Search results

This paper reports on the planning, introduction, and implementation of surface mount technology (SMT) for printed circuit board assembly at Convergent Technologies. It is written from the production personnel's view‐point. The report starts with a brief history of the company, describes its dynamic environment, outlines the factors that led to the decision to implement SMT and provides the time‐frame for said implementation. With this background the paper then deals at length with design and manufacturing issues and questions that arose during this undertaking. The report concludes with a summary that outlines the benefits and concerns of SMT and highlights the future trends for this technology.

This paper aims to explore the digital economy in the fields of the most promising new technologies: information and communication technologies, biotechnology and nanotechnology. It highlights the convergence of nano-, bio-, info- and cognitive (NBIC) technologies by developing a model for the accurate evaluation of different types of options in the development process of convergent technologies.

The empirical research is based on theoretical analysis and case studies. The authors conducted six in-depth interviews. The study covered different research projects led by centres of excellence, competence centres and institutions that support the transfer of innovations in the economic and business environment.

The research findings prove that there is a convergence of NBIC technologies that can be observed and modelled. The created evolutionary model of NBIC convergence, also based on the theory of real options, allows a proper evaluation of the entire convergence process.

For enterprises and scientific research institutions, the NBIC model could represent the starting point for developing further concepts of investment evaluation. The model also considers the indicators of the innovation system, which, in addition to the marketing area, include regulatory challenges of companies (competition, copyrights, patents, taxation, etc.).

This paper enhances the understanding of new technologies in a digital economy. The purpose of this study is to clarify the principal factors for the effective observation and measurement of the convergence phenomenon. It also offers suggestions for improvement of the research and innovation system in the new economy.

This research examines Indian service managers' perceptions on impact of convergent technologies on their work and resultant organisational performance. The research uses four dimensions – task productivity, task innovation, customer satisfaction and management control – taken together, to investigate the perceived impact of convergent technologies adoption in service organisations context and further examines the resultant organisational performance, based on these dimensions.

The study used partial least squares (PLS) approach to evaluate the measurement model and the structural model. The study was conducted in service industry firms that have made a significant progression towards adopting convergent technologies.

The results of the study demonstrated higher levels of perceived impact of adoption of convergent technologies on all the four dimensions (i.e. task productivity, task innovation, customer satisfaction and management control). The results of the study also indicate that all the impact dimensions positively influence organisational performance.

The results of the study suggest that all the impact dimensions positively influence organisation, therefore the service sector managers should be aware about the role of adopting latest convergent technologies so as to enhance the task productivity, innovation, customer satisfaction and management control in their job roles.

The practical implications of this research are derived on the basis of Future of Work, Labour Market Information Systems, Productivity, Enterprise Development, Enhancing skills of service employees and Employability themes.

To researchers best knowledge is to first study of its kind to evaluate the perceived impact of convergent technologies on organisational performance in Indian context.

The paper aimed to summarize innovative rules of Chinese manufacturing enterprises, and put forward some insights in optimal allocation of innovation resources and enhancing the capability of indigenous innovation, so as to overcome the innovation dilemma.

Having diagnosed the current research of innovation flows, the authors defined the concept and stated characteristics of mainstream and new‐stream innovation. Innovation life cycle theory and technology trajectory theory were used to map two evolution patterns of mainstream and new‐stream innovation. It took weeks to stay in firms to obtain original data and interview managers, engineers, and mechanists. From the case study the authors proposed the improvement projects and opportunities for firms to overcome the “innovation dilemma”.

In the indigenous innovation process, enterprises should breed new‐stream innovation as they strengthen the mainstream innovation, view the new‐stream technology as the innovation direction, and fulfill the constant innovation in the convergent innovation and replace evolution process. Meanwhile, enterprises should take precautions both to expand and develop, and fulfill technology transition and innovation upgrade through convergent innovation. Furthermore, firms' convergent innovation, which will finally achieve the “projects‐talents‐products‐markets” collaborative innovation, should be clear about target market and project‐oriented, take the product as the carrier, and be committed to cultivate creative talents and innovative teams.

This paper enriches the existing theory on indigenous innovation by introducing the new concept of mainstream and new‐stream innovation. The findings would help firms to jump out from the innovation morass.

Convergence in the life sciences and health care industries – the combining of two or more of drugs, diagnostics and devices to create an improved health care product – is leading to new opportunities for business growth and product differentiation. This report aims to examine the issues around convergence, including the drivers, risks and regulatory issues.

This report is based on industry and literature reviews and builds on research carried out by Deloitte Research on the life sciences and health care industry.

