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Most four‐year business degree programs have a common body of knowledge (CBK) or “business core,” composed of courses from all the major disciplines in the business curriculum. All business majors, regardless of specialization or area of concentration, are required to take these courses, or their equivalent, as a part of their degree programs. On many campuses, non‐business majors are also enrolled in these courses. Some of these non‐business students are required by their curriculum programs to take specific business courses; others take them as electives. The result is a mixture of students with varying backgrounds and interests in some CBK classes. This mix of business and non‐business majors in the same course raises several questions, three of which were examined in this study. In a mixed course, is there any difference between business and non‐business majors’ attitudes about the course? Is there any significant difference in performance between business and nonbusiness majors in the same course? What are the attitudes of faculty who teach such courses concerning student performance and instruction of the course? A survey was administered to study perceptions of business and non‐business majors concerning a single CBK course at one institution. In addition, course grades for business and non‐business majors at that institution were compared. Another survey was administered to ascertain the opinions of professors teaching the same CBK course at institutions located throughout the southeastern United States. Results of the surveys showed that faculty and students had different perceptions and that student grades tended to differ by major.

This paper aims to present a case study on how to develop financial markets in one of the emerging economies of the MENA region – Kuwait.

The analysis proceeds in two steps: first, the need for developing and deepening these markets is established; second, the impediments curtailing market development are identified and discussed.

It is argued that Kuwait currently faces a valuable window of opportunity to build up further its sukuk and bond markets. The paper also assesses the prospects for the emergence of a regional financial market across GCC countries.

Besides the direct policy recommendations provided for Kuwait, given the similarities with other emerging economies, the lessons learned from this study may be relevant to other countries in the MENA region.

This study aims to examine the extent and drivers of anti-money laundering (AML) disclosures in the audited annual reports of regional listed banks in Kenya.

Using the Financial Action Task Force recommendations and other guidelines, the authors develop an AML disclosure index that is used to score the extent of AML disclosures by banks. A sample of 15 listed regional banks in Kenya over the period of 2007-2017 is used. Using this sample, the authors performed fixed-effects regressions to identify the significant determinants of AML disclosures.

The study establishes a low level of AML disclosures in the audited annual reports of sampled banks. The extent to which the AML disclosures improved across three distinct regulatory regimes over the period of 2007-2017 is reported. The authors find that the AML disclosures are largely driven by corporate governance (board size and audit committee size) and the ratio of diaspora remittances to GDP.

Owing to the global nature of money laundering activities, the study suggests that the Central Bank of Kenya needs to internationalize AML regulations and follow internationally accepted best practices in AML to respond to emerging trends in money laundering and related crimes.

To the best knowledge of the researchers, this is perhaps the first study to examine the drivers of AML disclosures by banks in a developing economy in the East and Southern African region. Given the global nature of money laundering, the study makes an important and original contribution to the body of knowledge with potential for replication in other jurisdictions. The findings will also form a basis for developing an AML reporting or disclosure framework.

This case study shows how methods of lean philosophy can be successfully taught to undergraduate students and applied to improving a real-world loan process. Students were instructed to use newly acquired classroom skills to analyse and improve a bank loan process in Kuwait.

This study involved an initial gemba walk through the bank. A case study format with direct observation and semi-structured interviews was adopted by 27 undergraduate students to identify waste, analyse the loan process and develop an efficiency plan.

The results revealed that undergraduate students could quickly learn basic lean principles and techniques and utilize them in a real-world situation to significantly improve a bank loan process. Areas of waste included over-production, over-processing, defects in procedure, under-utilized skills, wasted motions and poor time management. Suggested corrective measures were expected to reduce loan processing time by 30%.

Increasing costs and competition in the business environment make efficiency improvements imperative, and it was shown that students can play a major role in applying lean principles to a bank loan process while gaining knowledge and skills highly valued in industry. Universities have the opportunity to create a valuable learning experience for undergraduate students in applying classroom skills to solving a real-life problem.

This is the first study of a novel classroom technique for teaching undergraduate students to apply lean techniques in a Kuwaiti bank.

To date, critical success factors for design and implementing knowledge management (KM) system in a multi‐case study research have not been systematically investigated. Most of existing studies have derived their critical success factors from single company perspectives and have not considered all factors in an integrated way in a multi case study research. This paper is aimed to bridge this gap.

A qualitative case study technique has been used in this paper for data collection to gain insights into the topic being investigated. For that, “grounded theory” research approach has been selected by which the collected data from real case studies (successful organizations in KM adoption) are categorized and analyzed through specific stages. The extracted concepts can demonstrate critical success factors of KM system within organizations.

The overall results from the real case studies were positive, thus reflecting the appropriateness of the proposed critical success factors. Also 16 concepts and a conceptual framework are the other findings of this research that clarify how to design and implement a KM system in an organization. The conceptual framework presents a roadmap for success of KM programs in the organizations.

