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Telemedicine, similarly to social media, accelerates information exchange, enriches information, provides better access to information and, furthermore, has an impact on mobilizing resources in business-to-business relationships. This paper aims to contribute to the understanding of the changes brought about by telemedicine, as a new technology, in patient routes.

This case study method was applied to examine five health-care protocols through their patient routes (series of activities) with and without telemedicine technology. The ARA model was applied to examine the changes telemedicine engendered in relation to activities, resources and actors. The strategy of visual mapping was applied for the comparative analysis.

The analyzed cases show that the new resources applied through telemedicine technology modified the number and substance of relevant activities and the set and role of actors who were involved. The quantity or the availability of output information increased in patient routes when new resources were added by telemedicine technology. When technology change occurred, any change in data or information systems – the two building blocks of information – could result in new or modified activities. If data that is used or produced while undertaking an activity change simultaneously along with the information system used for encrypting this data, then this “joint change” will certainly entail some kind of change in the set of activities, resources or actors that are involved. If not, then the activities continued the same as with the face-to-face protocol (without the new technology).

The novelty of the paper is that the results highlight the role of information in the extent of change in interactions induced by new technology. Findings about such changes show how information influenced by activities, resources and actors can help decision-makers in relation to the use of telemedicine.

This paper focuses on understanding the contribution of Industry 4.0 technologies to manufacturing flexibility.

A multiple-case study was conducted through interviews and complementary data from 12 adopters of Industry 4.0 technologies from the industrial sector. To enable a broad perspective, cases from 5 industry sectors with different technological intensity levels were studied.

The findings show that Industry 4.0 technologies are mostly used to improve machine flexibility since there is a major focus on technological approaches rather than on wider flexibility. The results also showed that cloud services, IoT, and data analytics provide the basis for flexible operation, and collaborative robots, ERP/MES/PLM, AGVs, and traceability devices are the most commonly implemented technologies for flexibility. However, inherent contingency factors such as production complexity and product life cycle need to be considered.

This article expands the research on manufacturing flexibility, considering new capabilities introduced by Industry 4.0.

The rapid development of Intelligent and Connected Vehicles (ICVs) has boomed a new round of global technological and industrial revolution in recent decades. The Technology Roadmap of Intelligent and Connected Vehicles (2020) comprehensively analyzes the technical architecture, research status and future trends of ICVs. The methodology that supports the roadmap should get studied.

This paper interprets the roadmap from the aspects of strategic significance, technical content and characteristics of the roadmap, and evaluates the impact of the roadmap on researchers, industries and international strategies.

The technical architecture of ICVs as the “three rows and two columns” structure is studied, the methodology that supported the roadmap is explained with a case study and the influence of key technologies with proposed development routes is analyzed.

This paper could help researchers understand both thoughts and methodologies behind the technology roadmap of ICVs.

In this interview, the author of The Innovator’s Dilemma reviews his theory of how businesses are affected by disruptive technology. Most business leaders are aware of sustaining technologies, which can be simple incremental improvements or radical, up‐market technology innovations that leap‐frog ahead of the competition. However, they tend to ignore disruptive technologies, which initially provide neither a better product nor acceptable margins. By ignoring disruptive technology, companies forfeit the opportunity to ensure long‐term growth and prosperity. Business leaders must help their organizations develop new business models that utilize the disruptive technologies if they are to survive and evolve over time.

The purpose of this paper is to empirically validate the moderating roles of organizational inertia and project duration in the new high‐tech product development process.

The study methodology involved two phases, viz. exploratory and descriptive. The exploratory phase, with the support of a focused literature survey, has resulted in a theoretical framework, which got later validated through the survey based empirical phase.

The study results suggest that organizational learning and absorptive capacity could trigger a firm's technology acquisition intent, which in turn could increase the firm's propensity to new product commercialization. Contrary to the authors' hypothesis, the study results did not support firm size as an antecedent to the firm's technology acquisition intent. Further, while the project duration is found to negatively moderate the technology acquisition intent to new product commercialization relationship, the study results did not support the moderating effect of organizational inertia on the same.

