315 research outputs found
Open source intelligence (OSINT): a contemporary intelligence lifeline
No full textTraditionally, intelligence has been distinguished from all other forms of information working by its secrecy.Secret intelligence is about the acquisition of information from entities that do not wish that information to be acquired and,ideally,never know that it has. However, the transformation in information and communication technology(ICT)over the last two decades challenges this conventionally held perception of intelligence in one critical aspect: that information can increasingly be acquired legally in the public domain-‘open source intelligence’(OSINT).
The intelligence community has recognised this phenomenon by formally creating discrete open source exploitation systems within extant intelligence institutions. Indeed,the exploitation of open source of information is reckoned by many intelligence practitioners to constitute 80 percent or more of final intelligence product. Yet,the resource committed to, and status of, open source exploitation belies that figure.
This research derives a model of the high order factors describing the operational contribution of open source exploitation to the broader intelligence function: context; utility; cross-check; communication; focus; surge; and analysis. Such a model is useful in three related ways: first, in determining appropriate tasking for the intelligence function as a whole; second, as a basis for optimum intelligence resource allocation; and third, as defining objectives for specifically open source policy and doctrine. Additionally, the research details core capabilities, resources, and political arguments necessary for successful open source exploitation.
Significant drivers shape the contemporary context in which nation-state intelligence functions operate: globalisation; risk society; and changing societal expectation. The contemporary transformation in ICT percolates each of them. Understanding this context is crucial to the intelligence community. Implicitly, these drivers shape intelligence, and the relationship intelligence manages between knowledge and power within politics,in order to optimise decision-making. Because open source exploitation obtains from this context, it is better placed than closed to understand it.Thus, at a contextual level,this thesis further argues that the potential knowledge derived from open source exploitation not only has a unique contribution by comparison to closed, but that it can also usefully direct power towards determination of the appropriate objectives upon which any decisions should be made at all
Corporate Entrepreneurship:insights on board of directors and major shareholder contributions
No full textCorporate Entrepreneurship is important for company’s profitability and growth. Corporate Entrepreneurship refers to the activities a firm undertakes to stimulate innovation and encourage calculated risk taking throughout its operations (Zahra, Filatotchev and Wright, 2009). Given its potential contributions, scholars have identified various factors that promote Corporate Entrepreneurship. Among the most important of these factors is board support of Corporate Entrepreneurship (Zahra 1996; Zahra et al., 2000, 2009). Despite its relevance, prior studies have produced partial results by focusing only on the monitoring and control functions of boards (Keasey and Wright, 1993; Beuselinck and Manigart, 2007; Scholes et al., 2007). A board of directors has also an entrepreneurial function in guiding managers to increase shareholders’ wealth (Zahra and Pearce 1989; Filatotchev and Wright 2005; Uhlaner et al., 2007; Brunninge et al., 2007; Zahra et al., 2009). A board can create new wealth by ensuring that managers develop and pursue a viable strategy, working with them to identify viable opportunities for growth and promoting attention to Corporate Entrepreneurship (Zahra et al., 2009).
In this dissertation we propose to understand the elements that affect both board functions and their impact on Corporate Entrepreneurship. We highlight two key variables that influence boards’ entrepreneurial function and their involvement in Corporate Entrepreneurship: board attributes and major shareholder type. To investigate how these elements draws on role of board and Corporate Entrepreneurship we apply agency theory, resource dependence theory and social network theory.
Board attributes include composition, characteristics, structure and process. Board composition refers to the size of board and the mix of inside and outside directors. Characteristics consist of directors’ background. and reflect the age, educational background, value and experience of directors. Board structure covers the number and types of committees, committee membership, the flow of information among these committees and board leadership. Process signifies the approach that boards take in making their decision and involves the frequency and length of meetings, CEO-board interface, the formality of board proceedings and the extent to which boards evaluate themselves. All these influence the entrepreneurial and monitoring roles of boards. Some boards may not always do a good job in performing both roles and may suffer from poor board structure, inappropriate composition or wrong processes (Zahra and Pearce, 1989). Prior studies have investigated how board composition influences Corporate Entrepreneurship (Zahra, 1996; Zahra et al., 2000). Less attention has been given to evaluating the impact of characteristics, structure and process. However, researchers suggest that having a board with the right mix of skills and connections can improve Corporate Entrepreneurship activity (Zahra et al., 2009). Researchers have also suggested that committees, flow of information and frequent meetings can improve the involvement of boards in strategic decision making (Zahra and Pearce, 1989). We propose to investigate how all these attributes influence the role of boards in sustaining Corporate Entrepreneurship.
