Traditional Push Research Articles

User-driven innovation? Challenges of user involvement in future technology analysis

The shift from the traditional push towards more user-driven innovation strategies in the information and communications technologies domain has urged companies to place the user at the core of their innovation process in a more systematic way. In this paper we reflect on the implications of this new innovation context for traditional product development processes. Given these implications, two challenges are discussed that are crucial to true user-driven innovation, i.e. the challenge of continuously involving the user and the need for tools to facilitate the integration of knowledge into the increasingly interdisciplinary development process. Drawing on our own experiences in the interdisciplinary Research On Mobile Applications and Services (ROMAS) project, which focused on future mobile applications in a living lab setting, we illustrate how the two challenges can be tackled.

IMPLEMENTATION OF KANBAN SYSTEM AT THE SHOP FLOOR OF A MULTINATIONAL COMPANY

Streamlining and managing flow of material in high volume production lines reduce the cost in terms of reduction of Work-In-Progress (WIP). Kanban system, which acts as a nerve of JIT production, is being used worldwide due to its simplicity and ability to reduce inventories and production lead times. This paper presents a case study of a successful attempt of implementation of Kanban System (KS) at shop floor of a Multi National Tobacco Factory (MNTF). A traditional Push system was replaced by Pull system with the objectives to reduce filter rods and quantity of raw material at workstations. The conversion from PUSH lo KS simplifies the material issuing procedure and benefits the company by reducing lead-time, Work-In-Process and inventory of finished items. The reduction of WIP is estimated about 59% which resulted in 42.99 million Pakistani Rupees (PKR) savings for the company.

ASAP Distributed Analysis

The Grid offers physicists far more resources than have previously been available by combining elements in computing centers around the world into a globally accessible resource. However, in order to harness this computing power many steps need to be performed for job creation and management and data discovery. ASAP (ARDA support for CMS analysis process) was developed to make this step as simple and straightforward as possible for physicists working on the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) experiment at CERN. ASAP transfers a local application to the Grid by packaging the application, discovering the location of input data then creating, submitting and monitoring jobs. One of the main components of the system is that users can delegate responsibility for their tasks to the ASAP server which can take actions on behalf of the user to ensure that tasks are completed successfully. The system can operate in the traditional push model but can also be used by agents executing on the Grid to pull jobs to the worker node for execution.

Management of Neonatal Hyperbilirubinemia - What is the Efficacy of Exchange Transfusion by Different Techniques?

Background: When rapid reduction of serum bilirubin is required in neonates, exchange transfusion (ET) is the choice. Greater percentage reduction in bilirubin and less stress on the cardiovascular mechanics by isovolumetric than traditional push-pull technique has been reported. Objective: To evaluate the reduction in serum bilirubin by isovolumetric and push-pull techniques of exchange transfusion. Design: Retrospective, observational. Setting: Level II neonatal intensive care unit attached to medical college hospital. Patients: Included 114 neonates who required exchange transfusion for hyperbilirubinemia between January 2000 and December 2004. Methods: Double volume exchange transfusion was carried out for neonatal hyperbilirubinemia whenever indicated. Techniques of either isovolumetric or push-pull was chosen at the discretion of physician and the procedure was carried out over 2 hours. The pre and post-exchange bilirubin levels were noted. The percentage reduction of bilirubin at the end of exchange was determined. The efficacy of both techniques were evaluated and compared. Results: Among the total of 114 newborns, 33.3% (38/114) underwent exchange by push-pull and 66.7 % (76/114) by isovolumetric technique. Pre-exchange bilirubin levels were above 20 mg/dl in 64 (56.1%) neonates. Overall, 58.8% (67/114) had bilirubin reduction of more than 40 %. The mean drops in bilirubin are 39.9% and 41.5% by isovolumetric and push pull technique respectively. When these two techniques are compared, 59.2% in isovolumetric and 57.9% in push pull group had more than 40% reduction in bilirubin level (p=0.15). The pre-exchange bilirubin levels did not seem to influence the post-exchange drop. Conclusion: In neonatal hyperbilirubinemia, exchange transfusion reduces the bilirubin level rapidly by about 40 %. The isovolumetric and traditional push pull techniques are comparable in efficacy.

Evaluation of the in-situ aerobic cometabolism of chlorinated ethenes by toluene-utilizing microorganisms using push–pull tests

A series of transport, biostimulation, and activity push–pull tests were performed under induced and natural gradient conditions in a trichloroethene (TCE) and cis-dichloroethene ( c-DCE) contaminated aquifer. Transport tests demonstrated the feasibility of injecting and recovering complex solute mixtures from the aquifer. During the biostimulation tests, decreases in toluene concentration and the production of o-cresol as an intermediate oxidation product indicated the presence of toluene-utilizing microorganisms. Activity tests demonstrated that the stimulated microbial community had the ability to transform injected c-DCE and trans-dichloroethene ( t-DCE) at similar zero-order rates. Injected isobutene was oxidized to isobutene oxide, which indicated that a toluene ortho-monooxygenase enzyme system was likely responsible for the observed c-DCE and t-DCE transformations. c-DCE zero-order transformation rates in drift push–pull tests were similar to those obtained from traditional push–pull tests (about 0.1 μM/h). Analysis of drift test data using first-order kinetic analysis resulted in similar conclusions as those obtained using zero-order kinetic analyses. When 1-butyne, an inhibitor of toluene ortho-monooxygenase, was added to injected test solutions, the oxidation of toluene, and the transformation of isobutene, c-DCE, and t-DCE were inhibited. The results illustrate how a series of push–pull tests can be used in combination to detect, quantify and confirm in-situ cometabolic microbial transformations.

