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A novel approach is used to reverse engineer polymeric parts in a low cost, non‐destructive manner. Solids created from polymers with an index of refraction matching that of an immersion liquid are reverse engineered using a CCD camera. Serial images are taken as the part is immersed into the liquid or taken out of the liquid. The images are then used to create digital solid models from the polymeric physical model. The concept of the process, the hardware as a proof‐of‐concept demonstration, and results to understand the accuracy and limitations of the process are described.

Al‐alumina interconnected phase composites were processed using the direct fused deposition process. These materials with tailored microstructures can find applications as structural materials with gradient properties.

In this process, feedstock material with fused silica as a starting material was compounded at a high shear mixer and then extruded as a filament using a single screw extruder. Extruded filaments were used with a commercial fused deposition modeler, FDM 1650, to process controlled porosity green ceramic structures. Porous green ceramic preforms were subjected to binder removal and sintering cycles in furnace air. Controlled porosity sintered ceramic structures were infiltrated with Al 5052 metal by pressureless reactive metal infiltration to form an in situ Al‐alumina structured composite.

The main advantage for this approach is to control distribution of both metal and ceramic phases in the composite. During metal infiltration good bonding was observed between the metal and the ceramic phases. Composites were tested under both quasi‐static and dynamic shock loading to evaluate their mechanical properties. Compression strength of these composites was 689±95 MPa.

This paper describes application of the direct fused deposition process for fabrication of ceramic/metal composites where both macrostructure as well as microstructure can be controlled simultaneously. The paper also focuses on one of the potential application area for 5052‐Al alloy.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the feasibility of direct fabrication of lunar/Martian regolith simulant parts, in a freeform environment, using Laser Engineering Net Shaping (LENS™) – an additive manufacturing technology.

Bulk lunar regolith simulant structures were fabricated using a LENS™‐750. Dense parts without any macroscopic defects were produced at a laser power of 50W, a scan speed of 20 mm/s, and a powder feed rate of 12.36 g/min. The laser processed parts were characterized using X‐ray diffraction, differential scanning calorimetry, scanning electron microscope and X‐ray photoelectron spectroscopy to evaluate the influence of laser processing on the microstructure, constituent phases and chemistry of lunar regolith simulant.

A combination of laser parameters resulting in a 2.12 J/mm² laser energy appeared to be ideal for generating a melt pool necessary for lunar regolith powder deposition without excessive liquid pool spreading and cracking of solidified parts. The results show that LENS™ based laser processing transformed crystalline regolith into nanocrystalline and/or amorphous regolith structures as a result of complete melting followed by resolidification. Laser processing also resulted in marginal changes in the composition of the regolith.

Establishment of a lunar/Martian outpost necessitates the development of methods to utilize in situ mineral resources for various construction and resource extraction applications. Fabrication technologies are critical for habitat structure development, as well as repair and replacement of tools and parts at the outpost. Current experimental results presented in the paper clearly demonstrate that net shape regolith simulant parts can be fabricated using LENS™ by exploiting its capabilities.

Organizations are reaching beyond typical firm boundaries to achieve competitive advantage. Human resource (HR) systems must simultaneously support alignment across the business ecosystem while acknowledging the benefits of disruption. The authors provide a fresh perspective on strategic HR management (SHRM), expanding the view beyond organizations to look at the ecosystem as a whole. The authors address the need for HR systems to balance the dualistic tensions of alignment and disruption. While examining the environmental logic of the ecosystem, the authors provide examples of disruption through competition and alignment through cooperation. The authors then examine potential research implications that could assist managers as they govern in a constantly changing and complex ecosystem. This chapter presents the HR ecosystem framework which provides a clear discussion of how different governance mechanisms might be utilized to help firms achieve a competitive advantage through the balance between alignment and disruption.

To understand social entrepreneurship and a social entrepreneur; to identify a social problem and develop a business idea; to understand the theory of entrepreneurial opportunity recognition; and to understand microfinance and its impact in the lives of the poor.

The case traces the journey of its founder Chandra Shekhar Ghosh from being a small time entrepreneur in microfinance to being the owner of a universal bank named Bandhan. Bandhan bank started its operations on August 23, 2015 with 501 branches, 2022 service center and 50 ATMs across 24 states. It had 14.3 million accounts, around 105 billion loan book and 19,500 employees. The founder of Bandhan bank, Chandra Shekhar Ghosh, an Ashoka fellow had won numerous awards such as Entrepreneur with Social Impact Award by Forbes (2014), Entrepreneur of the Year by Economic Times (2014), Skoch Financial Inclusion Award (2011), Entrepreneur of the Year Award (2014) by AIMA to name a few. In 2014, Bandhan was also recognized as Global Growth Company by World Economic Forum.

The case is suitable for analysis in a MBA level course on social entrepreneurship.

Teaching Notes are available for educators only. Please contact your library to gain login details or email support@emeraldinsight.com to request teaching notes.

CSS 3: Entrepreneurship.

The purpose of this paper was development of patient-specific femoral prosthesis using rapid prototyping (RP), a part of additive manufacturing (AM) technology, and comparison of its merits or demerits over CNC machining route.

The customized femoral prosthesis was developed through computed tomography (CT)-3D CAD-RP-rapid tooling (RT)-investment casting (IC) route using a stereolithography apparatus (SLA-250) RP machine. A similar prosthesis was also developed through conventional CT-CAD-CAM-CNC, using RP models to check the fit before machining. The dimensional accuracy, surface finish, cost and time involvement were compared between these two routes.

In both the routes, RP had an important role in checking the fit. Through the conventional machining route, higher-dimensional accuracies and surface finish were achieved. On the contrary, RP route involved lesser time and cost, with rougher surface finish on the prosthesis surface and less internal shrinkage porosity. The rougher surface finish of the prosthesis is favourable for bone ingrowths after implantation and porosity reduce the effective stiffness of the prosthesis, leading to reduced stress shielding effect after implantation.

