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The purpose of this paper is to identify integrated solutions business as the first generation of servitized offerings and modular solution offerings as the second development phase in servitization of original equipment manufacturers. This study examines how the servitized manufacturer, Kone, moves from integrated solutions to modular solutions business and develops the requisite capabilities to design, produce and implement modular solution offerings.

The paper reports a longitudinal case study of a provider of integrated solutions installed in buildings. During the ten years studied, the manufacturer implemented a strategic initiative to modularize its integrated solutions offering.

The firm’s transition to modular solutions progressed through three major capability development phases: solutions based on ad hoc integration, smart solutions based on modular design and through-chain modularity. The modular structure aims at fostering the efficiency of the solution offering and the associated production system.

Leveraging the benefits of modularity calls for an aligned combination of strategic, operational and technical capabilities contributing to the integration of resources in a modular production system for the solution providers’ competitive performance.

The study reports how a solution provider can develop the operational capabilities to integrate the core and peripheral components into the solution, and orchestrate the modular production system.

This study is a rare longitudinal analysis of how a manufacturer builds a modular offering, the solution platform and the required competitive capabilities to provide the solution.

This work aims to report the experience of implementing a university digital library by introducing all the technical/administrative and scientific production in the education field.

The paper describes the process of conception, information architecture, the steps and methodology for structuring and establishing of the Digital Library of the Faculty of Education of the State University of Campinas (BDE – FE/UNICAMP), with the partnership of the UNICAMP Libraries System (SBU/UNICAMP), which manages the Nou‐Rau software and stores the Digital Library of UNICAMP (BDU). It also identifies the skills and abilities the information professional must have, concerning the definition of criteria for the evaluation and selection of documents to be scanned, and establishes management procedures for the implementation of services derived from this new tool for retrieving information in the educational area.

The paper finds that the constitution of a multidisciplinary staff and the skills and abilities required of an information professional involved in designing digital libraries is the object of discussion in several forums. The technical‐scientific skills are the most important ones, since this professional must be able to act in a changing environment, from an analogical to a digital culture. The attitude of the information professional, always related to a strictly technical situation, observed along this career's development, also goes through changes, and demands a professional who is a manager, a leader, visionary and strategist or, in other words, a real agent of changes.

The purpose of the BDE – FE/UNICAMP is to store and make electronically available to users the production of professors, students, employees (technicians) and the administration staff, generated within the Faculty. The implementation of this source of research, therefore, meets the expectation of the users and helps to spread the information.

Delight, and the possibility that an observer might continually delight in the same thing, is difficult to deal with in a rigorous way. Very little has been written recently about this subject. The purpose of this paper is to offer insights about this vital subject with reference to design work being undertaken at UCL.

It is the contention of this paper that arguments taken from constructivism and second, order cybernetics can help in this. The cyberneticians who have most significantly dealt with cybernetics and physical architecture are Pask and Glanville. They offer significantly different and contradictory insights. Techniques for conceptualising an interactive performative architecture are discussed, based on work undertaken with postgraduate students at the Bartlett Interactive Architecture Workshop, UCL.

Glanville and Pask can be reconciled. When physical architecture can be considered as contributing to physical performance both sets of insights can exist in a common theoretical frame.

Designers should consider creating work that contains rich variety and the cues for observer construction, while also offering the possibility of ambiguity where different distinctions are equally possible. It is possible to utilise the differences that arise from changes in the external environment to manipulate the latter.

The paper suggests ways of creating places that offer continual delight to their observers.

The study aims to carry out the production of a bulk heterojunction organic solar cell in a laboratory scale using a blend of poly (3-hexylthiopene) (P3HT) and [6, 6]-phenyl (C61) butyric acid methyl ether (PCBM).

Four inverted geometry organic solar cells were prepared based on 1:1 ratio of P3HT to PCBM and subjected to post annealing at different temperatures of 32, 120, 130 and 140°C. Solar cells were fabricated with structure glass/ITO/P3HT:PCBM/PEDOT:PSS/Au and characterized using Keithley 2400 series sourcemeter and a multimeter interfaced to a computer system with a LabVIEW software, which showed both dark and illumination current–voltage characteristic curves. Four reference cells were also fabricated with structure soda lime glass/P3HT:PCBM and annealed at different temperatures of 32, 120, 130 and 140°C.

The third organic solar cell prepared, Sample CITO, had the best performance with power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 2.0281 per cent, fill factor (FF) of 0.392, short circuit current of −0.0133 A and open circuit voltage of 0.389 V. Annealing of active layer was found to improve cell morphology, FF and PCE. Annealing of the active layer at 140°C resulted in a decrease of the PCE to 2.01 per cent.

These findings are in good agreement with previous investigation in literature which reported that best annealing temperature for a 1:1 ratio blend of active material is 130°C. Ultraviolet–visible spectra on reference cells showed that sample CITO had wider absorption spectra with peak absorbance at a wavelength of 508 nm.

This research is purely original.

Modularity promises to relieve problems of complexity in service systems. However, limited evidence exists of its application in specialized hospital services. The purpose of this paper is to identify enablers, constraints, and outcomes of modularization in specialized hospital services.

A qualitative comparative study of a hematology unit with modular service architecture and an oncology unit with integral service architecture in a university hospital is performed to analyze the service architectures, enablers and constraints of modularization, and outcomes.

