Ansätze zum Management der Additive Manufacturing Supply Chain

Da sich Additive Manufacturing (AM) von traditionellen Produktionsverfahren unterscheidet, entstehen neue Möglichkeiten im Produktdesign und im Supply Chain Setup. Die Auswirkungen der Aufhebung traditionellen Restriktionen im Produktdesign werden unter dem Begriff „Design for Additive Manufacturing“ intensiv diskutiert. In gleicher Weise werden durch AM Restriktionen im traditionellen Supply Chain Setup aufgehoben. Insbesondere sind die folgenden Verbesserungen möglich: Reduktion von Losgrössen und Lieferzeiten, bedarfsgerechte Produktion auf Abruf, dezentrale Produktion, Customization auf Ebene Bauteil und kontinuierliche Weiterentwicklung von Bauteilen. Viele Firmen investieren nicht selbst in die AM Technologien, sondern kaufen Bauteile bei Lieferanten. Um das Potential der AM Supply Chain mit Lieferanten umzusetzen, entstehen die folgenden Anforderungen an AM Einkaufsprozesse. Erstens muss der Aufwand pro Bestellung reduziert werden. Zweitens brauchen AM Nutzer einen direkten Zugang zu den Lieferanten ohne Umweg über die Einkaufsabteilung. Drittens müssen geeignete AM Lieferanten einfach identifiziert werden können. Viertens muss der Wechsel von Lieferanten mit möglichst geringem Aufwand möglich sein. Ein mögliche Lösung sind AM spezifische E-Procurement System um diese Anforderungen zu erfüllen

Assessing the state of Sustainable Land Management research in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan

This article synthesizes findings from a review of the state of research on sustainable land management in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan and from an analysis of the interface between research and action. Using the Global Land Project (GLP 2005) analytical framework, we analyzed the distribution of 131 selected publications (including a clearly defined set of local and international academic and gray literature) across the framework's components and links in a social–ecological system. There is a strong emphasis in the literature on the impact of changes in land use and management on ecosystems; however, there is little research on the implications for ecosystem services. This finding is opposed to that of a similar analysis of publications at the global scale (Björnsen Gurung et al 2012). Another major gap was the lack of research on Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan regarding the influence of global factors on social and ecological systems, despite social, economic, and political integration into global structures since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the increasing influence of climate change. Our analysis disaggregated academic literature published in the region and international academic literature, revealing stark differences. These differences are partly attributable to the legacy of the late Soviet era principle of “rational use of land resources,” which fit the planned economy but lacks approaches for decentralized resource governance. Finally, the emphasis of research on systems knowledge, the lack of transdisciplinary research, and the critical feedback of stakeholders at a regional sustainable land management forum suggest that actionable sustainable land management research on Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan is rare. Recommendations are made for targeted, application-focused, multistakeholder research and knowledge sharing, including local and international researchers as well as practitioners, policy-makers, and land users.

The research-action interface in sustainable land management in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan: Challenges and recommendations

International agencies and programmes introduced sustainable land management (SLM) to Central Asia after the former Soviet Republics became independent in 1991. An aim of early SLM initiatives was to address challenges linked to the transformation of the agricultural sector from a centrally planned economy to a decentralized market economy. This article analyses the knowledge–action interface in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan as it relates to SLM. The analysis focuses on the influence of underlying land management concepts by means of a literature review. Contemporary barriers at the research–action interface were identified using participatory appraisal. And a historically contextualized understanding of the effectiveness of interactions between researchers, policy makers and practitioners is based on an analysis of purposefully selected cases. The study concludes that knowledge of different stakeholder groups is often highly disconnected. Interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary studies are rare, and academic research on SLM has subsequently been ineffective at contributing to substantial benefits for society. Further, researchers, policy makers and practitioners in this context must recognize the differences between SLM and what is often referred to as the equivalent Soviet-era concept—rational use of land resources—and the resulting implications of these differences. The authors recommend the following: creating an enabling environment for SLM research through academic institutional reform removing structural constraints, making research outcomes more effective by applying systems approaches that produce evidence for policy makers on the multiple benefits of SLM, helping land users evaluate SLM strategies and investing in the establishment and maintenance of a multi-stakeholder SLM platform that allows dynamic exchange.

