The identification of new service opportunities: a case-based morphological analysis

Typically, firms try to differentiate their products through the integration of innovative services. For this reason, much recent research into new service development has focused on methods of identifying and generating new service ideas. The most prevalent method for generating a new service is a morphological analysis that decomposes a system into several dimensions and values, and then recombines those values to generate new services. Despite the popularity of morphological analysis, how to build morphological matrix has been an area of subjective expert judgment. In this paper, we focused on the possibility to utilize the big data to the morphological analysis to address the subjective morphological building process, by suggesting a case-based morphological analysis. By employing case-based reasoning and network analysis, firms can easily identify direct and indirect clues for the new services and integrate these results to the morphological building processes. To support this approach, this study first employs a case-based reasoning strategy to collect and identify similar services, and then assesses the patterns in those services through network analysis. By engaging in network analysis, firms can identify key aspects of new services, and determine what kinds of keywords or aspects should be employed for the dimensions and values of morphological matrices.     

Development of new technology-based services

In an environment where customers can hardly describe new technology-based services (TBSs) of the future and technological engineers are unlikely to understand how a new technology can work for new services, a guideline to generate ideas for TBS can be utilized to achieve successful service innovation. Thus, this paper aims to develop an ideation framework for TBS. Two methods – the technology tree and the function analysis systems technique – are employed to identify core utilities expected from a new technology. Then a new method, the service encounter value matrix, which is based on morphology analysis and is used for generating potential service ideas, is suggested. Finally, these ideas are evaluated, and only those that are of a high priority according to customers’ expectations of future society are selected. In this study, the framework is applied to telecommunication technology, which is timely and useful for designing future services.     

External sources for innovation in public organisations

This article's objective is twofold: First, to provide a framework for understanding the role of external information sources in service innovation, with particular attention to innovation in public organisations. The second part of the article's objective is to test the proposed framework. Method of analysis is based on data at European level from the 2010 Innobarometer Survey on Public Innovation. Data is used for estimating a bivariate probit with sample selection, where the selection variable indicates whether or not organisations have recently implemented service innovations and the estimated variable indicates whether organisations have introduced services that are new to the whole public sector. Results indicate a significant relation between the use of both internal and external sources of information and the implementation of innovations by public organisations. External sources are shown to be more relevant for the implementation of services that are new to the public sector.     

New services margin/high success discriminators

The present range of services, particularly financial, is subject to high privatisation and competition. Anticipating the future return of new projects is a critical challenge that confronts marketing managers at present. However, the transfer of success models from new products to services has not allowed a global vision of the internal and external environment that best set up the success of new services. Using a sample of 120 new Portuguese financial services (67 successful/57 failures), this study examines the relationships foreseen by a global model of success determinants of new services, i.e., formulates and tests hypotheses relative to the differentiated impact of the strategic and environmental factors on the multiple return indicators. The results of a binary logistic regression analysis suggest that a group of factors that best discriminate between new services of average and high return, through its different indicators that distinguishes the factors, is slightly different and less than one that distinguishes between successful and failed innovations.     

Fashion and the metaverse: Clarifying the domain and establishing a research agenda

In recent years, the metaverse has garnered significant attention as a term referring to a network of 3D virtual worlds that integrate elements of both physical and digital worlds. Fashion brands have begun exploring the metaverse as a new marketing platform, which is expected to bring about substantial changes in the fashion and retail industry. However, a lack of consensus on the nature of the metaverse and its impact on the fashion industry currently exists, and limited academic research is available on the metaverse's influence on fashion brands' marketing strategies and brand experiences. To address this gap, this study employs a thematic analysis approach on trade journals and industry articles that cover fashion brands' metaverse strategies. Through this analysis, the study provides a typology of current marketing strategies of fashion brands in the metaverse. Based on these empirical findings, this research proposes a theoretical framework that explains how different metaverse strategies affect different dimensions of brand equity. Finally, this study offers research directions for fashion brands' metaverse strategies by presenting an integrated framework that synthesizes the key insights from our research findings.     

