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Facing increased asset prices and growing competition, private equity firms needed to innovate their established business model and shift from focusing on financial engineering to creating operating value. Yet, the authors understand little about how private equity firms increase the value of companies in their portfolios. This paper aims to shed light on organizational strategies, activities and governance principles that private equity firms use to create value.

This investigation combines several qualitative research approaches. Using in-depth interviews with executives in 35 private equity firms, the authors define industry-specific design principles for value creation using a Gioia methodology. They then use the Eisenhardt methodology to make in-depth case comparisons among sample firms.

Private equity firms employ one of four strategies – labeled “Infiltrator,” “Consultant,” “Organizer” or “Investor” – to create value in portfolio companies, each with a different organizational structure, level of cooperation between investor and portfolio firm and specific configuration of design elements.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to focus on private equity value creation strategies from an organizational perspective. To their knowledge, no other publication has tapped this deeply into the interface between the private equity firm and the portfolio company to define the exact approach taken by the firm. This study contributes to the emerging discussion around the nonfinancial inputs to value creation. In addition, this qualitative research design is underrepresented in private equity research.

A zero-day vulnerability is a complimentary ticket to the attackers for gaining entry into the network. Thus, there is necessity to device appropriate threat detection systems and establish an innovative and safe solution that prevents unauthorised intrusions for defending various components of cybersecurity. We present a survey of recent Intrusion Detection Systems (IDS) in detecting zero-day vulnerabilities based on the following dimensions: types of cyber-attacks, datasets used and kinds of network detection systems.

Purpose: The study focuses on presenting an exhaustive review on the effectiveness of the recent IDS with respect to zero-day vulnerabilities.

Methodology: Systematic exploration was done at the IEEE, Elsevier, Springer, RAID, ESCORICS, Google Scholar, and other relevant platforms of studies published in English between 2015 and 2021 using keywords and combinations of relevant terms.

Findings: It is possible to train IDS for zero-day attacks. The existing IDS have strengths that make them capable of effective detection against zero-day attacks. However, they display certain limitations that reduce their credibility. Novel strategies like deep learning, machine learning, fuzzing technique, runtime verification technique, and Hidden Markov Models can be used to design IDS to detect malicious traffic.

Implication: This paper explored and highlighted the advantages and limitations of existing IDS enabling the selection of best possible IDS to protect the system. Moreover, the comparison between signature-based and anomaly-based IDS exemplifies that one viable approach to accurately detect the zero-day vulnerabilities would be the integration of hybrid mechanism.

This study aims to discuss the current context, scope and impacts of a metaverse in the hospitality and tourism industry. Although existing literature discussed the potentials of the metaverse in this context, the ways the metaverse work is still being defined and accessing a complete metaverse is still not yet possible. This existing knowledge will become increasingly sophisticated and complex as developments in the metaverse continue, eventually contributing to a knowledge gap in knowledge, and its implications in shaping how the future digital environment should take form.

This work is based on a critical reflection of the existing developments and applications of the metaverse. Drawing from authors’ experiences, and synthesis of existing works and narratives, this work discusses the applications of the metaverse, critical factors for considerations and applications of the metaverse and proposes the way forward for potential users.

The metaverse provides new opportunities for the hospitality and tourism industry but the impact of the technology may not be felt immediately. The real challenge lies in developing a responsible digital environment for users and suppliers. Although the aspects to be considered are many, a lack of preparedness is a great obstacle.

This paper provides a comprehensive evaluation of how the metaverse can be applied in the hospitality and tourism sector aiming to provide diverse stakeholders insights into the associated opportunities and pitfalls.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this paper is among the first attempts to critically reflect on the possibilities of the metaverse, and contributes to the discussion on the attributes of the metaverse for tourism and hospitality (e.g. SSIs, decentralization) and includes discussion on special needs users, sustainable usage and climate change, and presents several agendas for further actions.

This paper aims to provide a case study of complex conflict management within the arms race on the Korean Peninsula. Exploring the complex nexus of nuclear weapons, asymmetry and a qualitative arms race, the study explains how the arms race between Seoul and Pyongyang has promoted stability on the Korean Peninsula.

Presenting the limits of arguments that the US security guarantee is the factor that saved the two Koreas from going to war again, this paper explores the utility of the inter-Korean arms race as a stabilizer that promotes indirect negotiations. While presenting Korean anomalies, this paper analyzes the three stages of the inter-Korean arms race – especially its nuclear weapons, its asymmetry and the nature of arms races – and provides extant explanations on the causes and consequences of the qualitative arms race. These key elements drive the states’ strategic motives.

Using the case of the inter-Korean qualitative arms race and US extended nuclear deterrence on the Korean Peninsula, the study shows the complexities of conflict management today. This paper identifies three contributing factors – US nuclear weapons, asymmetry and the qualitative characteristic of the arms race – to explain the enduring stability on the peninsula despite the arms race’s intensification. The paper finds that although US nuclear-extended deterrence plays a critical role, it does not capture the full context of the ongoing, dynamic inter-Korean arms race; a prolonged arms race between the two Koreas has become a new regularity; the qualitative characteristic of the inter-Korean arms race, which is driven by technological advancement, contributes to stability in the arms race; and as the constant mismatch in priority technologies becomes more severe, the changes to the existing asymmetry could increase instability.

This paper offers a diverse perspective to the literature on conflict management and captures the complexities of 21^st-century conflict management. Through a thorough examination of the inter-Korean arms race, it brings readers’ attention to the nested dynamics within the arms race and shows how an intensifying arms race can promote stability. Furthermore, the paper explains the implications for potential instability – fueled by the comprehensive mix of a dynamic qualitative arms race and the US extended nuclear deterrence – in the Indo-Pacific region.

This study aims to use a theoretical-based case study of two distinct ownership groups of the Jack Daniel’s brand to explore how rhetorical history (i.e. malleability of the past for strategic goals) may evoke and capitalize on different forms of nostalgia. Within, the authors configure four forms of nostalgia (i.e. personal, historical, collective and cultural) from the individual or collective interaction and level of direct experience one has with the past as lived or happened.

This study uses an historical research approach which involved the identification of primary and secondary sources, facility tour, source criticism and triangulation to create themes of rhetorical history infused with nostalgic narratives using compelling evidence through rich description of this fusion.

The findings reveal how nostalgia-driven narratives reflecting different collective longing for the re-creation of an American Paradise Lost used by Jack Daniel (i.e. the man) and later but differently by Brown-Forman. This study uncovers how the company’s inherited past was used rhetorically throughout its history, beginning with the nostalgic story of Jack Daniel and the distillery’s nostalgically choreographed location in Lynchburg, Tennessee. This study delves into this setting to highlight the importance of symbols, details, emotional appeals and communications for collective memory and identity development and to showcase the ways in which they are influenced by different types and forms of nostalgia.

This study adds to a limited number of studies focused on understanding the impact of founders on an organization’s brand and how that is malleable. This study responds to scholarly calls to study the influence of sequenced historical rhetoric on an organization and highlight the relevance of social emotions such as nostalgia for rhetorical history. Finally, the theoretical contribution involves the advancing and construction of a theory typology of nostalgia previously proposed by Havlena and Holak in 1996.