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The purpose of this paper is to bridge the gap in the literature to examine key factors that influence Taiwanese consumers to repurchase Korean beauty products.

This study uses a quantitative approach to test the proposed hypotheses using structural equation modeling. Causal research design is used in this research to identify cause-and-effect relationship among the constructs. Primary data collection is used to gather data. This study provides the better understanding about key factors that influence Taiwanese consumers’ repurchase intention (RI) of Korean cosmetics products.

Results show that perceived price (PP) and country of origin (COO) significantly influence word-of-mouth (WOM). PP, COO and WOM significantly influence RI. WOM is the most influential variable toward RI, followed by COO and PP.

Very few studies have examined a general construct of RI related to beauty product. The findings of this study imply several practical directions for marketers of beauty product industries specifically for Taiwanese consumers. This study helps to know what factors become basic consideration for Taiwanese consumers in repurchasing Korean beauty products. Second, it underscores the role of WOM between the independent variables (PP and COO) and RI as the dependent variable.

The purpose of this paper is to determine the development and knowledge flows of dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) via the use of patent inventor database. Moreover, this study aims to explore patentees and inventors’ companies to help readers and practitioners to be able to understand the patentees, technology development and activities of knowledge flows from four countries. DSSCs, which are known as one of the key technologies of green energy, have been applied ever more widely to many different industries, and their use has quickly grown with a number of scientific publications and patent applications.

This paper was based on the US patent database collection of third-generation DSSCs in four typical countries such as USA, Japan, Germany and Taiwan to map the knowledge network of DSSC technology via the social network analysis method.

The knowledge network of 132 DSSC patents was explored. Among the four countries, Japan leads, with the main patent number being H01G009. This paper also indicates the knowledge flow situation of Japanese inventors of DSSCs. For example, patented inventors Wariishi and Koji (JP) served the Fuji Photo Film Co., Ltd. (JP) in 2002, and then in 2008, transferred to the Fuji Film Corporation (JP). This means that the knowledge of technology was transferred by people who moved to another company for a new job.

This study is based on US Patent and Trademark Office patent database to do exploration.

This study was expected to provide information for the industry, government and academia, so that they will understand the trajectory of the technology inventor, specialist cultivation and technology development in the DSSC industry.

This study provides useful information for the green energy industry, government and academia to understand the importance of the knowledge flows and future development of DSSC technology of the solar cell industry. Thereby, they can intensify industrial competence and innovation by externally collaborating in this field as well as to increase the industrial competence by reimbursing the funds from government and other research institutes.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the similarities and differences in consumer purchasing behavior of Taiwanese and Indonesian organic rice consumers.

This study uses quantitative methods with the primary data collected from consumers in Indonesia and Taiwan through structured questionnaire to understand customer purchasing behavior toward organic rice in the two countries. A total of 415 useable questionnaires were computed and analyzed through factor analysis, reliability analysis, regression analysis, correlation and t-test.

The results of this research indicate significant differences between Indonesia and Taiwan in their consumer knowledge and consumer purchase behavior, but not for environmental concerns and consumer attitude.

The results of this study will assist producers of organic rice in developing countries to adapt to new organic food standards and marketing to ensure high food quality standards for both domestic and export markets.

This study provides insights into the preferences of consumers of organic rice both in Taiwan and Indonesia. Empirical results in this study provides comparisons between two countries attitudes toward organic rice and this study emphasizes the correlation between consumer purchasing behavior, consumer knowledge, environmental concerns and attitude for Indonesian respondents, Taiwanese respondent, and both combined.

The purpose of this paper is to propose an optimal energy management (OEM) method using intelligent optimization techniques applied to implement an optimally hybrid heat and power isolated microgrid. The microgrid investigated combines renewable and conventional power generation.

Five bio-inspired optimization methods include an advanced proposed multi-objective particle swarm optimization (MOPSO) approach which is comparatively applied for OEM of the implemented microgrid with other bio-inspired optimization approaches via their comparative simulation results.

