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The work presented in this article is part of an action research project carried out in collaboration between Bang & Olufsen (B&O) and the Center for Industrial Production (CIP) of Aalborg University. The aim of the project is to investigate how end‐manufacturers can source new technology via innovative NPD‐related supplier relationships. Whereas prior work on buyer‐supplier relationships is dominated by a product‐oriented view, the present research has adopted a resource‐based (competence) view to develop a framework to guide companies in developing and handling competence‐based relationships with technology suppliers. The framework suggests four different types of inter‐organisational competence development, two of which will be illustrated using empirical data obtained through two in‐depth case studies of innovative partnership projects between B&O and some of its sub‐suppliers.

The purpose of this paper is two-fold: first, it attempts to determine whether suppliers perceive distributive justice (equity) when their key customers implement sustainable sourcing initiatives based on assessment governance, composed of codes of conduct and auditing; second, it generates insights into specific costs, rewards, and investments and how these together result in perceived equity.

A qualitative research design was adopted for this study. A total of 30 executives from textile manufacturing suppliers in China, India, and Bangladesh were interviewed to determine their perceptions of distributive justice in relation to their key customers’ sustainable sourcing initiatives.

Most of the interviewees perceived that their customers’ assessment of governance initiatives was unfair. Four types of suppliers are identified based on their varying perceptions of the equity equation.

The findings introduce distributive justice as an important mediating variable between assessment-based governance and compliance. They also provide insights into the various types of perceived costs, rewards, and investments related to sustainable sourcing, and how they form varieties of the equity equation. The findings rely on a limited number of respondents and should, therefore, be researched further.

Assessment based on codes of conduct and auditing is the most prevalent sustainable sourcing governance approach, but suppliers may perceive this as an injustice leading to non-compliance. Buying companies are therefore advised to consider supplier perceptions of costs, rewards, and investments and adapt their sustainable sourcing initiatives accordingly.

Increased consideration of distributive justice in sustainable sourcing should increase the likelihood of supplier compliance, improving conditions for employees in global textile plants.

Extant research has studied the connection between assessment-based sustainability governance and compliance or overall performance. This paper contributes by suggesting that distributive justice might be a mediating variable helping to explain this connection.

The purpose of this paper is to introduce the practice paradigm of pragmatic constructivism.

Pragmatic constructivism emphasizes the role of the actors in the construction of organized reality. For such construct to function successfully, four dimensions of reality must be integrated in the actor-world relations.

This includes an examination of pragmatic constructivist theory as an alternative to traditional realism and critical theories of organizational reality. The papers of the special issue include methodological, conceptual and empirical studies to expand the understanding of management accounting in relation to the actors’ construction of functioning organizational practices.

As pragmatic constructivism is a relatively new paradigm, there is a need for further methodological and conceptual development and empirical studies of functioning practices.

In a discipline such as management accounting that can be theoretically polarized between the “realist” scientific mainstream and social constructivist criticism, pragmatic constructivism offers a mediating model in which realism is retained as the pragmatic criteria of success of the organizational actors’ construction.

The purpose of this study is to show that the humidity levels for surface insulation resistance (SIR)-related failures are dependent on the type of activators used in no-clean flux systems and to demonstrate the possibility of simulating the effects of humidity and contamination on printed circuit board components and sensitive parts if typical SIR data connected to a particular climatic condition are available. This is shown on representative components and typical circuits.

A range of SIR values obtained on SIR patterns with 1,476 squares was used as input data for the circuit analysis. The SIR data were compared to the surface resistance values observable on a real device printed circuit board assembly. SIR issues at the component and circuit levels were analysed on the basis of parasitic circuit effects owing to the formation of a water layer as an electrical conduction medium.

This paper provides a summary of the effects of contamination with various weak organic acids representing the active components in no-clean solder flux residue, and demonstrates the effect of humidity and contamination on the possible malfunctions and errors in electronic circuits. The effect of contamination and humidity is expressed as drift from the nominal resistance values of the resistors, self-discharge of the capacitors and the errors in the circuits due to parasitic leakage currents (reduction of SIR).

