186,243 research outputs found
Digitalising products: Towards an integrated view of challenges in development, design and user acceptance
No full textMaking products smarter and connected through digital technologies requires firms to combine a product-oriented logic with a service logic. The challenges of such a combination are manifold and we have just begun understanding how firms should deal with these challenges. The papers included in this special issue have recalled the attention on the importance of horizontal integration mechanisms in the product development process and of a balanced managerial attention on the product and the service-side of innovation. In the same way, a crucial role in determining the market success of smart connected products is played by design decisions aimed at increasing the level of usefulness and efficiency of smart connected products compared to established solutions. This requires firms' attention not only on the design choices for product functionalities, but also on the capability to influence the institutional framework (i.e., the sets of meanings, values, and managerial principles) that affects how products are used
Strategic Alliances in the Electromobility Sector
No full textSince the late 2000s, the transition from a fossil fuel-based system to the fully renewable system has begun. This period, known as an Era of Ferment, is characterized by high technical and economic uncertainty and it's leading the automotive industry towards a paradigm shift: developing new car technologies, creating charging infrastructure needs and shaking up the supply chain structure. In light of ecosystem theory and the importance of alliances in the quest to develop an electric vehicle market, this paper analyses the electromobility ecosystem, tracking its lifecycle and investigating vertical and horizontal alliances between the main actors over time, including original equipment manufacturers, traditional suppliers, battery suppliers, and charging infrastructure providers. We analyzed an original longitudinal dataset composed of 281 alliances in the electric passenger vehicles market, initiated between 2000 and 2015. Through the study of the network of alliances, we describe the Electric Vehicle ecosystem's evolution, examining the entry time of incumbents, suppliers and complementors, the role of actors in the ecosystem and their previous industry sector, the key knowledge they possess and technological areas in which they operate, and the nations involved. Key network measures also provide insights into power and connectedness of different actors, highlighting a creative accumulation strategy of the incumbents
Data science for engineering design: State of the art and future directions
No full textEngineering design (ED) is the process of solving technical problems within requirements and constraints to create new artifacts. Data science (DS) is the inter-disciplinary field that uses computational systems to extract knowledge from structured and unstructured data. The synergies between these two fields have a long story and throughout the past decades, ED has increasingly benefited from an integration with DS. We present a literature review at the intersection between ED and DS, identifying the tools, algorithms and data sources that show the most potential in contributing to ED, and identifying a set of challenges that future data scientists and designers should tackle, to maximize the potential of DS in supporting effective and efficient designs. A rigorous scoping review approach has been supported by Natural Language Processing techniques, in order to offer a review of research across two fuzzy-confining disciplines. The paper identifies challenges related to the two fields of research and to their interfaces. The main gaps in the literature revolve around the adaptation of computational techniques to be applied in the peculiar context of design, the identification of data sources to boost design research and a proper featurization of this data. The challenges have been classified considering their impacts on ED phases and applicability of DS methods, giving a map for future research across the fields. The scoping review shows that to fully take advantage of DS tools there must be an increase in the collaboration between design practitioners and researchers in order to open new data driven opportunities
Iceking: A platform combining sustainable tourism and citizen science on glaciers
No full textIceKing is an app for sustainable tourism on glaciers that is also used to crowd-source photographs from tourists for glacier research. Our vision is to unite the power of the community and space technology, producing valuable data on resource utilisation and distribution, to protect planet Earth. We will achieve this by creating a virtuous cycle between sustainable tourism on glaciers and scientific research. Glaciers are among the most reliable indicators of climate change. They are also important ecosystems, providing fresh water and hydroelectric power. Therefore, our model aims to tackle climate change, as well as providing information for water and energy management. Our app offers an all-round experience, starting with useful information to organise the trip, from the choice of where to stay to local glacier guides. During the trip, tourists can join a global expedition to study glaciers, by uploading their geo-referenced photos of different glacier spots. These photos are useful to space agencies and researchers to validate the accuracy of satellite-based data models. Moreover, combined with SAR and Optical imagery from the Copernicus Sentinels, they can improve current water runoff models. After the trip, users will receive additional services such as an online diary thanks to the available GNSS data and the photographs taken on the glacier. Their participation to the glacier campaign will increase their curiosity and engagement towards the research community. Moreover, they will receive easy to read infographics translating the scientific data into meaningful information on the evolution of glaciers in response to climate change. The app is being developed through funding from the ESA Technology Transfer program, in cooperation with the Institute for Interdisciplinary Mountain Studies in Innsbruck and in accordance with the glacier classification system of the World Glacier Monitoring Service
Intellectual property management strategies of start-ups in space-related innovation
