How can strategic philanthropy contribute to innovation for companies

This investigation proposes to explore the existing link between a strategic conception of philanthropy and innovation. Indeed, the nature of the research question relies on an unexplored field in the CSR and Innovation management academic literature. It starts with the interest to know which the benefits are for a firm encouraged to invest strategically in philanthropy. In this regard, the analysis contributes in fitting this gap by following different objectives in an exploratory perspective. Throughout the research it will be analyzed the concept and the current and past contributions on the different branches of innovation (product innovation, managerial innovation, technological innovation), to accentuate the relation between an accurate strategic approach to philanthropy and the impact on the organizational value. Indeed, analyzing philanthropic innovation may provide insights about business opportunities and notions related to social investments and profit. That aspect includes the link between those strategic decisions that a firm can use to maximize those investments as it was part of their core business. It also proves the existing link between CSR and innovation, and the possibilities that the enterprises have towards this subject.

Cultura e innovación en empresas con relaciones de cooperación inter organizacional

Un gran número de empresas están inmersas actualmente en espacios de mercado conocidos y saturados de competidores. La innovación constituye una de las principales alternativas de las empresas para encontrar su posicionamiento estratégico y adaptarse a los cambios del entorno (Kim & Mauborgne, 2005). Igualmente, Demirci (2013) asegura que la cultura es un factor clave en la innovación, dado que está fuertemente asociada con los valores, actitudes, comportamientos y prácticas organizacionales. Esta investigación abarca el estudio de la cultura organizacional y la innovación en el marco de estrategias de cooperación inter-organizacional donde se plantea que el grado de cooperación que existe entre las empresas tiene un efecto sobre los valores culturales y la incorporación de innovaciones en cada organización. Para esto se llevó a cabo una investigación cuantitativa con un alcance de tipo descriptivo y de carácter no experimental y trans seccional, cuya unidad de análisis fueron 20 empresas de la red ParqueSoft Manizales. Para la medición de las variables de innovación se aplicó un instrumento basado en el Manual de Oslo de la OECD y Eurostat (2005) el cual contempla la innovación de producto, proceso, mercadotecnia y organización. A nivel de los valores culturales, la medición se realizó a través de un cuestionario inspirado en el modelo de Hofstede (1980). Los resultados obtenidos permiten demostrar que existe un grado de relación entre la cooperación y los valores culturales ‘distancia al poder’ y ‘tolerancia a la incertidumbre´, sin poder determinar la relación con la generación de innovación de producto, proceso, mercadotecnia y organización, así como con las otras dimensiones del modelo de valores de Hofstede.

Eficiencia de los sistema de salud en los países de América Latina y del Caribe desde el indicador de esperanza de vida al nacer para los años 1990 y 2012 frente al gasto total en salud como porcentaje del producto interno bruto para el año 1995 y 2012 “una oportunidad de brenchmarking para el sistema de protección social colombiano”

Para los países emergentes en América Latina y El Caribe se hace necesario determinar la eficiencia de su sistema de salud para generar beneficios a su población desde el indicador de esperanza de vida al nacer y los recursos que se hacen uso desde Colombia en comparación con sus homólogos. Se evidencia que a pesar de Colombia poseer una economía fuerte durante el análisis de los dos momentos se mantiene en la tendencia general de los demás países y con los mismos resultados del indicador. A su vez se concluye que el momento en que se tomaron las decisiones de cambio del sistema de salud es un factor diferenciador en los resultados obtenidos como fue el caso de Costa Rica identificado con el de mejor desempeño en la relación Indicador de esperanza de vida al nacer y Porcentaje de gasto en salud como parte del Producto interno bruto.

National System for Qualifications and Vet. 'Sistema Nacional de Cualificaciones y Formación Profesional'.

Se aborda el Sistema Nacional de Cualificaciones y Formación Profesional, analizando el Catálogo Nacional de Cualificaciones Profesionales, así como el desarrollo y aplicaciones del mismo. Incluye el texto de la Ley orgánica 5/2002, de 19 de junio, de las cualificaciones y de la formación profesional, y un glosario de términos relacionados.

