Information Technology Products Research Articles

Why did the terms of payment in international trade change so much?

ABSTRACTThis article examines factors contributing to the substantial change in the terms of payment, such as letter of credit (LC) and cash terms, in Korean export transactions during the period 1997–2015, using the Autoregressive Distributed Lag bounds test approach. We find that high competition in the world market, the expansion of exports of information technology products and intra-firm trade, and the improvement of information and communication technology (ICT) decrease the share of exports on LC terms in total exports in the long run. However, the increase in exports to developing countries raises the use of LC terms. On the other hand, the increase in intra-firm trade and ICT improvement raise the share of exports settled in cash, and higher trust between trading partners increases the use of cash terms.

Tailoring a Project Management Methodology That Suits One's Needs

This paper aims to review several project management frameworks that are widely used in the industries. Studies on how to adopt and adapt such frameworks remain limited. Three project management (PM) frameworks widely used in the information technology (IT) industry, such as PMBOK, PRINCE2, and ITIL, were analyzed and compared. The objectives of the review are twofold. First, to allow one to have a quick understanding of the widely used project management frameworks; and second, provide how these frameworks can be used together and complement each other at the different phases of a project lifecycle to address the specific needs of the industries managing IT products or services.

The global CO2 emission cost of geographic shifts in international sourcing

In this paper we simulated the global direct CO2 emission cost of geographic shift of international sourcing for the period 1995–2011 by comparing the scenarios with and without geographic shift. Our simulations indicate that in 2011, had the share of trade by the sourcing economy remained at the level of 1995, 2000, 2005, and 2008 whereas the global final demand remained the same, global CO2 emissions in production processes would have been 2.8 Gt, 2.0 Gt, 1.3 Gt, and 540 Mt., respectively, lower than the actual emissions. As there is a general outsourcing trend shifted from developed economies to developing economies, the overall direct emission costs have always been significantly positive. Further investigations by economy and industry show that such a geographic shift was mainly dominated by developed economies themselves and occurred in high-tech industries, such as production of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) goods and machinery, leading to positive emission cost in developing economies, especially China. Moreover, there is potentially even larger influence of geographic shift of sourcing on global CO2 emissions, as such a shift would stimulate the economic growth and consumptions in developing economies, consequently this may bring additional energy demand and CO2 emissions. Our results addressed the urgency of eliminating in carbon emission intensity gap between developing and developed economies and the successful development of new, scalable low carbon energy sourcing and technologies across the world.

Understanding and managing knowledge transfer for customers in IT adoption

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to advance information technology (IT) adoption research and practice by investigating the process of knowledge transfer (KT) undertaken by suppliers of IT innovations. The authors expound the intricacies of formal and informal mechanisms of the KT initiative that aims at augmenting the absorptive capacity (ACAP) of potential IT adopters with the objective of increasing the likelihood of adoption of new IT products or services.Design/methodology/approachThe authors draw on case studies of ten IT suppliers to build on the limited research on KT for customers in IT adoption. The authors focus on the for customer type of KT from the standpoint of the IT supplier firm.FindingsThe authors’ results show that complexity of the IT product or service increases the reliance on formal and systematic KT initiatives. This paper also shows that there is a required minimum threshold level of initial customers’ ACAP in order for the KT initiative to be worthwhile for the supplier, especially for those offering complex IT products and services. However, IT suppliers were found to limit their reliance on KT when they believed that customers that became too knowledgeable might threaten the innovation’s diffusion.Research limitations/implicationsSince the authors’ case firms represented innovation suppliers, future studies should investigate customer-supplier dyads to explore and integrate the customer’s perspective in the analysis of the KT process. To this end, longitudinal studies would also provide immense insights into the KT process and how it evolves over time.Originality/valueThe main contribution of this paper consists of illuminating the workings of KT initiatives aimed at existing and potential customers from the standpoint of the IT innovation supplier. By focusing on the for customers aspect of KT, this paper advances the authors’ understanding of why and how IT suppliers should resort to formal vs informal KT mechanisms. The authors’ proposed framework also integrates and shows the roles of customers’ ACAP, complexity of the IT innovation, and tacitness of the knowledge transferred to the customers.