The paper finds that technological advances, evolving health care needs and shifting market conditions are creating favourable conditions for convergence. Developing convergent technologies, however, has risks and uncertainties that life sciences companies need to consider along with regulatory issues. Cross‐sector partnerships are becoming more of a necessity and reality for health care firms, who have to be aware of the many operational and ownership issues involved.

Market pressures and opportunities are motivating life sciences firms of all types and sizes to invest in convergence. Convergent technology is transforming cardiovascular care, orthopedic treatment, tissue wound management and other clinical areas by creating solutions that are less invasive, less painful, more patient‐specific, more convenient and sometimes more affordable. Consequently, players from all sectors are entering the competition for R&D assets, setting up new rivalries and alliances.

In mapping the many factors surrounding convergence in the life sciences industry, this report enables firms to evaluate their own opportunities and priorities. It proposes a framework that companies can use to decide which pathway to convergence is best for them.

Industry 4.0, the integrated digital process world in production, is an under researched area. Especially for the wine industry, 4.0 theoretical base up to date is weak, impeding further digital transformation of the wine industry. Some basic-level digital capabilities exist in most of the researched business models, which is why further digital transformation requires strategic redefining of business models in order to further transform the whole industry.

A qualitative research approach based on the concept of business model innovation (BMI) has been deployed in order to identify business models and consensus building between industry´s stakeholders. Semistructured interviews delivered primary data.

The diversity of existing business models in the wine industry as well regarding BMI is confirmed, where each one occupies a specific place in the innovation ecosystem for Industry 4.0.

This qualitative research is exploratory and directed toward theory building. The findings confirm the importance of environmental scanning and market sensing for convergent technologies as well as the need to develop core value proposition.

This study has important implications for companies and their capabilities inside wine industry 4.0, while its main practical value being a systematical organization of weak signals to support small entrepreneurs’ transition to digitalization and Industry 4.0

The paper nourishes the theory on innovation trajectories for Industry 4.0 by including previously unidentified BMIs and a convergence–divergence continuum on the example of wine Industry 4.0.

The evolution of electronic information technologies in a Midwest state in the USA are discussed and this evolution is compared to national trends for processing information. Information management technologies are now in the third stage of evolution. Over the next five years, the technology for handling information will fully integrate voice, data, and video technologies. This integration has profound implications for how organizations manage its enactment and how organizations will adapt to their internal and external environments. In order to manage these enactments and adaptations, a new way of planning is required. Traditional “bottom up” and “top down” planning methodologies must be integrated into a planning method that defines the knit between information system architectures and resources with corporate policies and business plans. The article presents a model of this integrated planning approach for practitioners and policy makers who are responsible for designing organizational systems.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate how and why staying on the edge of emerging and converging technologies is significant for businesses to create the most vibrant, adaptive and complex behaviors, including a wider range of business relational initiatives (e.g. outsourcing, opportunistic partnership, merger and alliance, acquisition), and a better sense of which initiative to choose.

This is an inductive, interpretative case study complemented by hands‐on experience with the industry.

Appreciating why existing proprietary technologies need to be replaced with new robust and open technologies is important. Knowing when and how existing and emerging technologies would converge is even better. Developing an understanding of the likely impact of this convergence on existing network structure and network position is critical.

For practitioners the paper presents a framework for examining business relational initiatives at any given point in time and identifying a positioning path over time to shift the firm's network position. For academics it advances one's understanding on how various business relational initiatives are influenced by network structure and network position at the network level.

The purpose of this article is to discuss approaches to sustainable decision-making for integrating emerging educational technologies in library instruction while supporting evidence-based practice (EBP).

This article highlights recent trends in emerging educational technologies and EBP and details a model for supporting evidence informed decision-making. This viewpoint article draws on an analysis of recent literature, as well as experience from professional practice.

Authors discuss the need for sustainable decision-making that addresses a perceived lack of evidence surrounding emerging technologies, a dilemma that many library educators and practitioner-researchers will have faced in their own library instruction. To support the evidence-informed selection and integration of emerging educational technologies, a two-pronged model is presented, beginning with an articulation of pedagogical aims, alignment of technological affordances to these aims and support of this alignment via hard evidence available in the research literature, as well as soft evidence found in the environmental scan.

This article provides an outline and synthesis of key issues of relevance to library practitioners working within a challenging and ever-changing landscape of technologies available for learning and instruction. The proposed approach aims to create a sustainable model for addressing problems of evidence and will benefit academic librarians considering emerging educational technologies in their own pedagogy, as well as those who support the pedagogy of others.

J.D.C. Hemsley, a Director of OMI International Corporation's manufacturing and marketing business in the UK, has been elected President of The Institute of Metal Finishing for a two‐year term commencing July 1984.