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Additive manufacturing (AM) processes are the integration of many different science and engineering-related disciplines, such as material metrology, design, process planning, in-situ and off-line measurements and controls. Major integration challenges arise because of the increasing complexity of AM systems and a lack of support among vendors for interoperability. The result is that data cannot be readily shared among the components of that system. In an attempt to better homogenization this data, this paper aims to provide a reference model for data sharing of the activities to be under-taken in the AM process, laser-based powder bed fusion (PBF).

The activity model identifies requirements for developing a process data model. The authors’ approach begins by formally decomposing the PBF processes using an activity-modeling methodology. The resulting activity model is a means to structure process-related PBF data and align that data with specific PBF sub-processes.

This model in this paper provides the means to understand the organization of process activities and sub-activities and the flows among them in AM PBF processes.

The model is for modeling AM activities and data associated with these activity. Data modeling is not included in this work.

After modeling the selected PBF process and its sub-processes as activities, the authors discuss requirements for developing the development of more advanced process data models. Such models will provide a common terminology and new process knowledge that improve data management from various stages in AM.

Fundamental challenges in sharing/reusing data among heterogeneous systems include the lack of common data structures, vocabulary management systems and data interoperability methods. In this paper, the authors investigate these challenges specifically as they relate to process information for PBF – how it is captured, represented, stored and accessed. To do this, they focus on using methodical, information-modeling techniques in the context of design, process planning, fabrication, inspection and quality control.

This paper explores Lean Six Sigma principles and the DMAIC (define, measure, analyze, improve, control) methodology to propose a new Lean Six Sigma 4.0 (LSS 4.0) framework for employee occupational exams and address the real-world issue of high-variability exams that may arise.

This study uses mixed methods, combining qualitative and quantitative data collection. A detailed case study assesses the impact of LSS interventions on the exam management process and tests the applicability of the proposed LSS 4.0 framework for employee occupational exams.

The results reveal that changing the health service supplier in the explored organization caused a substantial raise in occupational exams, leading to increased costs. By using syntactic interoperability, lean, six sigma and DMAIC approaches, improvements were identified, addressing process deviations and information requirements. Implementing corrective actions improved the exam process, reducing the number of exams and associated expenses.

It is important to acknowledge certain limitations, such as the specific context of the case study and the exclusion of certain exam categories.

The practical implications of this research are substantial, providing organizations with valuable managerial insights into improving efficiency, reducing costs and ensuring regulatory compliance while managing occupational exams.

This study fills a research gap by applying LSS 4.0 to occupational exam management, offering a practical framework for organizations. It contributes to the existing knowledge base by addressing a relatively novel context and providing a detailed roadmap for process optimization.

Current facility management (FM) practices are inefficient and ineffective, partially because of missing information and communication issues. Information and communications technologies (ICT) are asserted to provide a promising solution for managing and operating facilities. However, the impact of ICT applications on current FM practices needs to be validated and the perception of FM professionals on ICT-based FM needs to be understood. Therefore, this paper aims to investigate the impacts and the perception of ICT application on FM practice and further develop an ICT-based integrated framework for smart FM practices.

To achieve the objective, the research starts with reviewing several promising ICT for FM, including building information modeling, geographic information systems, unmanned aerial vehicle and augmented reality. On this basis, a conceptional framework was synthesized in consideration of the benefits of each technology. A survey questionnaire to FM professionals was conducted to evaluate the proposed framework and identify the challenges of adopting ICT in the FM industry. Furthermore, return on investment and strength, weakness, opportunities and threats analysis have been used in this paper as evaluation methods for ICT industry adoption.

The survey results are validated by FM professionals for the future engagement of the integrated ICT applications. Also, the proposed framework can assist the decision-makers to have comprehensive information about facilities and systematize the communication among stakeholders.

This research provides an integrated framework for smart FM to improve decision-making, capitalizing on the ICT applications. Apart from this, the study sheds light on future research endeavors for other ICT applications.

The purpose of this study is to x-ray the issues surrounding the adoption of Internet of Things (IoT) in libraries from the perspective of developing countries.