As there is no AM machine for direct fabrication of metallic component like laser engineered net shaping and electron beam melting in our Institute, the metallic prosthesis was developed through RP-RT-IC route using the SLA-250 machine.

The patient-specific prosthesis always provides better fit and favourable stress distribution, leading to longer life of the prosthesis. The described RP route can be followed to develop the customized prosthesis at lower price within the shortest time.

The described methodology of customized prosthesis development through the AM route and its advantages are applicable for development of any metallic prostheses.

Firms embedded in networks of relations are theorized through Gnyawali and Madhavan’s (2001) (G&M) structural embeddedness model to gain competitive advantage from topological characteristics. Empirical studies to support their theory have never been executed in full. Our study provided a full empirical test of their model in a digital trading network to achieve a higher degree of certainty that those network structural characteristics can have a major impact on the degree to which certain firms lead to competitiveness in a digital trading network environment.

To examine how firms respond in competitive situations, we chose the hyper-active digital trading network, eBay as our empirical context. We used eBay auction data to analyze how the network characteristics of eBay resellers impact their competitive behaviors.

Our study found strong support for the G&M model of competitiveness. We offer explanations for where support was not as strong as the Gynawali and Madavan theory proposes.

Our research is limited by our chosen context and findings in support of part of G&M model. Future studies in other digital contexts are needed to enhance the modeling of network topologies and further study the impacts of network density and structural autonomy on competitive action.

Our study suggests that managers proceed cautiously in forming partnerships, weighing circumstances where the firm can find itself with increased information power and avoiding, to the greatest extent possible, situations where the playing field is roughly equal.

Theory-making in this domain has begun as well as initial empirical testing. Much more needs to be accomplished, though, before embeddedness modeling can be thought of as being well established.

The G& M Model of competitiveness is an SNA explanation of why some competitive units succeed and others do not. Our study is the first, full blown empirical analysis of the theory.

Purpose: To outline recent developments in digital service delivery in order to encourage researchers to pursue collaborations with computer science, operations research, and data science colleagues and to show how such collaborations can expand the scope of research on emotion in service delivery.

Design/methodology/approach: Uses archived resources available at http://LivePerson.com to extract data based in genuine service conversations between agents and customers. We refer to these as “digital traces” and analyze them using computational science models.

Findings: Although we do not test significance or causality, the data presented in this chapter provide a unique lens into the dynamics of emotions in service; results that are not obtainable using traditional research methods.

Research limitations/implications: This is a descriptive study where findings unravel new dynamics that should be followed up with more research, both research using traditional experimental methods, and digital traces research that allows inferences of causality.

Practical implications: The digital data and newly developed tools for sentiment analyses allow exploration of emotions in large samples of genuine customer service interactions. The research provides objective, unobtrusive views of customer emotions that draw directly from customer expressions, with no self-report intervention and biases.

Originality/value: This is the first objective and detailed depiction of the actual emotional encounters that customers express, and the first to analyze in detail the nature and content of customer service work.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a practitioners' perspective on financial challenges prevalent in the Indian hospitality industry. The paper also makes an attempt to give useful insights into possible solutions to the issues raised.

The study assimilates data from senior finance professionals from a spectrum of hotels in India. The study involves the collection of primary data through structured interviews.

The study highlights that some of the financial challenges faced by the Indian hospitality industry include high financing costs, multiplicity of taxes charged, licensing and legal issues, working capital issues and eroding margins. The study also gives some useful insights to the possible solutions to the challenges identified.

This paper provides some very useful qualitative analysis of the contemporary challenges and their possible solutions prevalent in the Indian hospitality sector. The findings will be useful for hoteliers, policy makers and researchers to deliberate on the issues raised. However, it does not involve any quantitative analysis.

This study makes a sincere attempt to bring forth some real life issues, challenges and solutions which would be a good value addition to the existing literature.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the nature of rural energy transition in cooking options in India. Although India is aiming to achieve a double-digit economic growth, a large share of rural households still rely on firewood for cooking which not only has serious repercussions of increasing indoor pollution but also has a concomitant adverse effect on women and child morbidity and mortality. However, transition to clean energy options like improved cookstoves for these households may not be necessarily linear. It is often driven or resisted by latent factors such as caste, trust, social capital, information flow, social positioning of clusters that are deeply embedded in the social and cultural norms and values specific to local rural contexts. This has been shown in the present case study that pertains to eight villages in the remote and deprived Purnea district of Bihar and the need for internalizing them in the macro energy policymaking has been established in the paper.

The paper applies a macro foundation research that is complemented by micro foundation tools of fuzzy cognitive mapping-based mental model framework to achieve the purpose of the study. Focused-group discussions and interviews are also conducted to establish the narrative of the paper.

Caste, socio-political position, asset structure, remoteness, culture and technology access affect rural households’ decision making capability that is related to shifting from using the traditionalmeans of firewood and biomass based traditional cookstoves for cooking to adopting improved clean cooking stoves which will enable the transition toward the use of clean rural energy in the eight villages in Bihar chosen for this study.

The findings of the paper have larger implications for the broader macro energy policymaking in the country by taking into account the non-linear, latent factors of village contexts.

The research will help energy policymakers in decision-making and will guide the implementation process of national- and state-level policies on rural energy transition in India.

The findings of the paper will help the smoother implementation of national- and state-level rural energy transition policies for cooking, creating developmental dividends for rural Indian households.

The research is new with regard to the application of non-deterministic fuzzy cognitive mapping-based mental model approach to contribute to the country’s national- and state-level rural energy transition policies.