Optimal multi-objective solutions through Pareto front demonstrate that the advanced proposed MOPSO method performs quite better in comparison with other meta-heuristic optimization methods. Moreover, the proposed MOPSO is successfully applied to perform 24-h OEM microgrid. The simulation results also display the merits of the real time optimization along with the arbitrary of users’ selection as to satisfy their power requirement.

This paper focuses on the OEM of a designed microgrid using a newly proposed modified MOPSO algorithm. Optimal multi-objective solutions through Pareto front demonstrate that the advanced proposed MOPSO method performs quite better in comparison with other meta-heuristic optimization approaches.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the input- and output-specific technical inefficiency of Vietnamese prawn-rice rotational crops (PRRC) and to identify the impacts of the socio-economic characteristics of farmers and farms on these technical inefficiencies.

This study first used a Russell-type (input-output) directional distance function to estimate the input- and output-specific technical inefficiency. Second, it applied a bootstrap truncated regression to analyze the factors influencing these technical inefficiencies. Data were gathered through a survey among 94 farmers, from Ben Tre and Kien Giang provinces, the two popular PRRC areas in the Mekong Delta.

Results show that Vietnamese PRRC farmers could reduce the water surface area by 3%, the use of seedlings by 15%, labor by 16%, fertilizers by 26%, and the use of others by 24%, while simultaneously increasing the revenue of farming system by 57% relative to the variable returns to scale (VRS) frontier. Farmers with more years of experience are generally better in managing the use of seedlings and in improvement of revenue. Farmers in Kien Giang province are more efficient in achieving revenue of the PRRC farming system than farmers in Ben Tre province.

Outcomes of this study are useful to identify strategies in minimizing the use of inputs while simultaneously maximizing PRRC production.

This paper relates to the comparison of two mostly different ecological zones, being the dominant production areas of PRRC, in which, Kien Giang represents the western part, while Ben Tre is in the eastern part of the Vietnam’s Mekong Delta. The findings not only expand the current understanding but also suggest various meaningful research questions regarding the development of Vietnamese PRRC under the impacts of climate change. The study also contributes to the literature on examining the input- and output-specific technical inefficiencies and influencing factors.

This paper aims to propose an advanced tracking control of the uncertain nonlinear dynamic system using a novel hybrid fuzzy linear quadratic regulator (LQR)-proportional-integral-derivative (PID) sliding mode control (SMC) optimized by differential evolution (DE) algorithm.

First, a swing-up and balancing control is presented for an experimental uncertain nonlinear Pendubot system perturbed with friction. The DE-based optimal SMC scheme is used to optimally swing up the Pendubot system to the top equilibrium position. Then the novel hybrid fuzzy-based on LQR fusion function and PID controller optimized by DE algorithm is innovatively applied for balancing and control the position of the first link of the Pendubot in the down-right position with tracking sinusoidal signal reference.

Experimental results demonstrate the robustness and effectiveness of the proposed approach in balancing control for an uncertain nonlinear Pendubot system perturbed with internal friction.

This manuscript is an original research paper and has never been submitted to any other journal.

This chapter provides information on the development of Vietnamese education under the influence of global forces based on the analysis of relevant education research and policies using Wolhuter’s frameworks. In the process of coming up with ways to develop education in the face of different influences of globalization, besides having reactions with patterns commonly found in countries around the world, Vietnam also has responses that reflect its own political, sociocultural and economic characteristics. The state still plays a controlling role in education at all levels and many culture-related features that have existed throughout the country’s history have hardly changed, namely aspects related to teachers, learners and teaching and learning methods. To sustain its education in the globalized era, Vietnam must make more efforts in various aspects such as the link between education and employment, the logic of education objectives, the feasibility and appropriateness of curricula, quality of education, especially of higher education and equality in education for underprivileged groups.

This study aims to dispense a concrete and coherent picture on the role of digitalization of accounting information (DOAI) among the small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) through a statistically reliable and parsimonious paradigm for procuring the impact of DOAI on sustainable innovation ecosystem (SIE) and public value (PV) generation. With this cue, the geographical scope of this tentative manuscript was framed in SMEs of developing countries.