The Information Technology Agreement and the ‘Make-in-India’ Initiative

The World Trade Organization’s Information Technology Agreement (ITA), which was concluded at the Singapore Ministerial Conference in 1996, is considered to be one of the biggest tariff-cutting deals by virtue of eliminating all customs-related duties on the exportation of certain categories of information technology products to a country, which is a member to the Agreement. Over time, new innovations in the information and communication technology (ICT) sector mandated the consideration of expanding the list of products covered by this Agreement, which took place in the form of ITA-II negotiations. India, which was an original member of the ITA-I, however, decided to opt-out of the negotiations to expand the list of products covered by the Agreement, and reasoned its absence by stating that the zero-tariff regime created by the ITA-I debilitated its electronics-manufacturing sectors and on the contrary resulted in an over-reliance on imported electronic inputs. Accordingly, providing duty-free treatment to a further list of IT products could potentially be detrimental for the country’s economic growth. Consequently, it preferred to give priority to its national policy initiative, namely the ‘Make-in-India’ programme, which embarks upon fostering domestic production of, inter alia, the ICT sector. This article accordingly weighs the better alternative for India and analyses the prospects of initiatives like the current one to resuscitate the ailing domestic electronics-manufacturing sector, before it can benefit from the zero-tariff regime over the expanding list of products covered by the ITA-II. JEL: K33, M15

The complementarity of IT and HRM capabilities for competitive performance: a configurational analysis of manufacturing and industrial service SMEs

ABSTRACTBuilding on the resource-based view (RBV) perspective, we analyse the combined effects of two highly-valued organizational resources, namely information technology (IT) capabilities and human resource management (HRM) capabilities, on the competitive performance of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Three resource configurations are derived from data on 227 SMEs (121 from the manufacturing sector and 106 from the industrial services sector) through a cluster analysis. These resource configurations are labelled IT Capabilities-dominant Configuration (ITC), e-Business Capabilities-dominant Configuration (e-BC), and HRM Capabilities-dominant Configuration (HRC). This last configuration is the best-performing, followed by the e-BC, with the ITC as the worst-performing. The results also show that manufacturing and service firms are very unevenly distributed within HRC and ITC configurations, suggesting notable differences between the two sectors regarding their respective IT and non-IT capability-building. The fact that service SMEs are overwhelmingly represented (93%) in the worst-performing configuration and completely absent (0%) in the most effective configuration while displaying the strongest IT infrastructure capabilities confirms that the IT productivity paradox is aggravated in service SMEs and calls for further research on this issue.

A Comparison of Competing Models for Understanding Industrial Organization’s Acceptance of Cloud Services

Cloud computing is the next generation in computing, and the next natural step in the evolution of on-demand information technology services and products. However, only a few studies have addressed the adoption of cloud computing from an organizational perspective, which have not proven whether the research model is the best-fitting model. The purpose of this paper is to construct research competing models (RCMs) and determine the best-fitting model for understanding industrial organization’s acceptance of cloud services. This research integrated the technology acceptance model and the principle of model parsimony to develop four cloud service adoption RCMs with enterprise usage intention being used as a proxy for actual behavior, and then compared the RCMs using structural equation modeling (SEM). Data derived from a questionnaire-based survey of 227 firms in Taiwan were tested against the relationships through SEM. Based on the empirical study, the results indicated that, although all four RCMs had a high goodness of fit, in both nested and non-nested structure comparisons, research competing model A (Model A) demonstrated superior performance and was the best-fitting model. This study introduced a model development strategy that can most accurately explain and predict the behavioral intention of organizations to adopt cloud services.