A framework and five propositions combining the characteristics of specialized hospital services, enabling activities, and outcomes of modularization were developed. Modular service architecture was developed through limiting the number of treatment components, reorganizing production of standardized components into a separate service unit, and standardizing communication and scheduling in interfaces. Modularization increased service efficiency but diluted ownership of services, decreased customization, and diminished informal communication. This is explained by the specific characteristics of the services: fragmented service delivery, professional autonomy, hierarchy, information asymmetry, and requirement to treat all.

Modularization can increase efficiency in specialized hospital services. However, specific characteristics of specialized care may challenge its application and limit its outcomes.

The study identifies enabling activities and constraints that hospital managers should take into account when developing modular service systems.

This is the first empirical study exploring the enablers, constraints, and outcomes of modularization in specialized hospital services. The study complements literature on service modularity with reference to specialized hospital services.

Sociologists studying the rise of postmodernism have generally concentrated on either macro-level structures of economy or micro-level subjectivities of individuals. Few have specified how meso-level actions within concrete institutions have produced both these macro- and micro-changes. Bourdieu's concept of field provides a meso-level concept that allows sociologists to explain the transition to a postmodern society by changes in the composition and competition of producers and consumers struggling for advantage in the economy and culture. The chapter focuses on architecture, revealing that the rise of a postmodern aesthetic was the result of internal changes of this field and their complex interrelation with the external changes of an economy in transition from Fordism to post-Fordism.

The purpose of this paper is to systematically review the extant literature on the relationship between product architectures and supply chain design to identify gaps in the literature and identify future research opportunities.

This paper examines the peer-reviewed literature on product architectures and supply chain written in English. The search strategy is based on selected databases and keywords. In total, 56 articles from 1995 to 2013 were identified.

Three key dimensions are identified for the categorization of the literature: the type of product architecture, the type of supply chain and the research methodology. Furthermore, we identify themes related to outsourcing, supplier selection, supplier relationships, distance from focal firm and alignment.

The present search strategy may have missed some references that are related to the area. However, as a counter-measure, we used back-tracking and forward-tracking to identify additional relevant papers. A research agenda is proposed for further research on the interaction of product architectures and supply chain design.

This paper is, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, the first broad review that investigates the interrelationship between product architectures and supply chain design.

This paper aims to investigate how the product architecture and service architecture methodology can be applied in strategic maintenance optimization to reduce the non-value-adding variance of maintenance, decrease the complexity and ensure alignment in maintenance practices in asset-intensive companies. The proposed maintenance architecture model will make it possible to make data-driven decisions regarding how the equipment should be grouped and maintained.

The research approach is considered exploratory, and the main research strategy is a case study. The maintenance architecture model is developed based on the product architecture methodology and then tested in three different cases in the oil and gas sector.

Through the maintenance architecture model, it is possible to pair a quantitative data-driven approach with qualitative understanding of dependencies between equipment, maintenance actions and maintenance work management processes, enabling a more holistic and top-down data-driven approach to improving maintenance, than what currently exists in literature.

The proposed model provides a contribution to the understanding of maintenance and is positioned at a detailed level, different from other maintenance improvement models. This model is focused on the main drivers of maintenance that can be utilized at the strategic level compared to optimization of maintenance for individual pieces of equipment.

“Can artificial intelligence produce architectural plan schemes?” discussion is the starting point of this study. The aim of this paper is to question whether this will be a new method in architectural design by producing plans with artificial intelligence interfaces working with human–computer interaction and to create a discussion environment.

The main research topic is the evaluation of architectural design decisions with the text-to-image generation AI algorithms method based on shape grammar rules. First, a sample space consisting of Palladio plans or plan diagrams was created. Plan diagram production experiments were made with different interfaces (Midjourney, Dall-e2, Stable Diffusion, Craiyon, Nightcafe), and alternative plan diagrams were recorded as outputs. The discussion of the outputs has been made over architectural design and space.

In the conceptual design phase of the architectural discipline and in the production of architectural plan scheme, AI algorithms are trending. This interaction imposes a new responsibility on architects. AI can create paradigm shifts in architectural processes with its tools with high data processing potential. On the other hand, in this study, it is emphasized that architecture is not just an act of producing visuals, but a functional act of producing visuals.

The technology is effective in producing architectural plans and directing them to artificial intelligence algorithms. With this study, multi-alternative architectural plan productions were tried with text-to-image bots with fast results. In this direction, a new method proposal has been developed for the conceptual design phase in architecture.

The objective of this study is to assess the applicability of Fine's three‐dimensional modularity concept as a tool to describe and to analyze the alignment of product, process, and supply chain architectures. Fine claims that the degree of modularity in the final output product has a one‐to‐one correspondence with the degree of modularity in transformation processes and supply chains.

An exploratory three‐company case study is used to investigate Fine's three‐dimensional modularity concept.

Empirical research shows that Fine's three‐dimensional modularity concept works well for descriptive purposes. However, the concept needs refinement when it is used for analytical purposes. For process modularity, the spatial aspect can be related to the concept of the territorial economy of firms, while the time aspect can be elaborated using a product life‐cycle perspective and the concept of interface reversibility. With respect to supply chain modularity, the concept of modular production networks, which specifies combinations of different degrees of geographic, organizational, cultural, and electronic proximity, is appropriate. In the specific setting of the building industry, a methodology for developing product platform architectures would refine the dimension of product modularity.

Starting from the above‐mentioned concepts, several strands of research are outlined for a further elaboration of product (developing a methodology for developing product platform architectures), process (taking a life‐cycle perspective on module development), and supply chain modularity (analyzing conditions for the application of modular networks).

The application of systematic engineering design methods, interface reversibility, and interorganizational ICT allows firms to align product, process, and supply chain modularity.