Major shareholder type (La Porta et al., 1999) affects Corporate Entrepreneurship (Jensen and Meckling, 1976; Zahra, 1996; Zahra et al., 2000; Munari et al., 2010). Agency theorists propose that large investors have a major incentive to monitor CEO decisions and commitments to Corporate Entrepreneurship (Bird and Wiersema, 1996). Further, social network theory suggests that board composition reflects the social network of the principal stakeholder (Lynall et al., 2003). Therefore there is a strong relationship between the mayor shareholder and the board’s role (Uhlaner et al., 2007). Scholars have focused on the relationship between institutional stock ownership and Corporate Entrepreneurship (Zahra, 1996; Zahra et al., 2000) and on the relationship between family or state ownership and the level of a firm’s R&D investments (Munari et al., 2010). However, the results of these studies are contradictory. In this work we would understand how different types of major shareholders may influence the entrepreneurial and monitoring functions of boards and their impact on Corporate Entrepreneurship.
In an attempt to analyze the influence of board attributes and major shareholders on board role in Corporate Entrepreneurship, we have structured our work as follows. In the first chapter we introduce the concept of Corporate Entrepreneurship and we describe the attributes and elements that characterize the phenomenon. In particular, we felt the need to first investigate the historical origin of the meaning of Corporate Entrepreneurship. After recognizing the field of Corporate Entrepreneurship as the link between entrepreneurship research and corporate management, we discuss the main traits of Corporate Entrepreneurship and the process through which a firm can nurture the level of entrepreneurship. We then focus on the “firm actors” that can contribute to the diffusion of entrepreneurship within the firm. After a brief literature review on employees, middle managers and top management contributions to Corporate Entrepreneurship activities, we focus our attention on the true research interest of this work: the investigation of how board attributes and major shareholders can influence a board’s role in Corporate Entrepreneurship. Thus, the second and third chapters concern the literature review of this specific stream of research and the attempt to explain the causal link that binds these elements. In particular, we focus on each category of board attributes (composition, characteristics, structure and process) and on the three different types of major shareholder (family, other corporation and state).
Finally, we attempt to support our discussion with empirical evidence, using a multiple case studies method. Thus, we have selected four different firms, with which we have conducted interviews. We have also collected data from these companies’ websites and from public reports. The analysis of the data collected provides empirical evidence that supports our thesis. In particular, case study analysis suggests that different major shareholders influence boards’ role in Corporate Entrepreneurship, particularly because different major shareholders correspond to different board attributes
Managerial Motivations for UK-Czech Joint Ventures
No full textThe paper examines the motives for the choice of the JV instead of other forms of investment (e.g. greenfield or licensing) in British investment in the Czech Republic. It is noted that despite popular belief, the level of uptake of JVs in the
Czech Republic is low in comparison with greenfield investments. The paper identifies organisational motives (resource seeking, synergies, economic and historic), partner related motives and exogenous motives. The role of the partner in the choice of the entry mode is emphasised. Managerial implications: despite theoretical benefits of JVs to investor, these might not be accrued in practice due to the quality of the resource acquired and difficulties in management
Scientometric portrait of Nobel laureate Leland H. Hartwell
No full textLeland H. Hartwell was honoured with the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (2001) at his 62 years age and at 41 years of research publishing career. The first contribution of the author was in 1961 at the age of 22. The number of his contributions in a year peaked in 1997 when it touched 8. He had 108 publications during 1961 – 2001 in domains: Molecular Biology of Cell Cycle Regulation (43), Genetics of Cell Division (48), Genomic Re-arrangement and DNA Repair (9), Molecular Genetics of Yeast Cell Fission (5), and Drug Target Interaction (3) which were analysed for authorship pattern with his 101 collaborators. Most active researchers having number of publications with Leland H. Hartwell were : Weinert, T. A. (10), Garvik, B. M. (8), McLaughlin, C. S. (8), Jenness, D. D. (5). His productivity coefficient was 0.76 which clearly indicates that his productivity increased after 50 percentile age. Highest collaboration coefficient (1) for Leland H. Hartwell was found during 1963-1965, 1968-1969, 1977, 1981-1983, 1985-1990, 1996 and 1998-2001. Journals have been the most preferred channel of communication where, as many as 96 papers out of 108 have been published. The core journals publishing his papers were: Cell (14), Genetics (12), Mol. Cell Biol. (8), J. Bactariol. (7), J. Cell Biol. ( 7), Science (7) J. Mol. Biol.(6), Exp. Cell Res. (5), and Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci.(5). Publication density is 2.63 and Publication concentration is 14.63. Most prolific keywords in titles of publications were: Saccharomyces cerevisiae , Yeast , Cell division cycle , RAD9, DNA Damage , Genes , Cell cycle, Genetic control , Check point (s) , Cell division , Mutant of Yeast
Sistema de inspeção visual de placas de circuito impresso para linhas de produção em pequenas séries em um contexto multiagentes
