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Facility maintenance is critical for the operation and management of petrochemical plants. Maintenance work completed with higher productivity eventually contributes to better plant performance. Mechanization reduces workforce demand and can increase the productivity of maintenance work. The purpose of this paper is to assess the current mechanization level of the maintenance activities and then identify applicable technology solutions for productivity improvement in petrochemical facility maintenance.

This paper utilizes a mechanization level assessment method for global maintenance data collection and analysis. Subject matter experts’ interviews and market scanning were used to identify corresponding technology solutions.

The study discovered numerous maintenance activities with lower mechanization levels and identified more than 50 technology solutions applicable for maintenance productivity improvement.

This paper provides a roadmap for petrochemical maintenance work participants to assess their mechanization level status quo and identify technology solutions for higher maintenance work productivity. The method adopted is replicable and customizable for further applications with different plant conditions in the petrochemical sector and other industrial contexts.

This study aims to form a new concept of power-to-gas-based virtual power plant (GVPP) and propose a low-carbon economic scheduling optimization model for GVPP considering carbon emission trading.

In view of the strong uncertainty of wind power and photovoltaic power generation in GVPP, the information gap decision theory (IGDT) is used to measure the uncertainty tolerance threshold under different expected target deviations of the decision-makers. To verify the feasibility and effectiveness of the proposed model, nine-node energy hub was selected as the simulation system.

GVPP can coordinate and optimize the output of electricity-to-gas and gas turbines according to the difference in gas and electricity prices in the electricity market and the natural gas market at different times. The IGDT method can be used to describe the impact of wind and solar uncertainty in GVPP. Carbon emission rights trading can increase the operating space of power to gas (P2G) and reduce the operating cost of GVPP.

This study considers the electrical conversion and spatio-temporal calming characteristics of P2G, integrates it with VPP into GVPP and uses the IGDT method to describe the impact of wind and solar uncertainty and then proposes a GVPP near-zero carbon random scheduling optimization model based on IGDT.

This study designed a novel structure of the GVPP integrating P2G, gas storage device into the VPP and proposed a basic near-zero carbon scheduling optimization model for GVPP under the optimization goal of minimizing operating costs. At last, this study constructed a stochastic scheduling optimization model for GVPP.

Entrepreneurship.

This case is suitable for MBA, EMBA and advanced undergraduate students.

Noah Wealth Management was founded by Ms Wang Jingbo, a lady in her mid 30s with a team of less than 20 members in 2005. Exploiting market opportunities offered by a lack of good wealth management products and services, Noah grew rapidly from one branch office in 2005 to 59 branch offices in 2011, reaching a staff size of 1,031. Noah listed its shares on the New York Stock Exchange in November 2010. In 2011, Noah was ranked No. 38 among the 100 Top Potential Enterprises in China. Nonetheless, Noah faced several problems of internal management during the course of its fast expansion. In the first quarter financial report of 2012, Noah suffered a 52.6 percent decrease in net income over the corresponding period in 2011. Faced with a rapidly declining share price, Noah announced on May 22, 2012 a US $30 million share repurchase program.

The case supports a basic lesson on the entrepreneurial cycle, including assessing a business opportunity, resource mobilization, identifying a business model, growth of the venture, listing on the stock market, and subsequent growth challenges. Students can learn about some of the typical dilemmas faced by founders of entrepreneurial ventures, including how to maintain the corporate culture while growing fast and how to prevent members of the founding team from becoming bottlenecks to the development of the organization. The case can also provide management students with an overview of China's wealth management industry.

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Infrastructure financialization plays a critical role in infrastructure development and urban growth around the world. However, on the one hand, the existing research on the infrastructure financialization focuses on qualitative and lacks quantitative country-specific studies. On the other hand, the spatial heterogeneity and influencing factors of infrastructure financialization are ignored. This study takes China as a typical case to identify and analyze the spatial characteristics, development process and impact factors of infrastructure financialization.

To assess the development and characteristics of infrastructure financialization in China, this study constructs an evaluation index of infrastructure financialization based on the infrastructure financialization ratio (IFR). This study then analyzes the evolution process and spatial pattern of China's infrastructure financialization through the spatial analysis method. Furthermore, this study identifies and quantitatively analyzes the influencing factors of infrastructure financialization based on the spatial Dubin model. Finally, this study offers a policy suggestion as a governance response.

The results demonstrate that infrastructure financialization effectively promotes the development of infrastructure in China. Second, there are significant spatial differences in China’s infrastructure financialization. Third, many factors affect infrastructure financialization, with government participation having the greatest impact. In addition, over-financialization of infrastructure has the potential to lead to government debt risks, which is a critical challenge the Chinese Government must address. Finally, this study suggests that infrastructure financialization requires more detailed, tailored,and place-specific policy interventions by the government.