Enhanced User-driven Ranking System with Splay Tree

E-learning is one of the information and communication technology products used for teaching and learning process [35]. An efficient and effective way to construct trust relationship among peer users in e-learning environment is ranking. User-driven ranking systems are based only on the feedback or rating provided by the users. In [46-48] the authors provide a variety of trust and reputation methods. Certified Belief in Strength (CBS) [45] is a novel trust measurement method based on reputation and strength. In [38] author presents a recommendation system based on the relevant feedback review to predict the user's interests, that are ranked based on the recommendations history they provide previously. Users with higher rating obtain high reputation compared to less scored users. In question answering websites like StackOverflow, new or low scored users are ignored by the community. This discourage them and their involvement with the community reduces further down, as power law states, alleged low users are pushed to the bottom of the ranking list. Avoid this condition by encouraging less reputed users and prevent them from moving further down in ranking level. Thus, low reputed users are provided with few more chances to participate actively in the e-learning environments. A splay tree is a Binary Search Tree with self-balancing skill. The splay tree brings the recently accessed item to the top of the tree, thus active users are always on the top of the tree. A splay tree is used to represent user's ranks, and to semi-splay low ranked users again in the tree thus preventing them from further drowning in the ranking list. The focus of this research work is to find and enhance low reputed users in reputation system by providing few more chances to take part actively in the e-learning environment using the splay tree. Normalized discounted cumulative gain (NDCG) acts as a decision part for identifying drowning users.

An IT Capability Approach to Informatization Construction of Higer Education Institutions

This paper proposes a new methodology of the infomatization construction of the higher education institutions based on IT capability for solving the information technology (IT) productivity paradox existing in informatization construction of higher education institutions at present. It analyzes the reasons that lead to the IT productivity paradox problem, expounds the factors and influence mechanism of IT capabilities in higher education institutions and proposes a way to improve the IT capability in higher education institutions by importing IT governance framework to make sure that the IT development is consistent with the development strategy of higher education institutions, to maximize the benefit of IT investments, and to take a good care of the accompanying risks occurred in the IT development process. In general, this paper proposes an effective solution to the problem of IT productivity paradox in the informatization construction of higher education institutions at present.

New Product of Information Technology: The Application of Micro Lessons in Higher Vocational College Innovation of English Teaching

As new product of information technology, micro lessons have stepped into English teaching of higher vocational college. They gather contents of English teaching and innovations of teaching methods. This paper generalized about micro lessons. It analyzed the application of micro lessons in English teaching of higher vocational college from classroom instruction to autonomous learning on line. Meanwhile, it reflected designs and actual effects of micro lessons, development and sharing in resources of micro lessons.

Design of remote smart home control system based on the Internet of Things

With the continuous innovation of related technology and the rapid development of information industry, the Internet of things, as a new product of information technology, has been applied in many fields, especially in the field of residential home. It is of great significance to promote the quality of people's daily life. In view of this, this paper briefly analyzes the collection and transmission of indoor remote control signal. On the basis of this, the design of remote control software is analyzed and discussed. Finally, the practical application test shows that the remote smart home control system designed by this research can realize the effective transmission of the indoor electrical control of information. It can meet the needs of practical use both in controlling accuracy and the delay.

Chapter 12 - Information technology for brain banking

Implementing and maintaining the information technology (IT) infrastructure of a brain bank can be a daunting task for any brain bank coordinator, particularly when access to both funds and IT professionals is limited. Many questions arise when attempting to determine which IT products are most suitable for a brain bank. The requirements of each brain bank must be assessed carefully to ensure that the chosen IT infrastructure will be able to meet those requirements successfully and will be able to expand and adapt as the size of the brain bank increases. This chapter provides some valuable insights to be considered when implementing the IT infrastructure for a brain bank and discusses the pros and cons of various approaches and products.

