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The Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) is considered a standard for measuring equipment productivity in terms of efficiency. Still, Artificial Intelligence solutions are rarely used for analyzing OEE results and identifying corrective actions. Therefore, the approach proposed in this paper aims to provide a new rule-based Machine Learning (ML) framework for OEE enhancement and the selection of improvement actions.

Association Rules (ARs) are used as a rule-based ML method for extracting knowledge from huge data. First, the dominant loss class is identified and traditional methodologies are used with ARs for anomaly classification and prioritization. Once selected priority anomalies, a detailed analysis is conducted to investigate their influence on the OEE loss factors using ARs and Network Analysis (NA). Then, a Deming Cycle is used as a roadmap for applying the proposed methodology, testing and implementing proactive actions by monitoring the OEE variation.

The method proposed in this work has also been tested in an automotive company for framework validation and impact measuring. In particular, results highlighted that the rule-based ML methodology for OEE improvement addressed seven anomalies within a year through appropriate proactive actions: on average, each action has ensured an OEE gain of 5.4%.

The originality is related to the dual application of association rules in two different ways for extracting knowledge from the overall OEE. In particular, the co-occurrences of priority anomalies and their impact on asset Availability, Performance and Quality are investigated.

The paper provides a detailed historical account of Douglass C. North's early intellectual contributions and analytical developments in pursuing a Grand Theory for why some countries are rich and others poor.

The author approaches the discussion using a theoretical and historical reconstruction based on published and unpublished materials.

The systematic, continuous and profound attempt to answer the Smithian social coordination problem shaped North's journey from being a young serious Marxist to becoming one of the founders of New Institutional Economics. In the process, he was converted in the early 1950s into a rigid neoclassical economist, being one of the leaders in promoting New Economic History. The success of the cliometric revolution exposed the frailties of the movement itself, namely, the limitations of neoclassical economic theory to explain economic growth and social change. Incorporating transaction costs, the institutional framework in which property rights and contracts are measured, defined and enforced assumes a prominent role in explaining economic performance.

In the early 1970s, North adopted a naive theory of institutions and property rights still grounded in neoclassical assumptions. Institutional and organizational analysis is modeled as a social maximizing efficient equilibrium outcome. However, the increasing tension between the neoclassical theoretical apparatus and its failure to account for contrasting political and institutional structures, diverging economic paths and social change propelled the modification of its assumptions and progressive conceptual innovation. In the later 1970s and early 1980s, North abandoned the efficiency view and gradually became more critical of the objective rationality postulate. In this intellectual movement, North's avant-garde research program contributed significantly to the creation of New Institutional Economics.

The paper addresses the following research question: how do decision-makers use heuristics in their international business (IB) environment? Whereas, the literature has focused on entrepreneurial companies, here contrasting approaches to learning and using heuristics in international marketing (IM) decisions are examined and discussed.

The paper aims to address a gap in the study of micro-foundations of internationalization, exploiting research from other disciplinary fields. It combines a multidisciplinary literature review and longitudinal case studies to illustrate different approaches in learning and using heuristics by international marketers.

International marketers can adopt “closed” heuristics that are consolidated and consistently followed, or “open” heuristics, which are constantly being adapted and learned. Established multinationals learn heuristics in international marketing decision-making, following both “closed” and “open” models.

This paper offers an original contribution by presenting different approaches not yet examined in the literature, focusing on how international marketers make decisions through learning and using heuristic rules. The focus is on established exporters, in contrast to the literature that has largely paid attention to the effectiveness of heuristics in new entrepreneurial firms.

An intractable effect of revenue and expense recognition based on tax regulation and accounting rules is unresolved and may be manageable only by reducing the value of deferred taxes. Therefore, in this study, the authors examined the relationship between the International Accounting Standard 12 (IAS 12) and deferred income taxes associated with tax and accounting rules.