This study not only contributes to enriching the knowledge body of global financialization theory but also helps optimize infrastructure investment and financing policies in China and provides peer reference for other developing countries.

This study aims to perform flow simulations inside the acinus with fine alveolar pores (Kohn pores) using hexagonal cells and bottom-up geometric modeling, which enabled the elimination of invalid voids using previous top-bottom methods and spherical or circular cells.

Regular hexagonal cells were used to construct alveoli with no gaps via tessellation. Some hexagonal cells were fused to eliminate the inner boundaries to represent the structure of the bronchial tree. For the remaining hexagonal cells, the side lengths of the shared walls were adjusted to construct alveolar pores. Periodic moving boundaries with the same phase were set for all walls to describe synchronous contraction and expansion of the bronchi and alveoli.

More realistic flow characteristics in the distal lung were obtained. The effects of pore size and the mechanism of auxiliary ventilation of alveolar pores were revealed.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first numerical simulation study on the function of multiple alveolar pores at the level of pulmonary acini, which will be helpful for simulating the dynamic process of cough and sputum excretion in the future.

The purpose of this paper is to comprehensively explore the dimensions of Chinese culture and further investigate the underlying mechanisms via which the Chinese culture, in various dimensions, affect the overseas performance of Chinese multinational enterprises (CMNE) expatriates. Along with the awakening of China, not only CMNEs but also the Chinese culture have infiltrated the world market. The uniqueness of Chinese culture has attracted considerable attention of a majority of practitioners, while relevant research on how it affects CMNE expatriates’ performance sounds rare. In contrast to domestic employees, the performance of CMNE expatriates is more likely to be influenced by Chinese culture because of the potential cross-border cultural conflicts between the home and host countries. Additionally, the impact of Chinese culture on CMNE expatriates’ performance may vary according to different cultural dimensions.

Comparative case study is adopted for this research. After sufficient literature review and interviews with human resource (HR) staff, this paper structured the research, and then conducted 30 in-depth interviews with Chinese expatriates from both state-owned enterprises and private-owned enterprises.

This paper identifies that the Chinese culture do affect CMNE expatriates performance; however, the degree of its effect diversifies according to different cultural dimensions, namely, individual-level culture including Reniqng, Mianzi and social-level culture including power distance, Guanxi, Yinyang, Hexie and collectivism.

A limitation of this study is that the sample is not big enough and empirical tests are needed to validate or refute the model. Nevertheless, due to the fact that it is still during the period of initial study, the conceptual development raised by this paper would help us to gain good insights from these important and unexplored areas of national culture, which is being thought to affect performance in CMNEs.

Through reviewing the relevant literature and deeply analyzing Chinese culture, this paper attempts to help young Chinese MNEs to build up and/or improve performance appraisal method and system according to the unique Chinese culture, and to supply a theoretical support for HR personnel to make related policies for the sake of improving expatriate performance overseas.

This paper is the first attempt to dig and explore the whole picture, and refine the dimensions of Chinese culture from individual level and social level. It aims to lay a foundation for the research related to Chinese culture, and to some extent, supply a theoretical support to motivate more researchers to explore more ways to improve the performance of expatriates from young CMNEs.

This paper presents the whole frame of Chinese culture and from an integral Chinese perspective digs the Chinese cultural dimensions from individual level and social level for the first time. According to the social cognitive theory, this paper provides a firm foundation for scholars to understand Chinese culture as well as to analyze the related relationship with performance, and for CMNEs to develop and utilize the effect of national culture to improve the performance of expatriates overseas. So far, the research on Chinese culture and the effect of national culture overseas have not yet been well considered.

In recent years, China's marine industry has maintained rapid growth in general, and marine-related economic activities have continued to improve. The purpose of this research is to analyze the basic situation of China's marine economy development, identify the problems therein, forecast development trends and propose policy recommendations accordingly.

This research conducts a comprehensive and detailed analysis of the development of China's marine economy with rich data in diversified aspects. The current situation of China's marine economy development is analyzed from the perspective of scale and structure, and the external and internal development environment of China's marine economy is discussed. With the application of measurement and prediction method such as trend extrapolation, exponential smoothing, grey forecasting and neural network method, the future situation of China's marine economy development is forecasted.

In a complex environment where uncertainties at home and abroad have increased significantly, China's marine economy development suffers tremendous downward pressure in recent years. As China has achieved major achievements in the prevention and control of the COVID-19 epidemic, the marine economy development will gradually return to normal. It is estimated that the gross marine production value in 2022 will exceed 10 trillion yuan. China's marine economy will continue to maintain a steady growth trend in the future, and its development prospects will remain promising.