No full textDissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Centro Tecnológico, Programa de Pós-Graduação em Engenharia de Automação e Sistemas, Florianópolis, 2015.A produção em pequenas séries (PPS) vem se destacando e aumentando sua representatividade no cenário econômico, principalmente quando o assunto é tecnologia. Atualmente, percebe-se que na produção de placas de circuito impresso (PCI), há uma necessidade de produzir de maneira personalizada e eficiente, logo, há um esforço da comunidade científica e industrial em aprimorar técnicas de processamento de imagens para a inspeção de PCI. Este trabalho inclui o estado da arte da inspeção óptica automática de PCI, não necessariamente aplicada a PPS. As técnicas utilizadas neste projeto visam a formação de um sistema para a inspeção de componentes do tipo SMD em uma PPS, garantindo uma qualidade de produção satisfatória, com a finalidade de reduzir o retrabalho. Com isso, foi proposto um sistema de inspeção baseado em características relacionadas ao contorno, posicionamento e histograma dos componentes. Este sistema é composto pelas seguintes três etapas: pré-processamento de imagens, extração de características e avaliação de componentes. A máquina de inspeção utilizada neste projeto está inserida no contexto de cooperação entre máquinas, com o objetivo de constituir uma fábrica totalmente autônoma, coordenada por um sistema multiagente. Desta forma, foi desenvolvido um método de interação entre a máquina de inspeção e um agente que a representa. Um software de inspeção foi implementado utilizando as arquiteturas e estruturas descritas ao longo desta dissertação. Os resultados obtidos pelos experimentos mostram-se adequados à inspeção de componentes SMD em uma PPS, pois apontam uma taxa de acerto acima de 89% ao utilizar componentes reais..Abstract : Small series production (SSP) has been higlighting and increasing its share in the economic scenario, especially when it comes to technology. Currently, it is seen that in printed circuit boards (PCB) production, there is a need to produce in a customized and efficient way, so an effort of the scientific and industrial community is present, to improve the image processing techniques for PCB inspection. It is present in this work the state of the art for automatic optical inspection in a PCB, not necessarily applied to SSP. The techniques used in this project aim the formation of a system to inspect SMD components in a SSP, ensuring a satisfactory production quality, with the purpose of reduce the rework. Therefore, an inspection system based on characteristics related to shape, positioning and histogram of components has been proposed. This system is compound of the following three steps: pre-processing of images, feature extraction and evaluation components. The inspection machine used in this project is inserted in the context of cooperation among machines in order to provide a fully autonomous factory, coordinated by a multiagent system. Thus, a interaction method between the inspection machine and a agent was developed. An inspection software was implemented using the architecture and structures described throughout this dissertation. The results obtained by experiments show that it is suitable for inspection of SMD components in a SSP, showing a success rate above 89% when using actual components
Transition expertise: Cognitive factors and developmental processes that contribute to repeated successful career transitions amongst elite athletes, musicians and business people
No full textThis thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University.This thesis examines the nature of transition expertise which enables individuals to make repeated successful transitions over the course of their career. It addressed four areas that contribute to transition expertise: 1) cognitive flexibility that enables the generalisation of expert knowledge and processes; 2) inferential and inductive cognitive mechanisms that enable expertise to be generalised; 3) personal intelligences that are used to support transitions; and 4) practical intelligence as it supports performance contextually during transitions.
The study used retrospective interviews to gather data from elite performers in three fields who had made successful career transitions: sports people who become national coaches or heads of national bodies; successful musicians who become heads of faculty or principals of a conservatoire; successful business people who become senior vice presidents or CEOs.
Participants were able to generalise expert knowledge and processes beyond their primary domains, contrary to widely held views about the domain specificity of expertise. Cognitive flexibility enabled this generalisation and was developed through broad based training, early exposure to multiple domains and the early use of generative cognitive processes during the development of primary domain expertise. Inductive, inferential and analogical cognitive mechanisms were the main tools through which expertise was generalised during transitions. Personal intelligence contributed to transition expertise. Intrapersonal intelligence enabled individuals to understand how their abilities, values and motivations shaped their career progression. Interpersonal intelligence enabled individuals to respond effectively to the requirements of their peers, direct reports, stakeholders and organisational context. Contrary to expectations, self regulatory processes did not play a central role in the management of transitions. Practical intelligence enabled transition expertise. It involved more than applying subject-area and tacit knowledge. It encompassed the abilities to: identify and resolve problems; manipulate environmental objects in the form of administrative tasks, schedules and plans; utilise resources in terms of people and materials; and shape their environment, corporate structures and culture.