The authors used a large sample of balanced data from 144 firms across 1992–2019. To mitigate the problem of superfluous results, the authors used the same number of firms and years for pre- and post-IAS 12 periods. The authors employed robust econometric estimations to establish the impact of IAS 12 on deferred tax.

The regression results show that deferred tax assets decreased significantly, whereas deferred tax liabilities increased significantly, in the post-IAS 12 period. These contrasting results imply that IAS 12 implementation has increased conservatism and prudence in financial reporting. However, the authors find that the increase in deferred tax assets post-IAS 12 is value destructive, suggesting that its implementation has unintended consequences. The results are robust to alternative measurements and econometric identification strategies.

While prior studies have explored topics such as deferred tax measurement and the impact of income and expense recognition, the authors specifically analyzed how IAS 12 affects deferred taxes and their effect on the market valuation. The authors find that certain accounting standards may not be relevant to the capital market.

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced many organisations to transform face-to-face teams into virtual ones through the adoption of remote working modes. This event has represented the starting point of a process that is changing how management control (MC) systems are designed and implemented to guide employees towards organisational objectives. The previous literature on virtual teams (VTs) has devoted scant attention to MC issues. This study aims to fill this gap by exploring how MC – and particularly cultural control – has changed to cope with the shift from face-to-face to VTs and by analysing the interrelationship between the different control mechanisms and the resulting tensions.

The research adopts the methodological framework based on abduction to provide a theoretical explanation and conceptualisation of MC in virtual settings. To tackle the research objective, this work undertakes a cross-sectional field study based on semi-structured interviews with managers of different service companies.

The results of the research highlight the key challenges that managers are called to deal with to design and change MC systems when implementing remote working. In particular, managers must cope with the reduced possibility to leverage cultural controls. To do this, this study’s analysis found that managers act by introducing and/or removing formal and informal controls and by orchestrating the interplays and tensions between these mechanisms.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, to date limited attention has been paid to MC in VTs. Moreover, few researchers have investigated the process of MC change from face-to-face to VTs. This work aims to contribute to this nascent stream of literature by providing interesting implications for both research and practice.

When financial statements are public, the choice between alternative reporting regimes constitutes a signal that addresses external stakeholders. Generally, the choice of more complex regimes acts as a complement of firms' transparency. However, in the absence of audits, opportunistic behaviors could be incentivized. This study aims to test whether SMEs' choice between alternative accounting regimes is associated with earnings quality.

Drawing on the literature about accounting choices and earnings quality, this study investigates whether the same conclusions are confirmed for SMEs. Using a sample of 4,054 Italian companies and 12,114 observations, it compared four earnings quality proxies of a group of companies that opted for the “Full” rules and those of a subsample of the population of companies that applied the Simplified rules.

The results suggest that the signaling power of accounting rules' choice could lead to wrong conclusions for SMEs. Indeed, a positive relationship emerged (H1) between the choice of the “Full” rules and income smoothing behaviors, while the same choice appears to reduce the probability to disclose SPOS. Moreover, the results suggest that opportunistic behaviors are more frequent for firms that have settled in a “non-cooperative” social environment (H2).

This study could foster research on financial reporting quality in private firms.

Comparing the quality of financial statements drawn up according to two alternative accounting regimes could provide useful suggestions for both users and regulators.

The results contribute to the limited literature on the implications of differential reporting. Finally, it enriches the literature about heterogeneity in accounting quality within private firms.

Digital resources such as smart applications reviews and online feedback information are important sources to seek customers’ feedback and input. This paper aims to help government entities gain insights on the needs and expectations of their customers. Towards this end, we propose an aspect-based sentiment analysis hybrid approach that integrates domain lexicons and rules to analyse the entities smart apps reviews. The proposed model aims to extract the important aspects from the reviews and classify the corresponding sentiments. This approach adopts language processing techniques, rules, and lexicons to address several sentiment analysis challenges, and produce summarized results. According to the reported results, the aspect extraction accuracy improves significantly when the implicit aspects are considered. Also, the integrated classification model outperforms the lexicon-based baseline and the other rules combinations by 5% in terms of Accuracy on average. Also, when using the same dataset, the proposed approach outperforms machine learning approaches that uses support vector machine (SVM). However, using these lexicons and rules as input features to the SVM model has achieved higher accuracy than other SVM models.