This study theoretically reviewed the adoption of IoT in libraries in developing countries.

This study revealed context-based factors such as technological, organizational, environmental and security/privacy factors as determinants of IoT adoption in libraries of developing countries.

The value of this study arises from the need to study the adoption of technological innovation such as the IotT from the lens of developing countries and proffer solution to its associated challenges.

Over the next decade, humanity is going to face big environmental problems, and considering these serious issues, businesses are adopting environmentally responsible practices. To put forward specific measures to achieve a more prosperous environmental future, this study aims to develop an environment-based perspective framework by integrating the Internet of Things (IoT) technology into a sustainable automotive supply chain (SASC).

The study presents a conceptual environmental framework – based on 29 factors constituting four stakeholders' rectifications – that holistically assess the SASC operations as part of the ReSOLVE model utilizing IoT. Then, experts from the SASC, IoT and sustainability areas participated in two rigorous rounds of a Delphi study to validate the framework.

The results indicate that the conceptual environmental framework proposed would help companies enhance the connectivity between major IoT tools in SASC, which would help develop congruent strategies for inducing sustainable growth.

This study adds value to existing knowledge on SASC sustainability and digitalization in the context where the SASC is under enormous pressure, competitiveness and increased variability.

The Internet of Things (IoT), which enables smart objects to collect and exchange data, has a variety of application domains used in everyday life including healthcare. As a set of promising next-generation technologies in the healthcare domain, Healthcare-related Internet of Things (H-IoT) promises to facilitate better healthcare by offering data-driven insights. While effective in practice at large, emerging data concerns arise because of the inscrutable black-box systems. Inspired by the notion of human data interaction, this paper seeks to understand how people engage with the H-IoT data that is about and produced by themselves and to elucidate the main data issues and challenges involved in the development of H-IoT.

This work conducted a comprehensive survey and integrated the method of content analysis by systematically review the recently published H-IoT research work in the healthcare domain.

This study thoroughly surveyed more than 300 research studies published in the last decades and classified seven H-IoT end-user groups, and three H-IoT data types that are important to H-IoT comprehension. Attention to human data interaction, our study also highlights several critical issues associated with this notion in the context of H-IoT.

This study will support H-IoT research by characterizing the data issues and challenges exist in the context of H-IoT user and data interaction. The findings will provide insights in designing for effective interactions with data in the H-IoT.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss how enterprises can effectively perceive and use the digital opportunities brought about by digital technologies and dynamic environments and how they can enhance their capabilities to realize digital transformation and adapt to the development of the digital economy era.

Based on the windows of opportunity theory and strategic cognition theory, this paper conducts an empirical analysis of the questionnaire data of 268 enterprises and discusses the influence of external windows of opportunity and internal windows of opportunity on the digital transformation of enterprises, as well as the action mechanism of strategic cognition and entrepreneurship.

The results show that both the external windows of opportunity and the internal windows of opportunity have significant positive effects on the digital transformation of enterprises. Strategic cognition plays a partial mediating role in the external windows of opportunity and the internal windows of opportunity influencing the enterprise digital transformation process. Entrepreneurship plays a positive regulatory role in the process of external windows of opportunity and internal windows of opportunity influencing strategic cognition.

This paper deepens the relationship between internal and external windows of opportunity and enterprise digital transformation and contributes a new theoretical cognition. This paper integrates the strategic cognition theory to clarify the complex process mechanism of digital transformation using external situational opportunities and internal capabilities. This paper introduces entrepreneurship into the path mechanism of digital transformation and expands the characteristics of the study of digital transformation antecedents to the individual level within the enterprise.

Building information modelling (BIM) has transformed the traditional practices of the Architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) industry. BIM creates a collaborative digital representation of built environment data. Competitive advantage can be achieved with collaborative project delivery and rich information modelling. Despite the abundant benefits, BIM’s adoption in the AEC is susceptible to confrontation. A substantial impediment to BIM adoption often cited is data interoperability. Other facets of interoperability got limited attention. Other academic areas, including information systems, discuss the interoperability construct ahead of data interoperability. These interoperability factors have yet to be surveyed in the AEC industry. This study aims to investigate the effect of interoperability factors on BIM adoption and develop a comprehensive BIM adoption model.