Network Dynamics in Natural Resource Governance: A Case Study of Swiss Landscape Management

Structural characteristics of social networks have been recognized as important factors of effective natural resource governance. However, network analyses of natural resource governance most often remain static, even though governance is an inherently dynamic process. In this article, we investigate the evolution of a social network of organizational actors involved in the governance of natural resources in a regional nature park project in Switzerland. We ask how the maturation of a governance network affects bonding social capital and centralization in the network. Applying separable temporal exponential random graph modeling (STERGM), we test two hypotheses based on the risk hypothesis by Berardo and Scholz (2010) in a longitudinal setting. Results show that network dynamics clearly follow the expected trend toward generating bonding social capital but do not imply a shift toward less hierarchical and more decentralized structures over time. We investigate how these structural processes may contribute to network effectiveness over time.

Transfer Pricing in the Decentralized Multinational Corporation

This paper considers how the multinational corporation's transfer price responds to changes in international corporate effective tax rates. It extends the decentralized decision-making analysis of transfer pricing in the context of different tax rates. It adopts and extends Bond's (1980) model of the decentralized multinational corporation that assumes centralized transfer pricing. The direction of transfer price change is as expected, while the magnitude of change is likely to be less than predicted by the Horst (1971), centralized decision-making model. The paper extends the model further by assuming negotiated transfer pricing, where the analysis is partitioned into perfect and imperfect information cases. The negotiated transfer pricing result reverts to the Horst (1971), or centralized decision-making, result, under perfect information. Under imperfect information, the centralized decision-making result obtains when top management successfully informs division general managers or it successfully implements a non-monetary reward scheme to encourage division general managers to cooperate. Under simplifying assumptions, centralized decision-making dominates decentralized decision-making, while negotiated transfer pricing weakly dominates centralized transfer pricing.

Managing software development information in global configuration management activities

Software Configuration Management (SCM) techniques have been considered the entry point to rigorous software engineering, where multiple organizations cooperate in a decentralized mode to save resources, ensure the quality of the diversity of software products, and manage corporate information to get a better return of investment. The incessant trend of Global Software Development (GSD) and the complexity of implementing a correct SCM solution grow not only because of the changing circumstances, but also because of the interactions and the forces related to GSD activities. This paper addresses the role SCM plays in the development of commercial products and systems, and introduces a SCM reference model to describe the relationships between the different technical, organizational, and product concerns any software development company should support in the global market.

On Managing Stochastic Decentralized Projects

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Washington, 2016-06

Knowledge management systems:finding a way with technology

Purpose - To consider the role of technology in knowledge management in organizations, both actual and desired. Design/methodology/approach - Facilitated, computer-supported group workshops were conducted with 78 people from ten different organizations. The objective of each workshop was to review the current state of knowledge management in that organization and develop an action plan for the future. Findings - Only three organizations had adopted a strongly technology-based "solution" to knowledge management problems, and these followed three substantially different routes. There was a clear emphasis on the use of general information technology tools to support knowledge management activities, rather than the use of tools specific to knowledge management. Research limitations/implications - Further research is needed to help organizations make best use of generally available software such as intranets and e-mail for knowledge management. Many issues, especially human, relate to the implementation of any technology. Participation was restricted to organizations that wished to produce an action plan for knowledge management. The findings may therefore represent only "average" organizations, not the very best practice. Practical implications - Each organization must resolve four tensions: Between the quantity and quality of information/knowledge, between centralized and decentralized organization, between head office and organizational knowledge, and between "push" and "pull" processes. Originality/value - Although it is the group rather than an individual that determines what counts as knowledge, hardly any previous studies of knowledge management have collected data in a group context.

Cooperation in an HMMS-type supply chain: A management application of cooperative game theory = Kooperáció egy HMMS-típusú ellátási láncban: A kooperatív játékelmélet egy menedzsment alkalmazása

