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This study aims to present the experimental and computational performance analysis in compact plate heat exchanger (PHE) using graphene oxide nanofluids at different concentrations and flow rate.

Field emission scanning electron microscope and X-ray diffraction were used to characterize graphene oxide nanoparticles. The nanofluid samples were prepared by varying volume concentration. Zeta potential test was done to check stability of samples. The thermophysical properties of samples have been experimentally measured. The experimental setup of PHE with 60° chevron angle has also been developed. The numerical analysis is done using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model having similar geometry as of the actual plate. Distilled water at fixed temperature and flow rate is used in hot side tank. Nanofluid at fixed temperature with varying concentration and flow rate is used in cold side tank as coolant.

The numerical and experimental results were compared and found that both results were in good agreement. The results showed ∼13% improvement in thermal conductivity, ∼14% heat transfer rate (HTR), ∼9% in effectiveness and ∼10% in overall heat transfer coefficient at cost of pressure drop and pumping power using nanofluid. Exergy loss also decreased using nanofluid at optimum concentration of 1 Vol.%.

The CFD model can be significant to analyze temperature, pressure and flow distribution in heat exchanger which is impossible otherwise. This study gives ease to predict PHE performance with high accuracy without performing the experiment.

The learning outcomes of this paper are as follows: to identify the pros and cons of waged employment and entrepreneurship, to identify the contextual factors influencing entrepreneurship, to set up a new venture, namely, steps, challenges involved and decision-making process, to scale up a small business; when, how and where? And to tradeoff required for scaling up a small business.

Pooja, a young management graduate from Varanasi, decided to overcome all challenges and barriers faced by a women entrepreneur and chase her lifelong dream of creating her own event management startup. After having achieved phenomenal success in a short period of time within the city, she began to receive interest from neighbouring cities as well. The decision to scale up operations was particularly difficult for Pooja, as she had funded the venture through her personal funds and personally nurtured the business and her team based on the values of quality and creativity. Like any small business, she had to decide what level of trade-off was required between scaling and dilution of control over the operations.

The case study is applicable for students of management. The learnings from the case can be applied by an individual who is looking to start a business or expand one.

Teaching Notes are available for educators only.

CSS 3: Entrepreneurship.

Reverse logistics (RL) is a strategic instrument across industries. The rapid evolution of online marketplaces has led to frequent product returns with variations across diversified businesses. These marketplaces have caused potential losses due to fraudulent returns, hence requiring a commitment of resources to RL. With information systems (IS) playing a role in improved supply chain performance, the purpose of this paper is to analyse the impact of a conceptualized IS framework on achieving RL strategic outcomes, under the individual moderating influence of resource commitment (RC) and return frequency.

Data have been collected through a questionnaire from top to middle management executives managing the supply chain, logistics and IS. Moderated regression analysis was conducted on the collected sample using Hayes’ (2013) process modeling.

The study depicts that IS capability, IS for logistics, IS partnership quality and IS for value addition lead to RL strategic benefits. Also, return frequency and RC act as relatively strong moderators with a negative impact. When analyzed for the individual IS constructs, RC has a stronger moderating impact than return frequency.

The IS usage framework can be used effectively by practitioners for enhancing strategic RL performances depending on variations in committed resources and return frequency for individual industries.

The study proposes an IS usage framework for achieving enhanced RL strategic outcomes and emphasizes on the moderating role played by RC and return frequency for producing the results.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the suitability of cloud computing for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in India.

Literature review is used to identify benefits, challenges, and factors concerning usage and adoption of cloud computing by SMEs. A conceptual framework was developed based on the existing theoretical models and factors identified from the literature. A survey based on questionnaire method was followed to collect data from 121 manufacturing SMEs in India. The conceptual framework was refined by using factor analysis, and multiple regression analysis was used to test the hypotheses.

Major benefits of cloud computing for SMEs include cost advantage, easy deployment process, easier access to latest information and communication technologies, automatic updates and upgrades, scalability, flexibility, and improved disaster recovery and back-up capabilities. The concern area includes perceived loss of control, vendor lock-in, security issues, reliability and availability issues, and internet connectivity and speed. The factors that are found significant include perceived benefits, top management support, competitive pressure, and perceived concerns. The model explained 73 percent of cloud computing adoption.

The study is expected to make significant contribution toward body of knowledge pertaining to information technology adoption in SMEs.

The study is expected to provide SMEs an insight into real benefits and challenges associated with adopting cloud computing. The model can help SMEs in evaluating their readiness for adopting cloud computing and can ensure successful outcome of cloud computing adoption in SMEs. Providers are also going to be benefited through their enhanced understanding of SMEs’ requirements.

The proposed framework incorporates all the relevant factors including perceived benefits, perceived concerns, and other organizational and environmental factors to improve model’s predictive power.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the mediating role of process simplification on the relationship between process integration and upstream supply chain flexibility in Indian automotive organizations.

The three-step mediation analysis was performed using SPSS macro PROCESS to assess the mediating role of process simplification on the relationship between process integration constructs: top management commitment and supplier relationship; and upstream supply chain flexibility.

The results indicate a complete mediation effect of process simplification between supplier relationship and upstream supply chain flexibility, while partial mediation effect is noticed between top management commitment and upstream supply chain flexibility.

