Search results

1 – 10 of 13
Open Access
Article
Publication date: 21 May 2024

Imoh Antai and Roland Hellberg

Management and risk techniques within industries have been studied from various disciplines in nondefense-affiliated industries. Given the assumption that these techniques…

Abstract

Purpose

Management and risk techniques within industries have been studied from various disciplines in nondefense-affiliated industries. Given the assumption that these techniques, strategies and mitigations used in one industry apply to other similar industries, this paper examines the defense industry for risk assessment. We characterize interactions for onward application to risk identification in the defense industry.

Design/methodology/approach

This research employs a systems theory approach to the characterization of industry interactions, using three dimensions including environment, boundaries and relationships. It develops a framework for identifying relationship types within system-of-systems (SoS) environments by analyzing the features of interactions that occur in such environments.

Findings

The study’s findings show that different systems environments within the defense industry SoS exhibit different interaction characteristics and hence display different relationship patterns, which can indicate potential vulnerabilities.

Research limitations/implications

By employing interaction as a means for evaluating potential risks, this research emphasizes the role played by relationship factors in reducing perceived risks and simultaneously increasing trust.

Originality/value

This paper intends to develop an initial snapshot of the relationship status of the Swedish defense industry in light of the global consolidation in this industry, which is a relevant contextual contribution.

Details

Journal of Defense Analytics and Logistics, vol. 8 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2399-6439

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 16 March 2023

Imoh Antai and Roland Hellberg

The total defence (TD) concept constitutes a joint endeavour between the military forces and civil defence structures within a TD state. Logistics is essential for such joint…

1344

Abstract

Purpose

The total defence (TD) concept constitutes a joint endeavour between the military forces and civil defence structures within a TD state. Logistics is essential for such joint collaboration to work; however, the mismatch between military and civil defence logistics structures poses challenges for such joint collaboration. The purpose of this paper is to identify logistics concept areas within the TD framework that allow for military and civil defence collaborations from a logistics operations perspective.

Design/methodology/approach

Pattern-matching analysis is used to compare patterns found in the investigated case with those prescribed from the literature and predicted to occur. The study seeks to identify logistics concepts within TD from the literature and from the events describing the Swedish response to the Covid-19 pandemic. Pattern matching thus allows for the reconciliation of logistics concepts from the literature to descriptions of how the response was handled, albeit under a TD framework.

Findings

Findings show quite distinct foci between the theoretical and observational realms in terms of logistics applications. While the theoretical realm identifies four main logistics concepts, the observational realm identifies five logistics conceptual themes. This goes on to show an incongruence between the military and civil parts of the TD.

Research limitations/implications

This study provides basis for further research into the applications and management of logistics activity within TD and emergency response.

Originality/value

Logistics applications within TD have not, until now, received much attention in the literature. Given this knowledge gap, this study is of original value.

Details

Journal of Humanitarian Logistics and Supply Chain Management, vol. 14 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2042-6747

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 20 January 2023

Imoh Antai and Nonyelum Lina Eze

In the African context, the threat of the disruption of traditional business value-creation processes, currently facilitated by the growing information technology (IT) ecosystem…

2348

Abstract

Purpose

In the African context, the threat of the disruption of traditional business value-creation processes, currently facilitated by the growing information technology (IT) ecosystem, came with the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Thus, this paper aims to investigate the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on interfirm relationships within the context of the digital ecosystem in Africa.

Design/methodology/approach

This study employs an explanatory–exploratory qualitative approach from an interpretivist stance to investigate the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on interfirm relationships. The authors conducted seven in-depth interviews with top management executives in a Nigerian technology company, together with the company's archival data that provided the pre, during and post pandemic (2018–2021) business-to-business (B2B) relationship structures, to determine how these relationships have been affected.

Findings

The results suggest that the pandemic had a minimal effect on partnership relationships in the B2B ecosystems of the case company but affected only non-partnership relationships.

Research limitations/implications

The authors' qualitative study is interpretive and the sample size is limited. Hence, there is a need for caution in generalizing the findings. The framework can be further validated across a wider population.

Practical implications

Partnerships can help organizations weather business crises. Consequently, organizations should maintain a healthy number of partnership relations to deal with periods in which challenges emerge in the business landscape. In other words, with tight contracts and a strategic focus on goals and objectives, partnership relations can help organizations weather business crises.

Originality/value

This study builds upon the burgeoning body of literature on digital ecosystems within the African context, which is a relevant contextual contribution.