The set of critical success factors can act as a list of items for organizations to address when adopting KM. This helps to ensure that the essential issues and factors are covered during design and implementation phase. For academics, it provides a common language for them to discuss and study the factors crucial for the success of KM program in an organization.

This study is probably the first to provide an integrated perspective of critical success factors for implementing KM through a multi case study research. It gives valuable information and guidelines which hopefully will help the leaders to accomplish KM through their organizations in an effective way.

There is a gap in knowledge about the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) because most studies are undertaken in countries outside the Gulf region – such as China, India, the US and Taiwan. The stock market contains rich, valuable and considerable data, and these data need careful analysis for good decisions to be made that can lead to increases in the efficiency of a business. Data mining techniques offer data processing tools and applications used to enhance decision-maker decisions. This study aims to predict the Kuwait stock market by applying big data mining.

The methodology used is quantitative techniques, which are mathematical and statistical models that describe a various array of the relationships of variables. Quantitative methods used to predict the direction of the stock market returns by using four techniques were implemented: logistic regression, decision trees, support vector machine and random forest.

The results are all variables statistically significant at the 5% level except gold price and oil price. Also, the variables that do not have an influence on the direction of the rate of return of Boursa Kuwait are money supply and gold price, unlike the Kuwait index, which has the highest coefficient. Furthermore, the height score of the variable that affects the direction of the rate of return is the firms, and the accuracy of the overall performance of the four models is nearly 50%.

Some of the limitations identified for this study are as follows: (1) location limitation: Kuwait Stock Exchange; (2) time limitation: the amount of time available to accomplish the study, where the period was completed within the academic year 2019-2020 and the academic year 2020-2021. During 2020, the coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19), which was a major obstacle, occurred during data collection and analysis; (3) data limitation: The Kuwait Stock Exchange data were collected from May 2019 to March 2020, while the factors affecting the stock exchange data were collected in July 2020 due to the corona pandemic.

The study used new titles, variables and techniques such as using data mining to predict the Kuwait stock market. There are no adequate studies that predict the stock market by data mining in the GCC, especially in Kuwait. There is a gap in knowledge in the GCC as most studies are in foreign countries, such as China, India, the US and Taiwan.

The Kenyan government’s announcement of a new 10 percent tax in March 2013 threatened the future prospects of M-Pesa, Safaricom’s mobile money transfer service, which had revolutionized the way money moved in Kenya. The new tax would be levied on all cash transfers but was largely targeted at M-Pesa, which controlled around 80 percent of the cash transfer market. In response to the new tax, Safaricom, the mobile communications market leader, announced a 10 percent price increase.

The case presents the structure Safaricom established in order to develop a mobile money transfer service in Kenya. As a concept, M-Pesa was unprecedented in Kenya: prospective customers had to get comfortable with the idea that a mobile communications company could provide a payment system, that transactions could be initiated through a mobile phone, and that nonbank outlets could provide cash-in/cash-out services. Even when the concept was accepted, however, customers needed a convenient network of agents to handle transactions, and stores needed to see demand from customers in order to be motivated to become agent outlets. Thus, in order to grow, M-Pesa needed to aggressively pursue and acquire both customers and agents in this two-sided market.

• Understand the complexity of pricing in two-sided markets

• Evaluate the profitability of different pricing strategies in two-sided markets

• Understand the effect of an innovation on the creation and capture of value

• Identify possible threats to competitive advantage in two-sided markets as well as in developing countries

• Understand the value of co-opetition and how cooperation with competitors and complementors can increase a company’s profitability

Understand the complexity of pricing in two-sided markets

Evaluate the profitability of different pricing strategies in two-sided markets

Understand the effect of an innovation on the creation and capture of value

Identify possible threats to competitive advantage in two-sided markets as well as in developing countries

Understand the value of co-opetition and how cooperation with competitors and complementors can increase a company’s profitability

The aim of this paper is to research grease and additives' influence on fretting wear of mild steel.

Experiments were performed on a laboratory stand with contact conditions cylinder on flat. The mild steel couples were tested under dry conditions and lubricated with mineral and synthetic greases containing as additives: graphite, molybdenum disulphide, ZDDP and molybdenum dithiocarbamate in different concentrations.

The results revealed a significant influence of grease consistency and its welding load on the fretting wear of steel couples. Graphite and molybdenum disulphide were effective in a 10 percent concentration. ZDDP additive in a more than 1 percent concentration increased fretting wear. Molybdenum dithiocarbamate was not more effective than molybdenum disulphide powder. Grease lubrication of the fretted couple changed significantly the wear mechanism observed on SEM photographs of fretting scars.

The paper presents some indications of proper selection of grease for fretting prevention.

The influence of the main features of grease on fretting wear was confirmed on the basis of extensive investigation.