close with a snapshot of ongoing explorations of the implications of recent developments in our understanding of cold dense quark matter for the physics of compact stars.Comment: 29 pages. 4 figures. latex with aipproc. References added and corrected. One version of this review is to appear in the Comments of Nuclear and Particle Physics section of Comments on Modern Physics. Other versions were contributed to the proceedings of the Conference on Intersections of Nuclear and Particle Physics, Quebec, May 2000 and to the proceedings of the 40th Zakopane School of Theoretical Physics, June 200

Traversing the QCD Phase Transition: Quenching Out of Equilibrium vs. Slowing Out of Equilibrium vs. Bubbling Out of Equilibrium

I review arguments for the existence of a critical point E in the QCD phase diagram as a function of temperature T and baryon chemical potential \mu. I describe how heavy ion collision experiments at the SPS and RHIC can discover the tell-tale signatures of such a critical point, thus mapping this region of the QCD phase diagram. I contrast the different ways in which the matter produced in a heavy ion collision can be driven out of equilibrium: quenching out of equilibrium (possible, but not guaranteed, if the transition region is traversed at \mu << \mu_E) vs. slowing out of equilibrium (guaranteed for \mu \sim \mu_E) vs. bubbling out of equilibrium (possible, but not guaranteed, for \mu >> \mu_E). Quenching or bubbling create and amplify distinct, detectable, non-gaussian fluctuations. In contrast, slowing out of equilibrium reduces the magnitude of the specific, detectable, gaussian fluctuations which signal the presence of the critical point.Comment: To appear in proceedings of International Conference on Quark Nuclear Physics, Adelaide, Australia, Feb. 2000. 10 pages, latex, espcrc1, 1 figure, epsfig, typos correcte

QCD at Finite Baryon Density: Chiral Symmetry Restoration and Color Superconductivity

We use a variational procedure to study finite density QCD in an approximation in which the interaction between quarks is modelled by that induced by instantons. We find that uniform states with conventional chiral symmetry breaking have negative pressure with respect to empty space at all but the lowest densities, and are therefore unstable. This is a precisely defined phenomenon which motivates the basic picture of hadrons assumed in the MIT bag model, with nucleons as droplets of chiral symmetry restored phase. This suggests that the phase transition to a chirally symmetric phase occurs by percolation of preexisting droplets of the symmetric phase, and in these proceedings we expand upon our previous presentation of this observation. At all densities high enough that the chirally symmetric phase fills space, color symmetry is broken by the formation of a condensate of quark Cooper pairs. A plausible ordering scheme leads to a substantial gap in a Lorentz scalar channel involving quarks of two colors.Comment: 12 pages; latex with ptptex; Contribution to appear in the proceedings of the YKIS 97 Worshop, Kyot