Developing smart service concepts: morphological analysis using a Novelty-Quality map

Among many techniques for generating new service ideas, morphological analysis has been used due to the advantage of decomposing the system into dimensions and shapes and bringing creative results in the process of recombining them. However, with the rise of smart service systems, the determination of dimensions and shapes has become a critical problem, particularly as both their structure and components become complex. This research focuses on a data-driven approach by incorporating mobile app service documents to increase objectivity and diversity in the construction of a morphology matrix. To this end, firstly, the novelty-quality map is developed to identify innovative data based on quantitative indicators. Secondly, morphological analysis is employed along with experts’ judgment in order to generate new smart service concepts. Finally, the feasibility and effectiveness of the proposed approach are shown based on a comparative analysis with conventional approaches and real services through a case study of smart home.     

论西方机构投资者对公司治理的参与

有关机构投资者的研究在公司治理领域内对传统理论提出了强有力的挑战 ,但仍处于初步发展阶段 ,尚未形成逻辑一致、系统的分析框架。借鉴美英公司治理模式下机构投资者对公司治理的参与 ,为进一步深入开展机构投资者与公司治理关系系统研究提供一个理论框架     

Commercialization of eHealth innovations in the market of the UK healthcare sector: A framework for a sustainable business model

Demographic trends with extended life expectancy are placing increasing pressures on the UK state‐funded healthcare budgets. eHealth innovations are expected to facilitate new avenues for cost‐effective and safe methods of care, for enabling elderly people to live independently at their own homes and for assisting governments to cope with the demographic challenges. However, despite heavy investment in these innovations, large‐scale deployment of eHealth continues to face significant obstacles, and lack of sustainable business models (BMs) is widely regarded as part of the greatest barriers. Through various empirical methods that include facilitated workshops, case studies of relevant organizations, and user groups, this paper investigates the reasons the private market of eHealth innovations has proved difficult to establish, and therefore it develops a framework for sustainable BMs that could elimiesnate barriers of eHealth innovation commercialization. Results of the study suggest that to achieve sustainable commercialization, BM frameworks and innovation diffusion characteristics should be considered complements but not substitutes.     

Innovation in American retailing, 1919-39: improving inventory management

The primary purpose of this paper is to examine one of the most important innovations in American retailing, the model stock plan. Proposed by E.A. Filene in 1930, the plan provided a new way to solve previous inventory problems. Building upon past solutions and integrating ideas from 'scientific management', Filene was better able to address the issue of customer diversity and geographic dispersion. The discussion is placed in the context of 'evolutionary economics', whose framework provides an alternative to the study of retail history. The introduction of this methodology forms the secondary purpose of this study.     

International heterogeneity in the associations of new business models and broadband Internet with music revenue and piracy

Broadband Internet has fundamentally changed business models in many industries. In the music industry, for instance, old business models were challenged by illegal competitors, and broadband Internet has enabled value creation through new business models. The changes that established business models experienced in the wake of broadband Internet, however, differed vastly across national markets, and these differences are not well understood. We build a conceptual framework and study the extent to which differences in economic and cultural factors are associated with different market outcomes in the wake of the proliferation of broadband Internet. Thus, we compile two unique data sets from the music industry, comprising (1) revenue data for 36 countries and 22 years and (2) piracy data for 47 countries and >2 years. We use a Bayesian multilevel model to explore between-country heterogeneity in the associations between these variables and broadband Internet adoption and business model innovations. Our results show that the negative association between broadband Internet penetration and music revenue is weaker in high-income countries, where income restrictions are less likely to drive demand towards illegitimate piracy services. In terms of cultural factors, we find that a market's response to the introduction of broadband Internet is less negative in countries scoring high on Hofstede's individualism and uncertainty avoidance dimensions. Furthermore, we find that overall revenues only recover after the latest generation of streaming services (e.g., Spotify) has been introduced, and the adoption of these services is associated with lower levels of online music piracy.     