No full textAppropriability measures such as patents, trademarks and copyrights can be important to encourage innovation. Especially in a technology-intensive sector, companies regularly need to invest large amounts of money in RD and infrastructure at the outset, thereby increasing their motivation to protect and appropriate the results of their efforts. This becomes particularly important in a scenario where the industry is attempting to increase business from the private sector, for example launching a space-based services market. We therefore concentrate on strategies of intellectual property management of startups arising around space technologies. In this context, we examine IP management practices in two different innovation settings that are typical of aerospace, (1) technology transfers from industry and space agencies, and (2) RD for new technology stemming from the participation in grand innovation challenges. For many years, the European Space Agency has established recommendations to both encourage innovation and defend the European industrial competitiveness, leading to an articulate IPR management strategy. This strategy is also used to create a number of startups who commercialize space technology in different terrestrial sectors. The IP management strategy initially adopted by the technology originator has repercussions on the start-up as well as ensuing technology trajectories. The second part of the paper covers the "Google Lunar X Prize" (GLXP) highlighting the differences of strategic approaches of teams to manage IP in dependence of their nature and origin of foundation and their specific situation on the trajectory path to become a successful contestant. In particular, questions to be answered cover e.g. which IP rights remain with the competitor and what part will be ceded to the organizer, as well as what part of IP will be revealed through the publication of the specific problem. We discover that circumstances around the foundation of a contestant team and its nature determines their subsequent approach towards management of IP. These two studies cover a wide spectrum of different scenarios and encourage a deeper reflection on the role of IP management in fostering innovation within and from space technologies. Moreover, insights from this paper could be considered in other sectors, such as Key Enabling Technologies, where heavy RD investments are carried out, often sponsored by research institutes or government entities, to achieve technological breakthroughs, and the novelty of emerging sectors encourages the presence of entrepreneurship
What's Your Stake When Engaging in Licensing? A Comparison Between Standard and Partnership-Embedded Licensing Strategies
No full textWhen engaging in licensing, companies may either use standard agreements or may embed the licensing deals into broader partnerships. Whether these alternative schemes are more frequently associated with particular types of licensors and licensees and whether they imply different outcomes for the two parties is still underinvestigated in the relevant literature. Inspired by this, our exploratory study, enriched by 341 observations of licensing contracts signed between 1990 and 2010, addresses these research gaps. Aiming at this, this article offers a full-fledged analysis, encompassing an in-depth overview of the overall licensing deals, a detailed description of the licensing parties’ profiles, and a t-test comparison of licensing parties’ traits both at the time of the licensing deal and after the deal, in the two different regimes. Further, it presents a complementary econometric exercise for assessing the impact of the two alternatives for both the licensor and the licensee. The study shows that, in general, licensors are more inventive and less specialized than licensees, and that licensors and licensees engaging in standard licensing have a higher knowledge overlap than firms engaging in partnership embedded licensing. The difference is also remarkable in terms of the outcomes of the different license agreements measured through patenting activity: the licensor is more likely to guide the invention process in standard licensing contexts, while the licensee is more likely to guide it in the opposite scenario
Available and incoming therapies for idiopathic focal and segmental glomerulosclerosis in adults
No full textFocal and segmental glomerulosclerosis (FSGS) is a histological pattern clinically characterized by nephrotic proteinuria, hypoalbuminemia, edema and dyslipidemia. Approximately 50% of patients progress to end-stage renal disease within 5-10 years, particularly those not responding to the therapies. FSGS pathogenesis is largely unknown and therapy is symptomatic and unspecific. The podocyte is considered as the pathogenetic main target and FSGS is now categorized as a podocytopathy together with minimal change disease, diffuse mesangial proliferation and collapsing glomerulonephritis. This paper provides an overview on the treatment of idiopathic FSGS in adults, citing the latest published trials and the most reliable pathogenetic hypotheses of the disease. A large part of the review then focuses on emerging therapies, specifying for each new drug the assumed mechanism of action and the data available in the literature on the drug's use in experimental animals and humans
Twenty years of Gender Equality Research: A Literature Review based on a New Semantic Indicator
No full textTwenty years of gender equality research: A scoping review based on a new semantic indicator
No full textGender equality is a major problem that places women at a disadvantage thereby stymieing economic growth and societal advancement. In the last two decades, extensive research has been conducted on gender related issues, studying both their antecedents and consequences. However, existing literature reviews fail to provide a comprehensive and clear picture of what has been studied so far, which could guide scholars in their future research. Our paper offers a scoping review of a large portion of the research that has been published over the last 22 years, on gender equality and related issues, with a specific focus on business and economics studies. Combining innovative methods drawn from both network analysis and text mining, we provide a synthesis of 15,465 scientific articles. We identify 27 main research topics, we measure their relevance from a semantic point of view and the relationships among them, highlighting the importance of each topic in the overall gender discourse. We find that prominent research topics mostly relate to women in the workforce-e.g., concerning compensation, role, education, decision-making and career progression. However, some of them are losing momentum, and some other research trends-for example related to female entrepreneurship, leadership and participation in the board of directors-are on the rise. Besides introducing a novel methodology to review broad literature streams, our paper offers a map of the main gender-research trends and presents the most popular and the emerging themes, as well as their intersections, outlining important avenues for future research
The research productivity of universities. A multilevel and multidisciplinary analysis on European institutions
No full textThe paper makes use of a novel dataset at European level which includes data on academic staff and students of universities from official National Statistical Authorities, bibliometric indicators on publications, and socio-economic indicators at regional level. The dataset covers all European countries. The unit of analysis is a combination between teaching activities at the level of Field of Education and publications classified by Field of Science, resulting in five major integrated areas of STEM (Science; Engineering; Computer Science; Agriculture; Medicine). Using a multilevel modeling framework and comparing results across disciplinary areas the paper finds strong support for peer effects at institutional level and for the positive effect of international collaborations and attraction of foreign PhD students. It does not find support for economies of scale in research, institutional age, specialization effects and private vs private governance. The external regional environment has an impact on research productivity only in applied disciplines
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