Transition expertise develops and evolves over the course of a career as it uses convergent and divergent cognitive processes, inductive mechanisms, personal awareness and cognitive pragmatics to address issues of increasing scope and implication. While motivational factors, self belief and personality resiliency are important contributors to transition expertise they did not form part of this study
Does corporate governance impact on the sustainable return of IPOs? A comparative analysis of China and New Zealand IPOs listed between 1999 and 2004
No full textThis thesis examines the impact of corporate governance practices on the short and longer-term sustainable returns of initial public offerings (IPOs) in China and New Zealand. In particular, the analysis focuses on the Shanghai, Shenzhen and New Zealand exchanges, providing a comparison between them. The closer trade and economic relations between China and New Zealand and the increasing immigration to New Zealand of relatively well-off Chinese makes the study topical. Different political and cultural settings may give rise to differing relationships between IPO success and governance in these three markets and this will promote some interesting implications.
Corporate governance involves regulatory and market mechanisms, and the roles and relationships between a company’s management, its board, its shareholders and other stakeholders. IPOs are very important for investors, stock markets and economic growth. The relationship between corporate governance mechanisms and IPO performance has received attention in studied by the literature. The bulk of prior research focuses on larger and more developed economies. There is an increasing volume of literature relating to Chinese IPOs but none have focused on this key issue of IPO performance and the corporate governance structures of the particular companies. New Zealand by comparison to China is a small economy, small population and has few IPOs. However, China has become New Zealand’s second largest trading partner since 2008 and China became one of the major sources of immigrants to New Zealand from late 1990s.
This thesis makes an important contribution to knowledge demonstrating that the short-term IPO performance is associated with different corporate governance attributes to those apparent for long-term performance of IPOs. The use of a wide range of governance variables for the analysis as compared with prior studies provides greater confidence in the findings. The longer time period, up to 11 years, used in this study is helpful in reviewing the longer-term sustainable IPO performance. China is the fastest growth economy in the world with rapidly developing stock markets. New Zealand, on the other hand, is a mature economy with a small stock market. The quality of data and analysis for two such very different economics provides an opportunity for careful diagnostic and specification testing. In this study a more robust empirical analysis, extending the commonly used OLS approach, through several panel data methods of generalised least square, and generalised method of moment models are explored.
The study uses data from Shanghai, Shenzhen and New Zealand stock exchanges, covering the IPOs listed from 1999 to 2004. Those data are secondary data collected from the websites of the three stock exchanges, NZX Deep Archive, CSMAR database and individual companies’ annual reports. The study includes an extensive range of governance variables, including board size, board demographics, board leadership, board education, and board evaluation variables. There are three long-term dependent variables and three short-term dependent variables. There are a group of control variables. Various tests and suitable regression models are used to find that relationship between corporate governance mechanisms and the short- and long-term performance of IPOs on three exchanges. Several diagnostic tests including serial correlation test, over-identification test, and joint significance test are also used to check the validity of the regressions.
The thesis finds that the panel data and cross sectional regressions explain the long and short-term IPO performance well on the Shanghai Stock Exchange. The results indicate that the panel data regressions explain the long-term IPO performance well, but the cross sectional regressions do not have acceptable explanatory power for the short-term IPO performance on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange. In New Zealand the panel data regressions explain the long-term IPO performance well, but the cross sectional regressions do not contribute a useful explanation for the short-term IPO performance.
This thesis contributes a number of important implications. The commonality of corporate governance variables associated with successful performance has implications for companies preparing to list, exchanges arresting companies with listing, investors looking for successful listings and policy makers wanting an efficient capital market. The difference in variables similarly provides insight for companies, exchanges, investors, and policy analysts
The impact of the NCEA on teacher collegiality
No full textThis study looks at the impact that the National Certification of Educational
Achievement (NCEA) has had on teacher collegiality in New Zealand. It is an
exploratory study using an in case and cross case method, located in four
secondary schools with a range of demographics. I was interested in gathering
the information from teachers in three key roles: Assistant teacher, Head of
Department and Principal's Nominee, finding out what their views were on the
change that the NCEA has bought to their professional lives and the impact made
on their collegiality. The literature reviewed shows there is an international
appreciation of the value of collegiality in schools but there is a fragile nature of
collegiality that challenges its strength. The complexity of school culture and the
symbiotic relationship between it and collegiality contributes to challenge of the
management and development in secondary schools. The findings showed the
teachers in this study considered there to have been a deepening in collegiality as
a result of increased sharing of material, professional communication through
moderation and professional development, and a heightened respect for
professional practice and understanding of personalities. There are threats from
reduced socialisation, workload, loss of autonomy and the fragility of collegiality.