This study aims to identify different consumer segments to address the strategies that can be adopted by companies and policymakers to increase the consumption of safer foods and reduce the negative externalities caused by pesticides. More than 3,000 consumers were involved in the survey, of which more than 1,000 completed in all parts.

The complexity of the topic required a multidimensional approach. Therefore, the authors modelled the decision support system by proposing a decision rule-based approach to analyse consumers' food purchasing choices. More precisely, the authors referred to the dominance-based rough set approach (DRSA).

Based on the DRSA results, three consumer segments were identified: green consumers, integrated pest management (IPM)-informed and active consumers, and potential low-pesticide consumers for which different policy implications have been highlighted.

Despite the high number of survey respondents, further research should seek to obtain data from a more balanced sample. Furthermore, different methods of analysis could be applied and the results compared.

Identification and promotion of managerial and public policies to increase the consumption of low pesticide food.

The main social implications can be summarised in the greater knowledge and awareness of the environmental aspects related to food, recognition of the intrinsic quality and/or functionality of food.

The authors contribute to the literature in two ways. First, the authors refer to the DRSA, an innovative approach in the context of consumer analysis. Second, based on the decision rules, the authors identify three consumer segments to which specific tools can be addressed.

This paper aims to conceptualize and empirically illustrate the challenges that financial market regulation presents to politicians and the organization tasked with specifying regulations and supervising their implementation in the interest of users and consumers of financial instruments. It analyses the problem from the viewpoint of the governor's dilemma and the control/competence conflict, the linked problem of the rent-seeking of agents/intermediators and consumers of financial instruments. Political accountability problems are enhanced by the materiality of the technologies used, i.e. algo trading.

The paper theoretically conceptualizes and empirically illustrates the argument.

The paper finds that regulators of digitalized financial markets are faced with considerable problems and depend on private agents when regulating financial transactions. However, the new technological instruments also offer new possibilities for securing compliance.

Further research should focus more in-depth on the cooperation between public and private actors in the specification and implementation of regulatory details. It should further investigate the conditions which allow regulators to use RegTech in the surveillance of financial firms.

Since financial market transactions are opaque for most users, the creation of more transparency is crucial to hold regulators accountable in their activity of surveillance of financial firms. New algorithm-based technologies may lend important support in doing so.

By linking the different analytical perspectives, i.e. the governor's dilemma vis-à-vis the intermediator or agent and the possible rent-seeking of intermediators, under the condition of a highly developed technology of financial transactions as well as the market structure, the paper offers new insights into the limits as well as new opportunities of regulating financial markets allowing for political accountability of regulators and financial firms.

The study aims to estimate the short- and long-run effects of monetary policy on residential property prices in South Africa. Over the past decades, there has been a monetary policy shift, from targeting money supply and exchange rate to inflation. The shifts have affected residential property market dynamics.

The Johansen cointegration approach was used to estimate the effects of changes in monetary policy proxies on residential property prices using quarterly data from 1980 to 2022.

Mortgage finance and economic growth have a significant positive long-run effect on residential property prices. The consumer price index, the inflation targeting framework, interest rates and exchange rates have a significant negative long-run effect on residential property prices. The Granger causality test has depicted that exchange rate significantly influences residential property prices in the short run, and interest rates, inflation targeting framework, gross domestic product, money supply consumer price index and exchange rate can quickly return to equilibrium when they are in disequilibrium.

There are limited arguments whether the inflation targeting monetary policy framework in South Africa has prevented residential property market boom and bust scenarios. The study has found that the implementation of inflation targeting framework has successfully reduced booms in residential property prices in South Africa.