We apply cooperative game theory concepts to analyze a Holt-Modigliani-Muth-Simon (HMMS) supply chain. The bullwhip effect in a two-stage supply chain (supplier-manufacturer) in the framework of the HMMS-model with quadratic cost functions is considered. It is assumed that both firms minimize their relevant costs, and two cases are examined: the supplier and the manufacturer minimize their relevant costs in a decentralized and in a centralized (cooperative) way. The question of how to share the savings of the decreased bullwhip effect in the centralized (cooperative) model is answered by the weighted Shapley value, by a transferable utility cooperative game theory tool, where the weights are for the exogenously given “bargaining powers” of the participants of the supply chain. = A cikkben a kooperatív játékelmélet fogalmait alkalmazzuk egy Holt-Mogigliani-Muth-Simon-típusú ellátási lánc esetében. Az ostorcsapás-hatás elemeit egy beszállító-termelő ellátási láncban ragadjuk meg egy kvadratikus készletezési és termelési költség mellett. Feltételezzük, hogy mindkét vállalat minimalizálja a releváns költségeit. Két működési rendszert hasonlítunk össze: egy hierarchikus döntéshozatali rendszert, amikor először a termelő, majd a beszállító optimalizálja helyzetét, majd egy centralizált (kooperatív) modellt, amikor a vállalatok az együttes költségüket minimalizálják. A kérdés úgy merül fel, hogy a csökkentett ostorcsapás-hatás esetén hogyan osszák meg a részvevők ebben a transzferálható hasznosságú kooperatív játékban a költség megtakarítást, exogén módon adott tárgyalási pozíció mellett.

Iowa DOT Project Management Peer Exchange, 2016

This project supported the planning and conduct of a two-day Iowa Department of Transportation–hosted peer exchange for state agencies that have implemented some or all of the suggested strategies outlined in the Second Strategic Highway Research Program–sponsored project R10, Project Management Strategies for Complex Projects. Presentations were made by participating states, and several opportunities were provided for directed discussion. General themes emerging from the presentations and discussions were identified as follows: To implement improvements in project management processes, agency leadership needs to decide that a new approach to project management is worth pursuing and then dedicate resources to developing a project management plan. The change to formalized project management and five-dimensional project management (5DPM) requires a culture shift in agencies from segmented “silo” processes to collaborative, cooperative processes that make communication and collaboration high priorities. Agencies need trained project managers who are empowered to execute the project management plan, as well as properly trained functional staff. Project management can be centralized or decentralized with equal effect. After an agency’s project management plan and structure are developed, software tools and other resources should be implemented to support the plan and structure. All projects will benefit from enhanced project management, but the project management plan should specify appropriate approaches for several project levels as defined by factors in addition to dollar value. Project management should be included in an agency’s project development manual.

The evolution and performance of river basin management in the Murray-Darling Basin

We explore bioregional management in the Murray-Darling Basin (MDB) in Australia through the institutional design characteristics of the MDB River Basin Organization (RBO), the actors and organizations who supported and resisted the establishment of the RBO, and the effectiveness of the RBO. During the last 25 years, there has been a major structural reform in the MDB RBO, which has changed from an interstate coordinating body to an Australian government agency. Responsibility for basin management has been centralized under the leadership of the Australian government, and a comprehensive integrated Basin plan has been adopted. The driving forces for this centralization include national policy to restore river basins to sustainable levels of extraction, state government difficulties in reversing overallocation of water entitlements, the millennium drought and its effects, political expediency on the part of the Australian government and state governments, and a major injection of Australian government funding. The increasing hierarchy and centralization of the MDB RBO does not follow a general trend toward multilevel participative governance of RBOs, but decentralization should not be overstated because of the special circumstances at the time of the centralization and the continuing existence of some decentralized elements, such as catchment water plans, land use planning, and water quality. Further swings in the centralization–decentralization pendulum could occur. The MDB reform has succeeded in rebalancing Basin water allocations, including an allocation for the environment and reduced diversion limits. There are some longer term risks to the implementation of reform, including lack of cooperation by state governments, vertical coordination difficulties, and perceived reductions in the accountability and legitimacy of reform at the local level. If implementation of the Basin plan is diverted or delayed, a new institution, the Commonwealth Environmental Water Holder, can play a major role in securing and coordinating environmental water supplies.