Century-of-Information Research (CIR): a strategy for research and innovation in the century of information

More data will be produced in the next five years than in the entire history of human kind, a digital deluge that marks the beginning of the Century of Information. Through a year-long consultation with UK researchers, a coherent strategy has been developed, which will nurture Century-of-Information Research (CIR); it crystallises the ideas developed by the e-Science Directors' Forum Strategy Working Group. This paper is an abridged version of their latest report which can be found at: http://wikis.nesc.ac.uk/escienvoy/Century_of_Information_Research_Strategy which also records the consultation process and the affiliations of the authors. This document is derived from a paper presented at the Oxford e-Research Conference 2008 and takes into account suggestions made in the ensuing panel discussion. The goals of the CIR Strategy are to facilitate the growth of UK research and innovation that is data and computationally intensive and to develop a new culture of 'digital-systems judgement' that will equip research communities, businesses, government and society as a whole, with the skills essential to compete and prosper in the Century of Information. The CIR Strategy identifies a national requirement for a balanced programme of coordination, research, infrastructure, translational investment and education to empower UK researchers, industry, government and society. The Strategy is designed to deliver an environment which meets the needs of UK researchers so that they can respond agilely to challenges, can create knowledge and skills, and can lead new kinds of research. It is a call to action for those engaged in research, those providing data and computational facilities, those governing research and those shaping education policies. The ultimate aim is to help researchers strengthen the international competitiveness of the UK research base and increase its contribution to the economy. The objectives of the Strategy are to better enable UK researchers across all disciplines to contribute world-leading fundamental research; to accelerate the translation of research into practice; and to develop improved capabilities, facilities and context for research and innovation. It envisages a culture that is better able to grasp the opportunities provided by the growing wealth of digital information. Computing has, of course, already become a fundamental tool in all research disciplines. The UK e-Science programme (2001-06)—since emulated internationally—pioneered the invention and use of new research methods, and a new wave of innovations in digital-information technologies which have enabled them. The Strategy argues that the UK must now harness and leverage its own, plus the now global, investment in digital-information technology in order to spread the benefits as widely as possible in research, education, industry and government. Implementing the Strategy would deliver the computational infrastructure and its benefits as envisaged in the Science & Innovation Investment Framework 2004-2014 (July 2004), and in the reports developing those proposals. To achieve this, the Strategy proposes the following actions: support the continuous innovation of digital-information research methods; provide easily used, pervasive and sustained e-Infrastructure for all research; enlarge the productive research community which exploits the new methods efficiently; generate capacity, propagate knowledge and develop skills via new curricula; and develop coordination mechanisms to improve the opportunities for interdisciplinary research and to make digital-infrastructure provision more cost effective. To gain the best value for money strategic coordination is required across a broad spectrum of stakeholders. A coherent strategy is essential in order to establish and sustain the UK as an international leader of well-curated national data assets and computational infrastructure, which is expertly used to shape policy, support decisions, empower researchers and to roll out the results to the wider benefit of society. The value of data as a foundation for wellbeing and a sustainable society must be appreciated; national resources must be more wisely directed to the collection, curation, discovery, widening access, analysis and exploitation of these data. Every researcher must be able to draw on skills, tools and computational resources to develop insights, test hypotheses and translate inventions into productive use, or to extract knowledge in support of governmental decision making. This foundation plus the skills developed will launch significant advances in research, in business, in professional practice and in government with many consequent benefits for UK citizens. The Strategy presented here addresses these complex and interlocking requirements.

Plant variety protection, innovation, and transferability: Some empirical evidence

Under the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, all member-countries of the World Trade Organization are required to provide an "effective" system of plant variety protection within a specific time frame. In many developing countries, this has led to a divisive debate about the fundamental desirability of extending intellectual property rights to agriculture. Empirical studies on the economic impacts of plant variety protection, especially its ability to generate large private sector investments in plant breeding and to facilitate the transfer of technology, have been very limited. This paper examines two aspects of the international experience of plant variety protection: (a) the relationship between legislation, research, and development expenditures and plant variety protection grants, i.e., the innovation effect and (b) the role of plant variety protection in facilitating the flow of varieties across countries, i.e., the transferability effect.