The study findings suggest that segmenting technology market based on firm size may not be an appropriate marketing strategy; instead organizational factors, viz. organizational learning and absorptive capacity, should be taken as the basis of high‐tech market segmentation. Further, the study has provided the much needed empirical support to the new high‐tech product development process by explaining the moderating effects of organizational inertia and project duration on the relationship between technology acquisition intent and new product commercialization.

The present study is one among those rare empirical investigations that explained the role of organizational variables in the new high‐tech product development process. In addition, the study provides the marketing practitioners the basis of segmentation for high technology markets.

The purpose of this paper is to find some feasible measures to solve the problems faced in China's renewable energy development and promote the industrial development of China's renewable energy.

The paper summarises the status and studies the problems of China's renewable energy industrial development, and then puts forward some proposals for the industrial development.

The paper finds that most of China's renewable energy technology is still in the transitional period from research and development to industrial production, and that the renewable energy industrial development needs the establishment of a series of technical experiments and demonstration projects to analyze and investigate the resources, the conversion and market development experience, and then form complete sets of equipment design and manufacturing, cultivation and collection of biomass resources and technology development capabilities, and that regulations should be established to provide a solid foundation for the large‐scale development of China's renewable energy. As a result, some development measures are suggested in the paper.

The paper raises the problems faced in China's renewable energy development, and gives some feasible development measures for the industrial development of China's renewable energy.

The purpose of this paper is to take advantage of Internet of Things (IoT) for intelligent route programming of crowd emergency evacuation in metro station. It is a novel approach to ensure the crowd safety and reduce the casualties in the emergency context. An evacuation route programming model is constructed to select a suitable evacuation route and support the emergency decision maker of metro station.

The IoT technology is employed to collect and screen information, and to construct an expert decision model to support the metro station manager to make decision. As a feasible way to solve the multiple criteria decision-making problem, an improved multi-attributive border approximation area comparison (MABAC) approach is introduced.

The case study indicates that the model provides valuable suggestions for evacuation route programming and offers practical support for the design of an evacuation route guidance system. Moreover, IoT plays an important role in the process of intelligent route programming of crowd emergency evacuation in metro station. A library has similar structure and crowd characteristics of a metro station, thus the intelligent route programming approach can be applied to the library crowd evacuation.

The highlights of this paper are listed as followings: the accuracy and accessibility of the metro station’s real-time information are improved by integrating IoT technology with the intelligent route programming of crowd emergency evacuation. An improved MABAC approach is introduced to the expert support model. It promotes the applicability and reliability of decision making for emergency evacuation route selection in metro station. It is a novel way to combine the decision-making methods with practice.

The purpose of this study is to locally develop low-cost wireless mesh networks for reliable data communications to devices that prevent the theft of these devices in learning institutions of South Africa.

A network test-bench was developed where millions of packets were transmitted and logged between interconnected nodes to analyze the quality of the network’s service in a harsh indoor building environment. Similar methodologies in “big data” analysis as found in particle physics were adopted to analyze the network’s performance and reliability.

The results from statistical analysis reveal the quality of service between multiple asynchronous transmitting nodes in the network and compared with the wireless technology routing protocol to assess coverage in large geographical areas. The mesh network provides stable data communications between nodes with the exception of reliability degradation in some multi-hopping routes. Conclusions are presented to determine whether the underlining mesh network technology will be deployed to protect devices against theft in educational institutions of South Africa.

The anti-theft application will focus on proprietary firmware development with a reputable tablet manufacturer to render the device inoperable. Data communications of devices to the network will be monitored and controlled from a central management system. The electronics embedding the system-on-chip will be redesigned and developed using the guidelines stipulated by the chip manufacturer.

Design and development of low-cost wireless mesh networks to protect tablets against theft in institutions of digitized learning. The work presents performance and reliability metrics of a low-power wireless mesh wireless technology developed in a harsh indoor building environment.

This paper, which will be published in two parts in consecutive issues of Circuit World, reproduces a chapter of the recently published book ‘Handbook of Printed Circuit Technology: New Processes, New Technologies’, edited by G. Herrmann and K. Egerer and published by Electrochemical Publications Ltd, Port Erin, Isle of Man.