For Indian automotive managers, the study suggests that for improving the upstream supply chain flexibility, organizations must have a strategy towards improving the simplification of supply chain processes by upgrading technology and providing training to their suppliers. This understanding will help the automotive managers to simplify their upstream supply chain processes for gaining competitive positioning and maximizing the organizational profit.

This study has considered the mediating role of process simplification (a relatively less studied variable) specifically in the context of its impact on upstream supply chain flexibility. Also, the presented study explores this role in the Indian automotive domain which further enhances its value for both practitioners and researchers alike.

The purpose of this paper is to identify and rank the contextual relationship among the quality management (QM) constructs for manufacturing and its related service organizations providing integrated value bundles, which has got limited research attention.

The QM constructs of manufacturing and services are selected by performing the citation analysis. Studies related to manufacturing and service are selected by reviewing their citations index in the three major research databases namely ProQuest, Scopus and Google Scholar. The subjective responses from both industry and academia are taken in order to gain better understanding of the contextual relationship among the QM constructs. Finally, an integrated model is proposed using Micmac analysis and Interpretive Structural Modeling (ISM).

The citation analysis lead to identification of 12 QM constructs: top management commitment, supplier relationship management, human resource management, strategic focus, customer focus, quality of information sharing, process management, servicescape, employee involvement, service quality, supply chain flexibility and customer satisfaction. The expert opinions of executives in the automotive industry and academia resulted in the development of contextual relationships among the identified QM constructs for the development of an ISM model, which is a major contribution of this study.

The unique focus of this study is on analyzing the contextual relationship among QM aspects in manufacturing and services as clubbed offering. The researchers in the existing literature have so far differentiated between manufacturing and services but this study integrates the QM constructs for manufacturing and its associated services through expert feedback and proposes an ISM model.

The study analyzes significant parameters defining the credit worthiness, economic viability and managerial efficiency of special purpose vehicles (SPVs) of infrastructure development firms engaged in the execution of road projects under PPP model in India.

The study is based on a comprehensive review of credit rating reports of major rating agencies. In particular, 18 special purpose vehicles (13 BOT-toll–based and 5 BOT-annuity–based road projects) during the period 2010–2019 were considered to conduct a comparative analysis of their rating progression. Considering both financial as well as nonfinancial parameters, their segregation was done on the basis of strengths, constraints and key rating sensitivities influencing the ratings of SPVs involved in road projects under PPP model.

Promoters' credibility emerged as an important factor affecting PPP credit ratings. Other prominent factors included nature of stretch and regulatory terms and conditions and the project's potential to generate cash flows. Inability of PPP projects to generate the projected levels of toll collections was a major constraint and hampered ratings over time. Growth in traffic was a key sensitive area in a toll-based project. Interestingly, despite the fixed nature of revenues, BOT (annuity) projects were impacted by rating changes.

Fewer sample projects (for which the data were available) was a constraint. Future research could consider larger data sets to provide deeper insights. An examination of credit rating parameters using rating reports of projects in other developing nations could provide meaningful implications. The findings of this research however cannot be undermined as the study bridges a gap in existing literature pertaining to the examination of PPP model from a credit rating perspective.

This study would guide project developers, government agencies and awarding agencies of PPP road projects to anticipate the challenges and take adequate steps to mitigate them.

Research in the area of PPP projects is skewed toward risk assessment with respect to financial parameters. The present study emphasizes the rating framework of SPVs. Comprehensive examination of factors affecting project ratings in the form of projects' strengths, constraints and sensitivities would provide inputs to academics and researchers.

Today, firm performance must be measured not only on traditional metrics but also on those that reflect the changing imperatives and new metric knowledge. Thus, the focus of managers, investors, and researchers is shifting from rubrics like sales and profitability to growth as a more appropriate measure of firm performance. We aim to highlight the effects that growth of a firm can have on the level of its systematic risk. Using a sample of 203 firms across nine industries taken from the Indian manufacturing sector for a period of 17 years (1998–2014), we develop and test a panel vector autoregressive (VAR) model to analyze the causal relationship between growth aspects and systematic risk of firms. Results depict that a growth option available to firms increase their level of systematic risk and the risk decreases when firms start chasing this growth by increasing their assets in place. Sustainable growth rate, which depicts the growth potential of firms, plays an important role in reducing the level of systematic risk. The findings of this chapter are relevant to managers who think that growth is always beneficial.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of service separation on the ability of service firms to build and maintain customer relationships, by exploring the differences in the strength of interrelationships among key relational constructs between separated and unseparated service delivery modes.

A field survey was conducted with retail banking customers in Saudi Arabia (n=592) using a structured self-administered questionnaire consisting of well-established scales. Data were analyzed using AMOS 24.

Service separation negatively moderates (weakens) the ability of the service firms to leverage their social benefits, relational trust and affective commitment to increase customer loyalty and to strengthen overall customer relationships.

This study uses retail banking customers in Saudi Arabia to test the impact of service separation in their relationship with the bank; hence, its findings may not be generalizable to other types of services and cultural settings.

Service firms using online and mobile technologies should be aware that trust and commitment remain key to building customer loyalty. Hence, the trade-off between the benefits of these technologies and their negative impact on customer relationship needs to be factored into managerial decision making.

The paper highlights the importance of maintaining face-to-face interactions with service customers to create robust relationships that yield loyalty, despite the growing popularity of online and mobile technologies.