Why Do Users Switch Mobile Applications? Trialing Behavior as a Predecessor of Switching Behavior

Mobile application providers face high user losses because users can easily and often switch to an alternative application. Researchers have recently started to study information technology (IT) switching. However, no studies have concentrated on the unique context of mobile applications. Mobile application switching differs from the switching behavior related to many other IT products and services because of the highlighted role of alternatives, beta versions, updates, reviews, and users’ spontaneous behavior. To address this gap, we develop a mobile-specific model by using a qualitative research approach. As a theoretical contribution, we introduce trialing behavior as a predecessor of switching behavior and present six new behavioral antecedents for them. As practical implications, we suggest ways for mobile application providers and developers to reduce user churn.

Implementacija 'Industrije 4.0' primjenom robota i digitalne tehnologije u proizvodnim procesima u Kini

A strategic plan called 'High-Tech Strategy 2020' in the Germany is continued, with an emphasis on scientific technological development which promotes the 'Industry 4.0' reform and modernization of production in all industries by introducing digital technologies and depends on a range of new and innovative technological achievements. Technologically advanced countries such as USA, UK, Japan, Sweden and others have also accepted and introduced digital technologies to manufacturing processes with the aim of creating intelligent automation or intelligent factories of future. China is confronted with a rally from ASEAN and Central Asia, which have cheap labor force by lowering export demand from China to the EU and USA, as shown by the 'Global Innovation Index 2015 Report'. The Government of China as a Response to 'Industry 4.0' provides the 'Made in China 2025' strategy, promoting the link between information technology and industrial production by introducing optimization of manufacturing processes, enhancing the innovation capability in the industry including ICT, industrial and service robots, high technology tools, new materials, etc. The results of Implication 'Industry 4.0' are visible in the automotive industry, where China is the first in the world on the application of industrial robots and manufactured automobiles. Implementing the adopted strategy China creates new opportunities for a successful, innovative and creative economy, from 'Great Industrial Economy' to 'Powerful Industrial Economy'.

A Study on Laser Micromachining

Ultra Violet (UV) pulse are widely used for micromachining in the research and development of Information Technology (IT), Nano Technology (NT), and Bio Technology (BT) products because due to short wavelength of the laser it not only allows micro drilling, micro cutting and micro grooving with high accuracy, but acts also as high penetrating coefficient, which give opportunity for different materials to machined properly. A finite element model considering photo-thermal and photomechanical properties was recommended to study the micro phenomena subject by mechanical pressure impacts and thermal heat transfers during a very short processing time. From the results of this research work, few of dynamic deformation behaviours such as deformation shape, strain, and stress distributions were examine and compare it with the experimental results of previous research work. The results from this comparison will help to know better knowledge about interference of UV laser beam and metal materials.

Zimbabwe's Preparedness in Managing Meteorological Disasters: A Case of Applying Disaster Risk Management in Managing Impacts of Climate Change

Climate change adaptation and building resilience among vulnerable communities can leverage on adoption of broader principles of Disaster Risk Management. In recent years many developing countries have seen an increasing push to merge Climate Change Adaptation (CCA) and Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) approaches into a single framework because many of the tools developed by the disaster risk management (DRM) community, such as risk identification and preparedness are important to climate resilient development. The study sought to establish Zimbabwe’s preparedness in managing meteorological disasters; mitigating climate change impacts using disaster risk management strategies; and to provide recommendations to help improve disaster preparedness in vulnerable communities in Masvingo province and proffer some disaster risk reduction remedies. The impact of the hybrid approach has far reaching positive results in dealing with climate change challenges in the country and beyond. One innovation adopted in this study is the use of an Android App to provide early warnings and other remedies after a disaster has struck. Given the wide use of Information technology products in Zimbabwe, minimum use of this App in managing climate change related disasters has potential to be effective especially for urban to peri-urban communities. The study established that the government is to a great extend prepared to manage disasters though more has to be done by availing more resources to avert impacts of disasters. Very little has been done to equip communities in terms of training and information dissemination especially in rural areas. The application developed was well received by communities and have great potential to inform vulnerable communities in preparation against disasters.