Decentralized systems for the protection and portability of personal data

The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) has been designed to help promote a view in favor of the interests of individuals instead of large corporations. However, there is the need of more dedicated technologies that can help companies comply with GDPR while enabling people to exercise their rights. We argue that such a dedicated solution must address two main issues: the need for more transparency towards individuals regarding the management of their personal information and their often hindered ability to access and make interoperable personal data in a way that the exercise of one's rights would result in straightforward. We aim to provide a system that helps to push personal data management towards the individual's control, i.e., a personal information management system (PIMS). By using distributed storage and decentralized computing networks to control online services, users' personal information could be shifted towards those directly concerned, i.e., the data subjects. The use of Distributed Ledger Technologies (DLTs) and Decentralized File Storage (DFS) as an implementation of decentralized systems is of paramount importance in this case. The structure of this dissertation follows an incremental approach to describing a set of decentralized systems and models that revolves around personal data and their subjects. Each chapter of this dissertation builds up the previous one and discusses the technical implementation of a system and its relation with the corresponding regulations. We refer to the EU regulatory framework, including GDPR, eIDAS, and Data Governance Act, to build our final system architecture's functional and non-functional drivers. In our PIMS design, personal data is kept in a Personal Data Space (PDS) consisting of encrypted personal data referring to the subject stored in a DFS. On top of that, a network of authorization servers acts as a data intermediary to provide access to potential data recipients through smart contracts.

Distributed argumentation technology: advancing risk analysis and regulatory compliance of distributed ledger technologies for transaction and management of securities

Distributed argumentation technology is a computational approach incorporating argumentation reasoning mechanisms within multi-agent systems. For the formal foundations of distributed argumentation technology, in this thesis we conduct a principle-based analysis of structured argumentation as well as abstract multi-agent and abstract bipolar argumentation. The results of the principle-based approach of these theories provide an overview and guideline for further applications of the theories. Moreover, in this thesis we explore distributed argumentation technology using distributed ledgers. We envision an Intelligent Human-input-based Blockchain Oracle (IHiBO), an artificial intelligence tool for storing argumentation reasoning. We propose a decentralized and secure architecture for conducting decision-making, addressing key concerns of trust, transparency, and immutability. We model fund management with agent argumentation in IHiBO and analyze its compliance with European fund management legal frameworks. We illustrate how bipolar argumentation balances pros and cons in legal reasoning in a legal divorce case, and how the strength of arguments in natural language can be represented in structured arguments. Finally, we discuss how distributed argumentation technology can be used to advance risk management, regulatory compliance of distributed ledgers for financial securities, and dialogue techniques.

A Decade Of Malaria During Pregnancy In Brazil: What Has Been Done Concerning Prevention And Management.

In Brazil, malaria remains a disease of major epidemiological importance because of the high number of cases in the Amazonian Region. Plasmodium spp infections during pregnancy are a significant public health problem with substantial risks for the pregnant woman, the foetus and the newborn child. In Brazil, the control of malaria during pregnancy is primarily achieved by prompt and effective treatment of the acute episodes. Thus, to assure rapid diagnosis and treatment for pregnant women with malaria, one of the recommended strategy for low transmission areas by World Health Organization and as part of a strategy by the Ministry of Health, the National Malaria Control Program has focused on integrative measures with woman and reproductive health. Here, we discuss the approach for the prevention and management of malaria during pregnancy in Brazil over the last 10 years (2003-2012) using morbidity data from Malaria Health Information System. Improving the efficiency and quality of healthcare and education and the consolidation of prevention programmes will be challenges in the control of malaria during pregnancy in the next decade.

Management Of Severe Thoracic Impalement Trauma Against Two-wheeled Horse Carriage: A Case Report And Literature Review.

Thoracic injuries in general are of great importance due to their high incidence and high mortality. Thoracic impalement injuries are rare but severe due to the combination of cause, effect and result. This study's primary objective is to report the case of a young man who was impaled by a two-wheeled horse carriage shaft while crashing his motorcycle in a rural zone. An EMT-B ferry was called at the crash scene and a conscious patient was found, sustaining a severe impalement injury to the left hemithorax, suspended over the floor by the axial skeleton with the carriage shaft coming across his left chest. As a secondary objective, a literature review of thoracic impalement injuries is performed. Cases of thoracic impalement injury require unique and individualized care based on injury severity and affected organs. Reported protocols for managing impalement injuries are entirely anecdotal, with no uniformity on impaled patient's approach and management. In penetrating trauma, it is essential not to remove the impaled object, so that possible vascular lesions remain buffered by the object, avoiding major bleeding and exsanguination haemorrhage. Severed impaled thoracic patients should be transferred to a specialist centre for trauma care, as these lesions typically require complex multidisciplinary treatment. High-energy thoracic impalement injuries are rare and hold a high mortality rate, due to the complexity of trauma and associated injuries such as thoracic wall and lung lesions. Modern medicine still seems limited in cases of such seriousness, not always with satisfactory results.