These elements have created a shift in school culture. How teacher collegiality
can best be supported using this assessment policy has been explored with
features involving school organisation and increasing deep collegial activities
such as collegial observation, marking, moderating and review being identified as
beneficial
The measurement of guanxi: Introducing the GRX scale
No full textThis is the post-print version of the final paper published in Industrial Marketing Management. The published article is available from the link below. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. Copyright @ 2010 Elsevier B.V.This study posits and examines a measurement scale for measuring guanxi based on three Chinese relational constructs – ganqing, renqing and xinren. Focusing on Anglo-Chinese buyer–seller relationships, the research reports the findings from six qualitative in-depth interviews and survey data obtained from over 200 Taiwanese trading companies. Based on exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses the findings from the final second-order confirmatory factor analysis of the guanxi model identified 11 items for measuring ganqing, renqing, xinren and guanxi respectively. The results offer a useful starting point in order for business practitioners to assess their guanxi and at the same time provide academics with a scale for operationalizing the measurement of guanxi
Nature inspired computational intelligence for financial contagion modelling
No full textThis thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University.Financial contagion refers to a scenario in which small shocks, which initially affect only a few financial institutions or a particular region of the economy, spread to the rest of the financial sector and other countries whose economies were previously healthy. This resembles the “transmission” of a medical disease. Financial contagion happens both at domestic level and international level. At domestic level, usually the failure of a domestic bank or financial intermediary triggers transmission by defaulting on inter-bank liabilities, selling assets in a fire sale, and undermining confidence in similar banks. An example of this phenomenon is the failure of Lehman Brothers and the subsequent turmoil in the US financial markets. International financial contagion happens in both advanced economies and developing economies, and is the transmission of financial crises across financial markets. Within the current globalise financial system, with large volumes of cash flow and cross-regional operations of large banks and hedge funds, financial contagion usually happens simultaneously among both domestic institutions and across countries. There is no conclusive definition of financial contagion, most research papers study contagion by analyzing the change in the variance-covariance matrix during the period of market turmoil. King and Wadhwani (1990) first test the correlations between the US, UK and Japan, during the US stock market crash of 1987. Boyer (1997) finds significant increases in correlation during financial crises, and reinforces a definition of financial contagion as a correlation changing during the crash period. Forbes and Rigobon (2002) give a definition of financial contagion. In their work, the term interdependence is used as the alternative to contagion. They claim that for the period they study, there is no contagion but only interdependence. Interdependence leads to common price movements during periods both of stability and turmoil. In the past two decades, many studies (e.g. Kaminsky et at., 1998; Kaminsky 1999) have developed early warning systems focused on the origins of financial crises rather than on financial contagion. Further authors (e.g. Forbes and Rigobon, 2002; Caporale et al, 2005), on the other hand, have focused on studying contagion or interdependence. In this thesis, an overall mechanism is proposed that simulates characteristics of propagating crisis through contagion. Within that scope, a new co-evolutionary market model is developed, where some of the technical traders change their behaviour during crisis to transform into herd traders making their decisions based on market sentiment rather than underlying strategies or factors. The thesis focuses on the transformation of market interdependence into contagion and on the contagion effects. The author first build a multi-national platform to allow different type of players to trade implementing their own rules and considering information from the domestic and a foreign market. Traders’ strategies and the performance of the simulated domestic market are trained using historical prices on both markets, and optimizing artificial market’s parameters through immune - particle swarm optimization techniques (I-PSO). The author also introduces a mechanism contributing to the transformation of technical into herd traders. A generalized auto-regressive conditional heteroscedasticity - copula (GARCH-copula) is further applied to calculate the tail dependence between the affected market and the origin of the crisis, and that parameter is used in the fitness function for selecting the best solutions within the evolving population of possible model parameters, and therefore in the optimization criteria for contagion simulation. The overall model is also applied in predictive mode, where the author optimize in the pre-crisis period using data from the domestic market and the crisis-origin foreign market, and predict in the crisis period using data from the foreign market and predicting the affected domestic market
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