Mapping IT innovation in Facilities Management

Over the past decade there has been significant growth in the facilities management (FM) sector resulting in a diverse and highly competitive marketplace. This marketplace engages contractors, in-house teams, suppliers, consultants and professional institutions. Many of these organisations have had to innovate to differentiate themselves from competitors. The subject of this paper is facilities management innovation. More specifically, it examines the introduction of information technology (IT) to support such innovations. Our understanding of how such innovations are brought about is scant. The intention of this paper is to examine the motivations and factors which have brought about ‘information system’ innovations in the sector based on an examination of a small but diverse collection of case studies. The study specifically considers the route by which the selected innovations came about and the way in which the innovation has diffused throughout the rest of the organisation. The IT innovations identified in case studies include whole life cost modelling, a content management solution, open book partnering, management information portal (fmNet), RFID technology, and capacity and capability planning. Taken together they characterise a sector that is using IT to codify and standardise information such that useful knowledge becomes widely dispersed.

Horses for courses: Relating innovation diffusion concepts to the stage of the diffusion process

The research uses a sociological perspective to build an improved, context specific understanding of innovation diffusion within the UK construction industry. It is argued there is an iterative interplay between actors and the social system they occupy that directly influences the diffusion process as well as the methodology adopted. The research builds upon previous findings that argued a level of best fit for the three innovation diffusion concepts of cohesion, structural equivalence and thresholds. That level of best fit is analysed here using empirical data from the UK construction industry. This analysis allows an understanding of how the relative importance of these concepts' actually varies within the stages of the innovation diffusion process. The conclusion that the level of relevance fluctuates in relation to the stages of the diffusion process is a new development in the field.

High-performance infrared narrow-bandpass filters for the Indian National Satellite System meteorological instrument (INSAT-3D)

This paper describes the design and manufacture of a set of precision cooled (210K) narrow-bandpass filters for the infrared imager and sounder on the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) INSAT-3D meteorological satellite. We discuss the basis for the choice of multilayer coating designs and materials for 21 differing filter channels, together with their temperature-dependence, thin film deposition technologies, substrate metrology, and environmental durability performance. (C) 2008 Optical Society of America.

Adaptive modelling with tunable RBF network using multi-innovation RLS algorithm assisted by swarm intelligence

In this paper, we propose a new on-line learning algorithm for the non-linear system identification: the swarm intelligence aided multi-innovation recursive least squares (SI-MRLS) algorithm. The SI-MRLS algorithm applies the particle swarm optimization (PSO) to construct a flexible radial basis function (RBF) model so that both the model structure and output weights can be adapted. By replacing an insignificant RBF node with a new one based on the increment of error variance criterion at every iteration, the model remains at a limited size. The multi-innovation RLS algorithm is used to update the RBF output weights which are known to have better accuracy than the classic RLS. The proposed method can produces a parsimonious model with good performance. Simulation result are also shown to verify the SI-MRLS algorithm.

Innovation in construction: a sociology of technology approach

An alternative approach to understanding innovation is made using two intersecting ideas. The first is that successful innovation requires consideration of the social and organizational contexts in which it is located. The complex context of construction work is characterized by inter-organizational collaboration, a project-based approach and power distributed amongst collaborating organizations. The second is that innovations can be divided into two modes: ‘bounded’, where the implications of innovation are restricted within a single, coherent sphere of influence, and ‘unbounded’, where the effects of implementation spill over beyond this. Bounded innovations are adequately explained within the construction literature. However, less discussed are unbounded innovations, where many firms' collaboration is required for successful implementation, even though many innovations can be considered unbounded within construction's inter-organizational context. It is argued that unbounded innovations require an approach to understand and facilitate the interactions both within a range of actors and between the actors and technological artefacts. The insights from a sociology of technology approach can be applied to the multiplicity of negotiations and alignments that constitute the implementation of unbounded innovation. The utility of concepts from the sociology of technology, including ‘system building’ and ‘heterogeneous engineering’, is demonstrated by applying them to an empirical study of an unbounded innovation on a major construction project (the new terminal at Heathrow Airport, London, UK). This study suggests that ‘system building’ contains outcomes that are not only transformations of practices, processes and systems, but also the potential transformation of technologies themselves.