The theoretical foundations of the proposed model are based on the European interoperability framework (EIF) and technology, organization, environment framework (TOE). Quantitative data collection from construction firms is gathered. The model has been thoroughly examined and validated using partial least squares structural equation modelling in SmartPLS software.

The study’s findings indicate that relative advantage, top management support, government support, organizational readiness and regulation support are determinants of BIM adoption. Financial constraints, complexity, lack of technical interoperability, semantic interoperability, organizational interoperability and uncertainty are barriers to BIM adoption. However, compatibility, competitive pressure and legal interoperability do not affect BIM adoption.

Finally, this study provides recommendations containing the essential technological, organizational, environmental and interoperability factors that AEC stakeholders can address to enhance BIM adoption.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this paper is one of the first studies to combine TOE and EIF in a single research model. This research provides empirical evidence for using the proposed model as a guide to promoting BIM adoption. As a result, the highlighted determinants can assist organizations in developing and executing successful policies that support BIM adoption in the AEC industry.

This work focuses on the interoperability of the blockchain from the viewpoint of its technological evolution in the wider context of supply chain systems. Interoperability concerns the most since it is among the most persevering problems in the process of blockchain adaptation. The study aims to trace and pinpoint all the different methods that affect the interoperability of blockchains, gather all the obtainable evidence and recognize gaps in between the applicable approaches mentioned across the contemporary academic literature.

An analysis is done of seven interoperability approaches based on their relevance, practical usefulness and adoption processes concerning the blockchain. Mainly, this work examines interoperability from several different perspectives. An interoperability modular decomposition via a layered model has been defined through the level of conceptual interoperability (LCIM) and level of information system interoperability (LISI), which represent the most popular metrics with regard to assessing the level of interoperability from a qualitative level.

Generally, the findings of this work are directed in two major aspects: Firstly, it expands the research around blockchain technology interoperability by providing crucial background information and pinpointing important connotations for both industrial and academic environments. It also defines and analyzes several different approaches toward the blockchain platform's interoperability. Secondly, it also identifies and proposes several scenarios that take advantage of multiple blockchain application approaches, highlights various issues and challenges to the evolution of interoperability standards and solutions and indicates the desired areas of further research.

An essential aspect of the originality of this paper is that, contrary to other work contributions, this work summarized the different interoperability approaches for blockchain in supply chain systems. Mainly, seven approaches were discussed for practitioners and researchers, and the open issues and future research direction were considered.

Information from Current Research Information Systems (CRIS) is stored in different formats, in platforms that are not compatible, or even in independent networks. It would be helpful to have a well-defined methodology to allow for management data processing from a single site, so as to take advantage of the capacity to link disperse data found in different systems, platforms, sources and/or formats. Based on functionalities and materials of the VLIR project, the purpose of this paper is to present a model that provides for interoperability by means of semantic alignment techniques and metadata crosswalks, and facilitates the fusion of information stored in diverse sources.

After reviewing the state of the art regarding the diverse mechanisms for achieving semantic interoperability, the paper analyzes the following: the specific coverage of the data sets (type of data, thematic coverage and geographic coverage); the technical specifications needed to retrieve and analyze a distribution of the data set (format, protocol, etc.); the conditions of re-utilization (copyright and licenses); and the “dimensions” included in the data set as well as the semantics of these dimensions (the syntax and the taxonomies of reference). The semantic interoperability framework here presented implements semantic alignment and metadata crosswalk to convert information from three different systems (ABCD, Moodle and DSpace) to integrate all the databases in a single RDF file.

The paper also includes an evaluation based on the comparison – by means of calculations of recall and precision – of the proposed model and identical consultations made on Open Archives Initiative and SQL, in order to estimate its efficiency. The results have been satisfactory enough, due to the fact that the semantic interoperability facilitates the exact retrieval of information.

The proposed model enhances management of the syntactic and semantic interoperability of the CRIS system designed. In a real setting of use it achieves very positive results.