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This paper aims to develop a fuzzy logic-based algorithm to predict the intermetallic compound (IMC) size and mechanical properties of soldering material, Sn96.5-Ag3.0-Cu0.5 (SAC305) alloy, at different levels of temperature. The reliability of solder joint in materials selection is critical in terms of temperature, mechanical properties and environmental aspects. Owing to a wide range of soldering materials available, the selection space finds a fuzzy characteristic.

The developed algorithm takes thermal aging temperature for SAC305 alloy as input and converts it into fuzzy domain. These fuzzified values are then subjected to a fuzzy rule base, where a set of rules determines the IMC size and mechanical properties, such as yield strength (YS) and ultimate tensile strength (UTS) of SAC305 alloy. The algorithm is successfully simulated for various input thermal aging temperatures. To analyze and validate the developed algorithm, an SAC305 lead (Pb)-free solder alloy is developed and thermally aged at 40, 60 and 100°C temperature.

The experimental results indicate an average IMCs size of 5.967 (in Pixels), 19.850 N/mm² YS and 22.740 N/mm² UTS for SAC305 alloy when thermally aged at an elevated temperature of 140°C. In comparison, the simulation results predicted 5.895 (in Pixels) average IMCs size, 19.875 N/mm² YS and 22.480 N/mm² UTS for SAC305 alloy at 140°C thermally aged temperature.

From the experimental and simulated results, it is evident that the fuzzy-based developed algorithm can be used effectively to predict the IMCs size and mechanical properties of SAC305 at various aging temperatures, for the first time.

The research on lead-free solder alloys has increased in past decades due to awareness of the environmental impact of lead contents in soldering alloys. This has led to the introduction and development of different grades of lead-free solder alloys in the global market. Tin-silver-copper is a lead-free alloy which has been acknowledged by different consortia as a good alternative to conventional tin-lead alloy. The purpose of this paper is to provide comprehensive knowledge about the tin-silver-copper series.

The approach of this study reviews the microstructure and some other properties of tin-silver-copper series after the addition of indium, titanium, iron, zinc, zirconium, bismuth, nickel, antimony, gallium, aluminium, cerium, lanthanum, yttrium, erbium, praseodymium, neodymium, ytterbium, nanoparticles of nickel, cobalt, silicon carbide, aluminium oxide, zinc oxide, titanium dioxide, cerium oxide, zirconium oxide and titanium diboride, as well as carbon nanotubes, nickel-coated carbon nanotubes, single-walled carbon nanotubes and graphene-nano-sheets.

The current paper presents a comprehensive review of the tin-silver-copper solder series with possible solutions for improving their microstructure, melting point, mechanical properties and wettability through the addition of different elements/nanoparticles and other materials.

This paper summarises the useful findings of the tin-silver-copper series comprehensively. This information will assist in future work for the design and development of novel lead-free solder alloys.

The aim of the current study is to empirically assess the effects of organizational flexibility on project portfolio (PP) performance, with the mediating role of innovation and moderating effects of environmental dynamism (ED) and absorptive capability (AC).

Data were collected from 173 manufacturing firms and analyzed using structural equation modeling (SEM) with the help of a partial least squares (PLS) approach.

Results show that innovation partially mediates the relationship between organizational flexibility and PP performance. Furthermore, the moderating effect of ED between organizational flexibility and innovation was analyzed. Additionally, AC also observed as a moderator between innovation and PP performance.

Based on the resource-based view, this study contributes to the literature by addressing the roles of innovation, ED and AC in the relationship between organizational flexibility and PP performance. Implications for managers also discussed in the end; for example, to be more competitive, they should incorporate flexibility into the firm to encourage innovation. It also emphasizes to select new innovative opportunities that correspondingly have effects on the PP performance.

The aim of the paper is to determine the asymmetric impact of tourism on the deficit in the balance of payments (BOPs).

The research uses the non-linear autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) model to investigate the asymmetric impact of tourism on Pakistan's BOPs deficit using quarterly data from 1995 to 2019.

The finding reveals that due to the positive change in tourism, the BOPs deficit decreases by 27%, although due to the negative change in tourism, the BOPs deficit rises by 2.3%. In addition, the significance of F-statistics (10.609) confirms the existence of co-integration between tourism and the deficit in the BOPs. The Wald test confirms the asymmetric association between tourism and the deficit in the BOPs over the long term.

In order to improve tourism in Pakistan, policymakers must consider the following implications. First, there is a need for an adequate infrastructure that can help the tourist. Second, the Government must maintain a stable law and order situation as a whole and particularly at tourist destinations. Finally, the Government should develop tourism-friendly policies in order to boost tourism in Pakistan.