The methodology of the analysis of the circuits using a range of empirical leakage resistance values combined with the knowledge of the humidity and contamination profile of the electronics can be used for the robust design of a device, which is also important for electronic products relying on low current consumption for long battery lifetime.

Examples provide a basic link between the combined effect of humidity and contamination and the performance of electronic circuits. The methodology shown provides the possibility of addressing the climatic reliability of an electronic device at the early stage of device design by using typical SIR data representing the possible climate exposure.

The aim of this work is to investigate the decomposition behaviour of the activator species commonly used in the wave solder no-clean flux systems and to estimate the residue amount left after subjecting the samples to simulated wave soldering conditions.

Changes in the chemical structure of the activators were studied using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy technique and were correlated to the exposure temperatures within the range of wave soldering process. The amount of residue left on the surface was estimated using standardized acid-base titration method as a function of temperature, time of exposure and the substrate material used.

The study shows that there is a possibility of anhydride-like species formation during the thermal treatment of fluxes containing weak organic acids (WOAs) as activators (succinic and DL-malic). The decomposition patterns of solder flux activators depend on their chemical nature, time of heat exposure and substrate materials. Evaporation of the residue from the surface of different materials (laminate with solder mask, copper surface or glass surface) was found to be more pronounced for succinic-based solutions at highest test temperatures than for adipic acid. Less left residue was found on the laminate surface with solder mask (∼5-20 per cent of initial amount at 350°C) and poorest acid evaporation was noted for glass substrates (∼15-90 per cent).

The findings are attributed to the chemistry of WOAs typically used as solder flux activators. The results show the importance WOA type in relation to its melting/boiling points and the impact on the residual amount of contamination left after soldering process.

The results show that the evaporation of the flux residues takes place only at significantly high temperatures and longer exposure times are needed compared to the temperature range used for the wave soldering process. The extended time of thermal treatment and careful choice of fluxing technology would ensure obtaining more climatically reliable product.

The purpose of this paper was to analyse typical printed circuit board assemblies (PCBAs) processed by reflow, wave or selective wave soldering for typical levels of process-related residues, resulting from a specific or combination of soldering processes. Typical solder flux residue distribution pattern, composition and concentration are profiled and reported. The effect of such contaminants on conformal coating was tested.

Presence of localized flux residues was visualized using a commercial residue reliability assessment testing gel test and chemical structure was identified by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, while the concentration was measured using ion chromatography, and the electrical properties of the extracts were determined by measuring the leak current using a twin platinum electrode set-up. Localized extraction of residue was carried out using a commercial critical contamination control extraction system.

Results clearly show that the amount and distribution of flux residues are a function of the soldering process, and the level can be reduced by an appropriate cleaning. Selective soldering process generates significantly higher levels of residues compared to the wave and reflow process. For conformal coated PCBAs, the contamination levels generated from the tested wave and selective soldering process are found to be enough to generate blisters under exposure to high humidity levels.

Although it is generally known that different soldering processes can introduce contamination on the PCBA surface, compromising its cleanliness, no systematic work is reported investigating the relative levels of residue introduced by various soldering processes and its effect on corrosion reliability.

While big data creates business value, knowledge on how value is created remains limited and research is needed to discover big data’s value mechanism. The purpose of this paper is to explore value creation capabilities of big data through an alignment perspective.

The paper is based on a single case study of a service division of a large Danish wind turbine generator manufacturer based on 18 semi-structured interviews.

A strategic alignment framework comprising human, information technology, organization, performance, process and strategic practices are used as a basis to identify 15 types of alignment capabilities and their inter-dependent variables fostering the value creation of big data. The alignment framework is accompanied by seven propositions to obtain alignment of big data in service processes.