Context-Sensitive Semantic Synchronization Enablement in Electronic Negotiations

When integrating electronic negotiations into real-world business processes, an important problem arising is the magnitude of e-business standards in use. In order to support electronic negotiations when negotiation partners use and need to integrate terms named and formatted according to different document standards, taxonomies or similar standards, references between those standards are needed. In this paper, we present a framework for a negotiation support meta-tool which is designed to maintain and dynamically evolve a collection of such references. To deal with semantic ambiguities in different contexts, it provides users with context-sensitive references. The framework uses technologies from ontological engineering and machine learning, its services can be integrated into existing negotiation applications via web services. Furthermore, it allows parameterzation for the actual domain of use.     

Demand pull and technology push perspective in technology-based innovations for the points of sale: The retailers evaluation

Despite the consumers' increasing demand of technology-based innovations for making stores more appealing and the huge availability of advanced technologies, there is still a lack of research on the retailers' and employees' points of views towards the introduction of these systems. In fact, an efficient innovation should take care of both the final users/consumers' and the retailers/employees' needs and expectations. Hence, the aim of this study is to advance our knowledge on retailers' pull of new technologies for improving their job in accordance with the most recent systems, as well as on the main characteristics of these innovations for defining a new integrative framework of analysis and development.     

Making bottom-up and top-down processes meet in public innovation

Innovations in an organisation derive from multiple sources. In the public sector, users and the policy sphere provide important but often unconnected impulses for innovation. These impulses are transmitted to the organisation by grassroots employees who interact with users and managers who implement policy requirements. The paper examines the actors and activities that coordinate bottom-up and top-down initiatives and promote their development into innovations. It creates a theoretical framework that combines the views of employee-driven innovation and strategic reflexivity and supplements them with an analysis of coordination in innovation processes. The functioning of this framework is illustrated in the context of children's day care services. The results highlight the central role of middle managers and provide new knowledge regarding their ‘bridging’ activities in innovation. The adjustment of bottom-up and top-down processes requires the personal involvement of managers, and the creation of communication arenas, networks and mediating tools.     

服务型跨国公司全球模块化与服务业国际转移及其对中国的启示

日趋激烈的全球竞争迫使服务型跨国公司必须更加高效地整合全球资源,增强全球竞争力和创新能力。全球模块化为服务型跨国公司实现这一目标提供了重要路径,也在客观上有力地推动了服务业国际转移。本文首先进行了相关理论综述;然后分析了服务型跨国公司实施全球模块化的可行性;接着阐释服务型跨国公司全球模块化是如何发展及其如何推动服务业国际转移,并选取国际快递业作为新样本行业进行理论检验;最后,对中国服务企业应该如何运用全球模块化来更好地承接服务业国际转移或整合全球战略性服务资源提出相关政策建议。     

新医改背景下如何评价医疗服务质量——基于通用评估框架的探索与应用

评价和改进医疗服务质量是我国新一轮医药卫生体制改革的重要目标,这需要建立在拥有一套科学和完善的评价指标体系基础之上。然而,我国现有的医疗服务质量评价指标体系滞后于医疗卫生体制改革实践,缺乏系统的理论框架,仅侧重于医院等级评价和业务考察,而没有将评价看作是一个系统的过程,也就难以促进医疗服务质量的持续改进。尝试将广泛应用于公共部门绩效评价的通用评估框架引入医疗卫生服务领域,开发了一套包含三个评价层级共27个指标的医疗服务质量评价指标体系,并以北京S医院为例进行了应用和完善。研究表明,通用评估框架可以为我国医疗卫生质量评价提供新的思路,在实际应用中具有较好的效果,可以准确地呈现医院医疗服务质量的结果和影响医疗服务质量的因素,但也需要在今后的应用中不断更新评价指标,聚焦新医改的任务,增加客观性指标。     

Towards a model of destination innovation process: an integrative review

The goal of the present paper is to integrate five types of literature related to the innovation process (i.e. cluster theory, innovation systems, network relations, knowledge management, and innovation types) and apply them to the local tourism destination to build a destination innovation process model with macro and micro perspectives. The suggested models intend to broaden the thinking on destination innovation process for tourism-related agents at the local and national level. The paper undertakes a careful review of the relevant literature before creating the conceptual models. The paper’s novelty and uniqueness lies in suggesting a new conceptual model of addressing how innovation competence of tourism destinations can be developed, and offering insight for tourism-related agents at the local and national level into how to effectively create and manage innovations. Future research should undertake empirical studies to test the integrated models presented in this conceptual paper.     