The research provides new evidence of the impact of tourism on the BOPs using the novel non-linear ARDL (NARDL) technique. The evidence will help policymakers to develop policies to improve tourism in order to reduce the BOPs deficit.

This research designed, optimized and tested a context-specific scale to evaluate public sector employees' pension choices.

The authors developed the scale using a comprehensive process of interviews and focus groups with experts across academia and finance. The authors used the refined scale to collect data from 564 faculty members in public sector universities following a multistage systematic cluster sampling technique. The findings revealed diversity in choice across different socio-economic and demographic variables.

The results revealed that items related to the defined benefit pension system explain most of the data variance and are preferred widely. This is followed by a preference for monetizing pension benefits and a defined contribution system. These findings indicated the need for flexible pension plans.

Therefore, the progressive movement towards monetization and the shift from defined benefit to a defined contribution pension system due to economic pressures must be accurately calculated and introduced where it is suitable.

Although the theory of introducing a defined contribution pension system and monetization system is appealing, its practical implementation may not be encouraging for all employees.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between knowledge sharing and project portfolio success in Chinese construction firms. It also examines how and under what conditions knowledge sharing contributes to project portfolio success.

The authors collected questionnaire survey from 178 construction enterprises in China that manage project portfolio as a main form of their business. Hierarchical multiple regression was used to test the proposed framework.

The empirical results indicate that all three types of knowledge sharing (knowledge sharing within the project, knowledge sharing among projects and knowledge sharing within the organization) are positively related to project portfolio success. Portfolio management quality (PMQ) conduits the impact of knowledge sharing on project portfolio success. Furthermore, portfolio interdependency moderates the main effect.

This research is among the first to explicitly differentiate three types of knowledge sharing existing in project portfolios. Also, this research contributes to the literature on the antecedents of project portfolio success by showing the effect of knowledge sharing. Furthermore, this study empirically contributes to portfolio management research by clarifying the critical role of PMQ and portfolio interdependency in the mechanism of knowledge sharing and project portfolio success.

Tin-Silver-Copper is widely accepted as the best alternative to replace Tin-Lead solders in microelectronics packaging due to their acceptable properties. However, to overcome some of the shortcomings related to its microstructure and in turn, its mechanical properties at high temperature, the addition of different elements into Tin-Silver-Copper is important for investigations. The purpose of this paper is to analyse the effect of lanthanum doping on the microstructure, microhardness and tensile properties of Tin-Silver-Copper as a function of thermal aging time for 60, 120 and 180 h at a high temperature of 150°C and at high strain rates of 25, 35 and 45/s.

The microstructure of un-doped and Lanthanum-doped Tin-Silver-Copper after different thermal aging time is examined using scanning electron microscopy followed by digital image analyses using ImageJ. Brinell hardness is used to find out the microhardness properties. The tensile tests are performed using the universal testing machine. All the investigations are done after the above selected thermal aging time at high temperature. The tensile tests of the thermally aged specimens are further investigated at high strain rates of 25, 35 and 45/s.

According to the microstructural examination, Tin-Silver-Copper with 0.4 Wt.% Lanthanum is found to be more sensitive at high temperature as the aging time increases which resulted in coarse microstructure due to the non-uniform distribution of intermetallic compounds. Similarly, lower values of microhardness, yield strength and ultimate tensile strength come in favours of 0.4 Wt.% Lanthanum added Tin-Silver-Copper. Furthermore, when the thermally aged tensile specimen is tested at high strains, two trends in tensile curves of both the solder alloys are noted. The trends showed that yield strength and ultimate tensile strength increase as the strain rate increase and decrease when there is an increase in thermal aging.

The addition of higher supplement (0.4 Wt.%) of Lanthanum into Tin-Silver-Copper showed a lower hardness value, yield strength, ultimate tensile strength, ductility, toughness and fatigue in comparison to un-doped Tin-Silver-Copper at high temperature and at high strain rates. Finally, simplified material property models with minimum error are developed which will help when the actual test data are not available.

This study examines the impact of network embeddedness (NE) on innovation performance in small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), and analyses absorptive capacity as mediator and openness as moderator.

Data were collected from 209 employees of SMEs using a convenient sampling technique. Partial least squares structural equation modeling in SmartPLS was used to analyze the various constructs.