A three-pronged methodology was disposed in this research, namely, literature review, expert interviews and self-administered survey. Qualitative data was procured from a series of semi-structured in-depth interviews. The quantitative data was drawn on a self-administered survey in which the closed-ended questionnaires were conveniently circulated to a cross-sectional sample of 583 respondents. The data captured from quantitative approach was processed and analyzed via covariance-based structural equation modeling with AMOS 26.0.

The outcomes analysis highlighted that there were significant positive associations between the hypothesized constructs regarding significance and effect size. These interlinks were also partially mediated through the mediation of quality of information on financial reports and SIE.

This research was bounded by geographical provenance emphasis on one country and relative smallness of the data set procured through anonymous survey-based approach drawn from a convenient sample of digitally savvy respondents working in one sub-sector resulted in the reduction in the robustness and generalizability of the observations. Nevertheless, these above-mentioned limitations could thus offer the starting points for novel avenues creation for the future research.

The practitioners would definitely have valuable benefits from in-depth insights on the obtained findings. Concretely, as lifting the degree of understandings on the magnitude of long-term cooperation and superior coordination within the SIE would enable practitioners to enlarge their business viewpoints to better cope with the challenges of complicated business settings, facilitating them to co-create PV for all their key stakeholders through giving priority to implementing DOAI.

Society could benefit from this study if policymakers and the influencers of government focus on innovative features and assure the possible environment for innovation deployment through embarking on introducing policies that would facilitate the digitalization as well as stimulate and incentivize establishing the SIE for PV generation. It would be good for both the SMEs and society when SMEs could thrive in community settings as well as this togetherness.

Unpacking the potential of DOAI has been considered as the promising research avenues that are outlined not only to redress the shortfall in the research stream in relation to the digitalization among SMEs but also provide the right directions for sustainable development among SMEs.

This paper aims to propose a method to reduce the resistance of silicon-based V-shaped electrothermal microactuator (VEM) by applying a surface sputtering process.

Four VEM’s samples have been fabricated using traditional silicon on insulator (SOI)-Micro-electro-mechanical System (MEMS) technology, three of them are coated with a thin layer of platinum on the top surface by sputtering technique with different sputtered times and the other is original. The displacements of the VEM are calculated and simulated to evaluate the advantages of sputtering method.

The measured results show that the average resistance of the sputtered structures is approximately 1.16, 1.55 and 2.4 times lower than the non-sputtering sample corresponding to the sputtering time of 1.5, 3 and 6 min. Simulation results confirmed that the maximum displacement of the sputtered VEM is almost 1.45 times larger than non-sputtering one in the range of voltage from 8 to 20 V. The experimental displacements are also measured to validate the better performance of the sputtered samples.

The experimental results demonstrated the better displacement of the VEM structure after using the platinum sputtering process. The improvement can be considered and applied for enhancing displacement as well as decreasing the driving voltage of the other electrothermal microactuators like U- or Z-shaped structures while combining with the low-cost SOI-MEMS micromachining technology.

Building on my earlier work (Dang, 2007, 2008), this chapter provides an updated review of the private tutoring phenomenon in Vietnam including the reasons, scale, intensity, form, cost, and legality of these classes. In particular, this chapter offers a comparative analysis of the trends in private tutoring between 1998 and 2006 using all available data.

This chapter analyzes data from different sources, including (i) the 2006 Vietnam Household Living Standards Measurement Survey (VHLSS), (ii) the 1997–1998 Vietnam Living Standards Measurement Survey (VLSS), (iii) the 2008 Vietnam Household Testing Survey (VHTS), and (iv) local press in Vietnam. Quantitative methods are used.

Several (micro-)correlates are examined that are found to be strongly correlated with student attendance at tutoring, including household income, household heads’ education and residence areas, student current grade level, ethnicity, and household sizes. In particular, I focus on the last three variables that received little attention in the previous literature on the determinants of tutoring.

This chapter provides an updated and systematic review of the private tutoring phenomenon in Vietnam. Findings are highly relevant to the ongoing debates on private tutoring among all stakeholders in Vietnam, as well as policymakers/researchers in other countries. Suggestions are proposed on current gaps in the literature for future research.