This research explores the current situation and trends of China's marine economy development and puts forward policy recommendations to promote the steady and health development of China's marine economy accordingly.

This study aims to explore the role of international ambidexterity (IA) in improving the innovation capability of emerging market multinationals. In particular, the main purpose of this research is to study the relationship amongst digitalisation, IA and innovation performance (IP) amongst multinational enterprises in China’s healthcare industry.

The data for this investigation were collected from 134 listed companies in China’s healthcare industry during the study period. This study tested the hypotheses by constructing a two-way fixed-effects model.

The results show that both the balance dimension and the combined dimension of IA have significant positive effects on IP. Digitalisation not only has a direct positive effect on IP but also positively moderates the positive correlation between IA and IP.

Previous studies have not captured the relationship between ambidexterity, digitalisation and IP, and this study helps to fill in the gap and examine these associations in China’s healthcare industry. The results of this study provide valuable insights for healthcare industry managers to understand the role of ambidexterity and digitalisation in innovation in the context of internationalisation.

The aim of this paper is to illustrate how scholars may adopt a multi‐method – not just multidisciplinary – approach on research on conflict management. Taking the Diaoyu Islands as a case, the author draws on literature from management, political sciences, war, military studies, history, etymology and culture. In the process, the author deepens, enriches and expands the Thomas‐Kilman (T‐K) model for mapping out possible solutions in resolving conflicts: not just between people at workplaces but for between states as well. For instance, the author explains why the Diaoyu Islands conflict, if not amicably resolved may well lead to obliteration (integrated as part of the model) in resolving the conflict via a nuclear outbreak. Third World War may just be sparked off with Russia aligned with China against Japan and the USA.

Of all the issues in management, conflict management is the most culturally embedded. Through a multi‐method approach, the author illuminates the complexity of the Diaoyu Islands case. Literature from past empirical war studies are reviewed to suggest the geography of the islands (proximity, borderless, richness of resources) makes war highly probable. Past Chinese‐Japanese hatred (utilizing visual imagery), antagonism and guanxi are reviewed in exploring their impacts on outcomes (see model). Etymological research is attempted using English, Japanese and Chinese words, characters and pictograms that are related to concepts within the T‐K model. To better grasp how young Chinese feel towards the Diaoyu Islands and the Japanese, the author conducted some field research in Harbin, China. The continuing Chinese angst against Japanese is explained through war imagery: there remains in young Chinese an unquenchable thirst for exacting revenge on the Japanese. In a search to uncover ways of resolving the dispute, a further, extended study is undertaken on ancient Chinese pictograms: for example, whether a 5,000 years old Chinese concept of compromise zhe zhong (Graphic 1; oracular bones) or splitting into halves may be relevant. The role of time in conflict management is discussed in relation to the Diaoyu Islands.

By providing the WWII visual imagery as a backdrop to Chinese‐Japanese antagonism, the author explains to readers why the Diaoyu Islands is such a complex case to resolve. Also in his fieldwork, he highlights that the younger Chinese are as equally indignant about Japanese unethical grabbing, “thieving” behaviour. In their minds, such behaviour harks back to the blatant seizure of Manchuria and Japanese puppetry of Manchukuo. Through the Diaoyu Islands case, the T‐K model and theory of conflict management is broadened, enriched and enhanced. The paper illustrates how in conflicts that involve cultures are very different from the West, for instance very ancient civilizations like China and India, authors should take a multi‐method approach and explore the issues and search for solutions far more deeply.

Very few scholars seek to integrate the two streams of research in resolving conflict as illustrated through this paper: management and social sciences (e.g. political sciences, military and war studies). Conflict is about people and therefore integral use of multi‐methods needs to be used.

This paper aims to investigate the electrochemical corrosion behavior of a five-layer Al alloy composites (4343/4047/3003/4047/4343) with a thickness of 0.2 mm in NaCl solution.

Electrochemical impedance spectroscopy, polarization curve and morphology analyses were used to study the corrosion behavior of the Al alloy composites from cross-sectional and plane directions.

The corrosion resistance of the surface from the plane direction was higher than that from the cross sections. Si-enrich particles were observed in the outer 4047/4343 layer, and AlFeCuMnBi phases were identified in the core 3003 layer. The galvanic coupling between the Si-enrich particle and the Al matrix accelerated the dissolution Al matrix.

This work lays the experimental foundation for corrosion mechanism of the Al alloy composite plate.