ICT and the English Language: The Defective Impact of Text Messaging and E-Mailing

This paper examined the various innovations occasioned by the global study of English language and observed the challenges posed to effective writing by products of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) such as the Global System for Mobile Communication (GSM) and E-mail. In what seems like a ‘method in madness’, the paper identified an emerging written language of the E-mail and (GSM) via the Iexemes, morphemes, syntax and mechanics of punctuations (capitalization and spacing), and use of symbols in sampled messages written in English in the Short Message Service (SMS) and E-mail. Despite the advantages of electronic-English, it introduces many problems. Among these are: arbitrary use of affixation, consequent difficulties with well-formed sentences as well as with mechanics. Most importantly, there is the overall chaotic effect of these coinages. The paper called on writers using the English medium to strive to stick to the original and keep the written language of E-mail and GMS out of formal writing so that it will not lead to the extinction of formal writing.Key Words: ICT, text-messaging, GSM, E-mailing, and Internet

The Productivity Impact of New Technology: Evidence from the US Retailers Industry

This study determines how information technology impacts selected retailers’ overall financial productivity. To measure the impact of information technology on productivity in the retail industry, a purposive sample of five retailers’ technological innovation and financial performance was collected and analyzed. Five retailers were selected from a list of the most prevalent retailers in the U.S.: Starbucks, Target, Verizon Wireless, Ulta Beauty, and Build-A-Bear Workshop, Inc. The linear regression with analysis of variance performed revealed a weak or insignificant relationship between information technology usage and productivity as measured by retailer revenue.

A Study on Strengthening International Competitiveness of Korean High-tech Industries for Protectionism

This study analyzed the international competitiveness of Korean high-tech industries in the U.S., Japan, and China, all of which are Korea’s major trading partners by using UN comtrade database. In terms of trade volume from 2001 to 2016, China s trade volume increased the 18 times, and Korea’s exports and imports increased by five to seven times during the period. In the case of the U.S. and Japan, the increase in exports was very little, but the increase in imports was significant. As a result of examining the trade specialization index by item, it was found that there were many import-specialized sectors in Korea in general. Specifically, import specialization in the biotechnology industry was very high. In the U.S., nuclear technology and electronic products are found to be export-specialized sectors, while in Japan, export specialization of automatic production and electronic products are high. On the other hand, China is highly specialized in exporting weapons, information and communication technology products. While the U.S. and Japan are losing their overall competitiveness, Korea’s technological competitiveness is increasing while China’s price competitiveness is increasing. In order to establish and implement effective policies to enhance the competitiveness of high-tech industries, government-led R&D policies should be encouraged to involve private companies, major universities, and government agencies.

Application of TISM and MICMAC for analysis of influential factors of sustainable development of tablet devices: a case study

With the advancements in technology and increase in demand for eco-efficient products, manufacturers are focusing on sustainable development of products. Enticing a huge demand over the recent years, sustainable development of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) products are a subject of interest for most practitioners and academicians. A number of factors are found to influence the sustainable development of ICT products. It is necessary to identify the most important factors and determine the dependencies of factors among themselves. In this regard, a case study has been conducted in the context of sustainable development of tablet devices. The most influential factors have been identified from literature and with experts input. The factor dependencies are established using Total Interpretive Structural Modelling (TISM) methodology. MICMAC analysis is used to classify the factors based on their ability to influence other factors. The output of TISM forms the input for MICMAC analysis. From the study, it was found that the factors, ‘Customer pressure’, ‘Government regulations’, ‘Competitiveness’, ‘Organization initiative’ and ‘Technological advancements’ are the most driving factors. Factors ‘Environmental impact’, ‘Energy efficiency’ and ‘Opportunities to upgrade’ were found to be dependent.