Can a modelling exercise be developed to aid and foster sustainable planning processes and guide the future growth of a small coastal Australian city?

Over the past few decades coastal cities around the world have grown at an incredible rate. With this growth have come major challenges relating to land use planning, social relationships, economic development, bio diversity and the ecological footprint. Three forces are working to influence the growth rate in coastal cities. They include: -population growth (i.e. the type and quantity of human demand for land), the existing and future properties of the land (i.e. current land status or changes due to nature and human activities), and finally technical changes to a land system (i.e. rezoning or the influence of other external factors). The goal of this research was to determine whether a planning framework could model the three (population growth, the existing and future properties of land and technical changes to a land system) variables in order to assist smaller councils undertaking long term land use planning decisions. The test site for the research was the City of Portland in western Victoria, Australia.

Practitioner prognostications on the future of online marketing

In arguably the most dynamic period in the history of marketing, and in particular the management of marketing communication, the challenges and opportunities presented by online marketing are both immense and unprecedented. In an effort to understand how these challenges are perceived at the ‘coal face’, this paper solicits and longitudinally compares senior marketing practitioners' perceptions and perspectives, both recently (late 2008) and five years prior (2003). Due to the rapid evolution of online marketing and its impact on both consumer behaviour and marketing strategy, a longitudinal qualitative research design was employed to track changes in senior marketers' perceptions. Findings are presented and discussed within the context of six recurring themes: interactivity, personalisation, integration, evaluation, agency structures, and capabilities. The paper concludes by examining the utility of integrated marketing communication as a marketing management framework for online marketing strategy.

Factories of the future : a system of systems engineering perspective

Factories of the Future will be distinguished by intelligent machines, automation, human factors integration and knowledge management. Modelling and simulation is recognised as a key enabling technology essential to economic, social and environmental sustainability of future manufacturing systems. This talk will explore the history, recent achievements and directions in modelling and simulation for 21st century factories and supply chains. A systems science approach is employed, from stakeholder engagement through participative modelling to self-tuning and self-assembling simulations. Our contributions lower the cost of the application of modelling and simulation to manufacturing processes, enabling real time planning, dynamic risk analysis, dashboards and 3D visualisation. This realisation of the virtual factory integrates human factors and decisions into the core technology platform. The implications to future manufacturing enterprises are explored through a series of case studies from aerospace, mining and small and medium manufacturing enterprises.