Details

Information Technology & People, vol. 36 no. 8
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0959-3845

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 22 January 2010

Imoh Antai and Crispin M. Mutshinda

The purpose of this paper is to suggest the use of reverse medical supply chain data to infer changes of a population's health status with regard to a focal disease. It includes a…

1082

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to suggest the use of reverse medical supply chain data to infer changes of a population's health status with regard to a focal disease. It includes a detailed illustration of how health status information can be obtained from drug reverse chains.

Design/methodology/approach

A Bayesian dynamical model linking drug reverse supply chain data to relevant health status indicators with regard to a focal disease is developed. A detailed implementation of the model on computer‐simulated data is considered. The predictive ability of the methodology is also assessed using out‐of‐sample Monte Carlo‐based predictive analysis.

Findings

The results substantiate the good fit of the model to the empirical data.

Research limitations/implications

Difficulty in obtaining actual return data and in selecting appropriate health status indicators. The correspondence disease‐drug is typically not one‐to‐one. Experts' opinion is required in setting up suitable mixing weights as many drugs may inform the health status relative to a given disease and vice versa.

Practical implications

Reverse logistics data may contain potential information, and this is not exclusive to medical chains.

Originality/value

The paper's suggestions tend to reinforce the notion that supply chain data may be used in many unsuspected settings. Solutions to issues of immediate concern in public health require multidisciplinary cooperation, and this paper shows how supply chain management can contribute. It is believed that the potential of reverse chain data in the health status prospect has previously hardly ever been pointed out.

Details

Management Research Review, vol. 33 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2040-8269

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 2 August 2013

Imoh Antai and Hans Olson

Although the supply chain (SC) competition concept has emerged during the past decade as the way firms will compete in future, there is scant academic research on actual…

3640

Abstract

Purpose

Although the supply chain (SC) competition concept has emerged during the past decade as the way firms will compete in future, there is scant academic research on actual mechanisms through which such competition can occur. The purpose of this paper is to proposes interaction as the means by which competition between supply chains may be undertaken.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper investigates a Swedish logistics center via case study methodology to develop the idea of interaction for SC vs SC competition.

Findings

Results suggest that interaction points along organizations ' supply chains may present enough breadth to assume a role in determining how SC vs SC competition may be played out in reality.

Research limitations/implications

Interaction, as proposed here, implies an emphasis on all points at which supply chains meet to request goods and services, including various points where such supply chains converge, e.g. service providers, original equipment manufacturers, etc.

Originality/value

Most studies dealing with competition between supply chains fall short of exploring the link between theory and corresponding practice of this evolving competition mode. Such a link is provided with the use of logistics centers.

Details

International Journal of Physical Distribution & Logistics Management, vol. 43 no. 7
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0960-0035

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 3 August 2015

Imoh Antai, Crispin Mutshinda and Richard Owusu

The purpose of this paper is to introduce a 3R (right time, right place, and right material) principle for characterizing failure in humanitarian/relief supply chains’ response to…

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to introduce a 3R (right time, right place, and right material) principle for characterizing failure in humanitarian/relief supply chains’ response to natural disasters, and describes a Bayesian methodology of the failure odds with regard to external factors that may affect the disaster-relief outcome, and distinctive supply chain proneness to failure.

Design/methodology/approach

The suggested 3Rs combine simplicity and completeness, enclosing all aspects of the 7R principle popular within business logistics. A fixed effects logistic regression model is designed, with a Bayesian approach, to relate the supply chains’ odds for success in disaster-relief to potential environmental predictors, while accounting for distinctive supply chains’ proneness to failure.

Findings

Analysis of simulated data demonstrate the model’s ability to distinguish relief supply chains with regards to their disaster-relief failure odds, taking into account pertinent external factors and supply chain idiosyncrasies.

Research limitations/implications

Due to the complex nature of natural disasters and the scarcity of subsequent data, the paper employs computer-simulated data to illustrate the implementation of the proposed methodology.

Originality/value

The 3R principle offers a simple and familiar basis for evaluating failure in relief supply chains’ response to natural disasters. Also, it brings the issues of customer orientation within humanitarian relief and supply operations to the fore, which had only been implicit within the humanitarian and relief supply chain literature.

Details

Journal of Humanitarian Logistics and Supply Chain Management, vol. 5 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2042-6747

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 13 September 2011

Imoh Antai

The purpose of this paper is to propose a conceptualization of supply chain vs supply chain competition using the ecological niche approach. It suggests a probabilistic…

3153

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to propose a conceptualization of supply chain vs supply chain competition using the ecological niche approach. It suggests a probabilistic methodology for evaluating competition from time series data, using overlap in the utilization of services provided by critical providers as a source of competition.