The results exhibit a positive and significant relationship in NE and absorptive capacity. Also, this study found a positive and significant relationship in absorptive capacity and innovation performance. Moreover, absorptive capacity has a positive and significant mediation role in the relationship between NE and innovation performance. Also, openness positively moderated the relationship of NE and absorptive capacity.

SMEs should try to implement the functions of NE, such as interaction with other firms in higher frequency, developing trust among all parties, clear alliance among the partners to enhance innovation performance. Similarly, SMEs should focus on absorptive capacity and openness to enrich innovation performance.

This study adds in the current literature of the chosen constructs and empirically contributes the effects in the manufacturing industry of Jiangsu Province, China.

This paper aims to assess the impact of big data analytics capabilities (BDAC) on organizational innovation performance through process-oriented dynamic capabilities (PODC), as a mediator, as well as the moderating roles of organizational culture (OC) and management accountants, in this artificial intelligence (AI) era. This paper also aims to provide information on the emerging trends and implications of the abovementioned relationships by focusing on these relationships and interactions.

This exploratory study used the close-ended questionnaire approach based on the resource-based view and socio-materiality theories. This included sending questionnaires to top-level management, including Chief Financial Officer/Chief Executive Officers/Chief Information Officers (CFO/CEOs/CIOs), having an in-depth understanding of the concepts, practical applications and usage of big data as well as BDAC.181 valid questionnaire-based responses were analyzed using the partial least square structural equation modelling technique and bootstrapping moderated mediation method.

This study provides empirical insights into how BDAC impact innovative performance through PODC as well as the moderating effects of OC and management accountants. This involves a shift in focus from almost standardized approaches to developing BDAC without contextual focus on approaches that are much more heterogeneously related to each organization and hence are more focused on the context of the pharmaceutical industry.

The main aim of key research questions in this study is to increase the contributions of BDAC toward improving innovation performance in the presence of the abovementioned variables and relationships that exist between them. The chosen research approach can be improved by carrying out interviews with the top management to obtain more relevant and detailed information for developing a better understanding of the abovementioned relationships.

This study outlines how organizations that are developing BDAC approaches can focus on relevant factors and variables to help their initiatives and its role in organizational innovative performance. This will also help them develop sustainable competitive advantage in manufacturing concerns, specifically in the health industry, namely, the pharmaceutical industry.

This study investigated the effects and implications of big data on organizations in the AI era that aim to achieve innovation performance. At the same time, it provides an original understanding of the contextual importance of investing in BDAC development. It also considers the role of management accountants as a bridge between data scientists and business managers in a big data environment, especially in the pharmaceutical industry. The current study used first-time data from surveys involving CFOs, CEOs or CIOs of pharmaceutical companies in Pakistan and analyzed the proposed model using bootstrapping moderated mediation analysis.

Annually, hundreds of drilling crew suffer from major injuries during performing oil and gas drilling operation because of the deficiency of an adequate hazard safety management system for real-time decision-making in hazardous conditions. According to previous studies, there is a sheer industrial need for an effective industrial safety management decision support system for accident prevention at oil and gas drilling sites at both drilling domains. Therefore, this paper aims to focus on the design and development of knowledge base decision support system (KBDSS) for the prevention of hazardous activities at Middle Eastern and South Asian origins’ onshore and offshore oil and gas industries during drilling operations.

In this study, data were gathered from safety and health professionals from targeted oil and gas industries in Malaysia, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan through quantitative and qualitative approaches. Based on identified data, KBDSSs (HAZFO Expert 1.0) were systematically developed and designed by adopting Database Development Life Cycle and Waterfall Software Development Life Cycle models. MySQL and Visual Studio 2015 software were used for developing and designing knowledge base and graphical user interface of the system.

KBDSS (HAZFO Expert 1.0) for accident prevention at onshore and offshore oil and gas drilling industries based on identified potential hazards and their suitable controlling measures aligned with international safety standards and regulations. HAZFO Expert 1.0 is a novel KBDSS that covers all onshore and offshore drilling operations with three and nine outputs, respectively, to achieve the current trend of Industry Revolution 4.0 and Industrial IoTs for workforce safety.

This industrial safety management system (HAZFO Expert 1.0) will be efficiently used for the identification and elimination of potential hazards associated with drilling activities at onshore and offshore drilling sites with an appropriate hazard controlling strategy.

Moreover, the developed KBDS system is unique in terms of its architecture and is dynamic in nature because it provides HAZFO Expert 1.0 data management and insertion application for authorized users. This is the first KBDSS which covers both drilling domains in Malaysian, Saudi Arabian and Pakistani industries.