The study demonstrates empirical anchoring of how alignment capabilities affect a company’s ability to create value from big data as identified in a service supply chain.

Service supply chains and big data are complex matters. Therefore, understanding how alignment affects a company’s ability to create value of big data may help the company to overcome challenges of big data.

The study demonstrates how value from big data can be created following an alignment logic. By this, both critical and complementary alignment capabilities have been identified.

This paper aims to investigate the effect of no-clean flux chemistry with various weak organic acids (WOAs) as activators on the corrosion reliability of electronics with emphasis on the hygroscopic nature of the residue.

The hygroscopicity of flux residue was studied by quartz crystal microbalance, while corrosive effects were studied by leakage current and impedance measurements on standard test boards. The measurements were performed as a function of relative humidity (RH) in the range from 60 to ∼99 per cent at 25°C. The corrosiveness of solder flux systems was visualized by the ex situ analysis using a gel with tin ion indicator.

The results showed that the solder flux residues are characterized by different threshold RH, above which a sudden increase in direct current leakage by 2–4 orders of magnitude and a significant reduction in surface resistance in the impedance measurements were observed.

The findings are attributed to the deliquescence RH of the WOA(s) in the flux and chemistry of water-layer formation. The results show the importance of WOA type in relation to its solubility and deliquescence RH on the corrosion reliability of printed circuit boards under humid conditions.

The classification of solder flux systems according to IPC J-STD-004 standard does not specify the WOAs in the flux; however, ranking of the flux systems based on the hygroscopic property of activators would be useful information when selecting no-clean flux systems for electronics with applications in humid conditions.

This article presents a theoretical investigation of the concept of ‘subject’ or ‘subject matter’ in library and information science. Most conceptions of ‘subject’ in the literature are not explicit but implicit. Various indexing and classification theories, including automatic indexing and citation indexing, have their own more or less implicit concepts of subject. This fact puts the emphasis on making the implicit theories of ‘subject matter’ explicit as the first step. A very close connection exists between what subjects are, and how we are to know them. Those researchers who place the subjects in the minds of the users have a conception of ‘subject’ different to that possessed by those who regard the subject as a fixed property of the documents. The key to the definition of the concept of ‘subject’ lies in the epistemological investigation of how we are going to know what we need to know about documents in order to describe them in a way which facilitates information retrieval. The second step therefore is an analysis of the implicit epistemological conceptions in the major existing conceptions of ‘subject’. The different conceptions of ‘subject’ can therefore be classified into epistemological positions, e.g. ‘subjective idealism’ (or the empiric/positivistic viewpoint), ‘objective idealism’ (the rationalistic viewpoint), ‘pragmatism’ and ‘materialism/ realism’. The third and final step is to propose a new theory of subject matter based on an explicit theory of knowledge. In this article this is done from the point of view of a realistic/materialistic epistemology. From this standpoint the subject of a document is defined as the epistemological potentials of that document.

In organizational health promotion research, health promotion capacity is a central concept that is used to describe the abilities of individuals, organizations, and communities to promote health. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the theoretical underpinnings of the literature on health promotion capacity building and, further, to suggest an alternative theoretical perspective which draws on recent developments in organizational theory.

The paper begins by a critical discussion of the capacity building literature, which is juxtaposed with the relational perspective of contemporary organizational theory. The theoretical argument is developed in reference to the case of Danish municipal health promotion agencies, drawing on secondary sources as well as ethnographic fieldwork among public health officers.

The capacity building literature tends to reify the concept of capacity. In contrast, this paper argues that health promotion capacity is constantly defined and redefined through processes of organizing. The case study suggests that, faced with limited resources and limited knowledge, health promotion officials attain a sense of capacity through an ongoing reworking of organizational forms.

Organizational health promotion research should look for the organizational forms that are conducive to health promotion practices under shifting social circumstances.

This paper makes explicit an inherent theoretical tension in the capacity building literature and suggests a novel theoretical framework for understanding organizational capacity.