Innovation at the workplace: Do professional competencies matter?

This paper analyzes individuals' propensity to innovate in professional environments, by focusing on the specific competency profile of individuals who play a role in the incorporation of product, technological, and knowledge innovations at work. The analysis draws on economic and managerial literature on innovation, innovative behavior, and competencies to gain a better understanding of the relationships between the process of competency development and innovative behavior in working environments. Using data from REFLEX, a European survey on the transition from higher education to labor markets, the empirical component of this study estimates discrete response models to explain the propensity of individuals to innovate at work. The models take the responses to a set of 19 questionnaire items as the basis for determining individuals' competency profiles, while also incorporating firm, working environment, and personal characteristics. The estimation results provide evidence of significant marginal effects of specific competencies on the probability that individuals act as innovators at the workplace. Competencies such as alertness to new opportunities, ability to present products, ideas or reports, ability to mobilize the capacities of others, ability to come up with new ideas and solutions, and ability to use computers and the Internet appear to have stronger marginal effects on the likelihood of innovating and, consequently, emerge as key competencies in explaining the propensity of individuals to become innovators in their working environments.     

Integrating soft factors into the assessment of cooperative relationships between firms: accounting for reputation and ethical values

Alliances and other forms of cooperation between firms often promise great benefits, for example, by the exchange of knowledge or co‐specialization of resources. At the same time, the necessary actions to realize these benefits can augment vulnerability to opportunistic behaviour of partners. In addition to formal contracts to mitigate the resulting behavioural uncertainties, often, mechanisms, such as reputation or ethical values, are suggested as important supplements. However, when it comes to assessment of a specific cooperation opportunity, it is difficult to account systematically for the economic consequences of these ‘softer factors’. Therefore, this paper aims to surpass mere financial analysis of chance and risk and to integrate systematically both reputation and ethical values into an economic assessment of cooperative relationships. For this purpose, we develop a theoretical framework that is based on a simple‐decision model to account for reputation and ethical values of potential partners as drivers of behavioural uncertainty reduction. We also discuss how this framework can be used to assess cooperative relationships and illustrate these ideas with reference to the inter‐organizational accounting practices of a large drugstore chain and its suppliers.     

基层人民银行支持社会主义新农村建设的探索与思考

基层人民银行支持新农村建设要把贯彻执行货币信贷政策与支持社会主义新农村建设有机结合起来;充分发挥六大服务功能,为社会主义新农村建设提供优质、高效的金融服务;以大力支持农村信用社改革为重点,加强对辖内金融改革的指导,重构支农金融体系;加强农村金融生态环境建设,为社会主义新农村建设提供良好的金融生态环境;加强调查研究和监测分析,找准切入点,努力探索基层人民银行支持新农村建设的新思路和新方法;进一步加强金融稳定工作,为社会主义新农村建设提供稳定的金融保证。     

The impact of the global factory on economic development

The global factory is a structure through which multinational enterprises integrate their global strategies through a combination of innovation, distribution and production of both goods and services. The global factory is analysed within a Coasean framework with particular attention to ownership and location policies using methods that illustrate its power in the global system. Developing countries are constrained by the existence and power of global factories. Firms in developing countries are frequently constrained to be suppliers of labour intensive manufacturing or services into the global factory system. Breaking into this system is difficult for emerging countries. It requires either a strategy of upgrading or the establishment of new global factories under the control of focal firms from emerging countries. The implementation of these strategies is formidably difficult.