Design/methodology/approach

Literature on ecological niche theory and competition is explored and given the uncertainty that surrounds the operation and management of supply chains, a probabilistic approach to the analysis of supply chain vs supply chain competition (via the Bayesian inference) is advocated. Simulated data are used to illustrate the methodology.

Findings

Should an area of overlap be identified, ecological niche theory provides a sensible approach to identifying the nature and extent of competition between supply chains. Applicability of the methodology is not limited to supply chain vs supply chain competition.

Research limitations/implications

The data used for the analysis of competition between supply chains are computer generated and use a single niche dimension. Although this was done to merely test/validate the proposed model, the approach is somewhat oversimplified. However, the model is readily extendable to multiple niche dimensions.

Originality/value

The proposed approach offers a simple and straight‐forward method of estimating competition in general, and supply chains vs supply chain competition in particular. Attempts at using the niche theory of competition in this context are so far inconspicuous. Hence, approaching competition in this way contributes to furthering our understanding of competitive interaction especially in supply chains, whose prospect is yet to be pointed out in literature.

Article
Publication date: 30 March 2010

Aseem Kinra and Imoh Antai

The purpose of this paper is to elicit the subtle but progressive shift in organizational/institutional interaction with its rivals within a competitive framework, and thereby…

1512

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to elicit the subtle but progressive shift in organizational/institutional interaction with its rivals within a competitive framework, and thereby discusses and analyses paradigm shifts in competition and competitiveness. The paper argues that interorganizational networks and the recent concept of supply chain management may have induced a change in how competitiveness is viewed at the national, industry, and firm levels of interaction.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper conceptualizes extant literature into distinct themes of (organizational and institutional) analysis – micro, macro, and meso – and based on this review the paper seeks to identify emerging logics and shifts within mainstream competitiveness literature over the last decade.

Findings

The paper suggests that the micro‐macro theme of competition and competitiveness remains dominant in mainstream literature. Results from the analysis also support the notion of emergent logics of competition and competitiveness, which could then imply that a paradigm shift may well have begun within the area of competition and competitiveness.

Research limitations/implications

The limited findings point towards more detailed forays into competition of interorganizational forms such as networks and supply chains, before a paradigm shift may be claimed.

Practical implications

The paper serves to trigger the consciousness of stakeholders to think realistically with regards to claims that competition and competitiveness are carried out on the network level, e.g. a supply chain vs supply chain playing field.

Originality/value

While networks and supply chains have generally been inferred as new frontiers for contemporary competition in different functionally‐oriented literature domains, analysis and performance of such emergent logics is yet to be shown. The classification of different competition logics put forth in this paper aid in systemizing the competitiveness/competition rhetoric.

Details

Competitiveness Review: An International Business Journal, vol. 20 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1059-5422

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 February 2016

Richard A Owusu, Crispin M Mutshinda, Imoh Antai, Kofi Q Dadzie and Evelyn M Winston

– The purpose of this paper is to identify user-generated content (UGC) features that determine web purchase decision making.

2544

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to identify user-generated content (UGC) features that determine web purchase decision making.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors embed a spike-and-slab Bayesian variable selection mechanism into a logistic regression model to identify the UGC features that are critical to web purchase intent. This enables us to make a highly reliable analysis of survey data.

Findings

The results indicate that the web purchase decision is driven by the relevance, up-to-dateness and credibility of the UGC information content.

Research limitations/implications

The results show that the characteristics of UGC are seen as positive and the medium enables consumers to sort information and concentrate on aspects of the message that are similar to traditional word-of-mouth (WOM). One important implication is the relative importance of credibility which has been previously hypothesized to be lower in the electronic word-of-mouth (e-WOM) context. The results show that consumers consider credibility important as the improved technology provides more possibilities to find out about that factor. A limitation is that the data are not fully representative of the general population but our Bayesian method gives us high analytical quality.

Practical implications

The study shows that UGC impacts consumer online purchase intentions. Marketers should understand the wide range of media that provide UGC and they should concentrate on the relevance, up-to-dateness and credibility of product information that they provide.

Originality/value

The analytical quality of the spike- and- slab Bayesian method suggests a new way of understanding the impact of aspects of UGC on consumers.

Content available
Article
Publication date: 20 January 2012

Abbas J. Ali

776

Abstract

Details

Competitiveness Review: An International Business Journal, vol. 22 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1059-5422

1 – 10 of 13