MetaFisher: Next–Generation Bots and Phishing

MetaFisher is a little-known code to most, yet it is one of the most important as we consider current-day and future threats. It's the most sophisticated bot ever developed. It utilizes a PHP command and control interface to monitor, update, and control bots. This is a pull technique instead of the traditional push technique utilized within IRC. Additionally, it contains sophisticated phishing attacks that dynamically inject HTML into targeted banking sites to steal information from the victim. MetaFisher is a cause for alarm, revealing the sophistication behind criminal fraud and hacker-for-hire situations that have matured over the past few years on the Internet.

MetaFisher: Next-Generation Bots and Phishing

MetaFisher is a little-known code to most, yet it is one of the most important as we consider current-day and future threats. It's the most sophisticated bot ever developed. It utilizes a PHP command and control interface to monitor, update, and control bots. This is a pull technique instead of the traditional push technique utilized within IRC. Additionally, it contains sophisticated phishing attacks that dynamically inject HTML into targeted banking sites to steal information from the victim. MetaFisher is a cause for alarm, revealing the sophistication behind criminal fraud and hacker-for-hire situations that have matured over the past few years on the Internet.

The Poker Chip Game: A Multi-product, Multi-customer, Multi-echelon, Stochastic Supply Chain Network Useful for Teaching the Impacts of Pull versus Push Inventory Policies on Link and Chain Performance

Supply chain management is a topic that many practitioners and students generally find difficult to understand (Boudette [Boudette, N. 2005. Chrysler offers bonuses to dealers: Move to reduce inventory aims to close year strong, but the reaction is mixed. The Wall Street Journal (December 13)]). The authors present a supply chain game that they have found to be an effective tool to increase student interest in and comprehension of supply chain management. The supply chain game literature is briefly reviewed. The poker chip game is discussed with respect to the well-known Beer Game. The poker chip game is a multi-product, multi-customer, multi-echelon, stochastic supply chain game used to teach the problems of traditional push models (economic order quantity/reorder point and Min-Max inventory models) and the elements of the new pull models (Just inTime and Theory of Constraints).

Insinking: A Methodology to Exploit Synergy in Transportation

Over the last decades, companies' average profit margins have been decreasing and as a result efficiency of transportation processes has become critical. To cut down transportation costs, shippers often outsource their transportation activities to a Logistics Service Provider of their choice. This paper proposes a procedure that puts the initiative with the service provider instead. This procedure is based on both operations research and game theoretical insights. To stress the contrast between the traditional push approach of outsourcing, and the here proposed pull approach where the service provider is the initiator of the shift of logistics activities from the shipper to the Logistics Service Provider, we will refer to this phenomenon as insinking, the antonym of outsourcing.Insinking has the advantage that the logistics service provider can proactively select a group of shippers with a strong synergy potential. Moreover, these synergies can be allocated to the participating shippers in a fair and sustainable way by means of customized tariffs.Insinking is illustrated by means of a case study in the Dutch grocery transportation sector.

Vom Push zum Pull – Der Perspektivewechsel in der Wertschöpfungskette von Forst- und Holzwirtschaft | From push to pull: a shift in the perspective of the value chain of forestry and wood management

Forestry management – contrary to general public awareness of the matter – is a branch in the process of undergoing dynamic changes. Impulses for these changes come in part from actors and others involved in the «timber value chain» and in part from outside influences. Today, in addition to numerous other effects, these dynamics have led to a situation where«timber chain» supply flows are no longer initiated and mobilised exclusively by what the forest owner fells and offers to customers, but above all by more specialised wood customers with an increasing appetite for wood who articulate their increasing impatience by the means of market forces. Over the years the traditional push effect has thus given way to a pull effect. Forest owners are obliged to react to this development and to seek, together with others-for instance with universities and their faculties-out suitable future strategies. In turn and without a doubt this will impact on the education and training of forest academics, as well as on the self-understanding of forestry employers.

New class of molecules predicted to exhibit non-linear optical properties

The search for materials with non-linear optical (NLO) properties has been the subject of intense research, due to their application in a wide range of technologies, such as optical computing and optical communication [1– 3]. Although several inorganic substances are known to exhibit NLO properties, macroscopic assemblies of organic molecules show great promise as new materials for building NLO devices, due to their fast response times [3]. Attempts at designing organic molecules with nonlinear optical activity have traditionally used the push– pull model, where an electron donor group is connected to an electron-acceptor group through a spacer. In order to facilitate charge transfer between the donor and the acceptor groups, the spacer is usually a conjugate, planar or quasi-planar system. Although molecules with reasonably large calculated hyperpolarizabilities (β and γ ) can be designed following this procedure, at the crystalline level, the property can be cancelled due to anti-parallel centrosymmetrical stacking of the molecules induced by their planarity. A well known example of the failure of the push–pull design model is p-nitro-aniline, which was expected to have a large (at least for that time’s standards) non-linear optical activity. Unfortunately, at the crystalline level the NLO activity vanishes. Some of the inconveniences of the 1-D π conjugated systems can be more or less circumvented by other arrangements such as 2-D shaped molecules or 3-D tetrahedral DA compounds [4, 5]. Recently, Barbosa and Nascimento [6] proposed a new approach, where a non-planar unit, with high electron affinity, is used as the acceptor, to which several donors can be linked. This new strategy presents two great advantages over the traditional push–pull model: first, the non-planarity of the central acceptor unit reduces the probability of forming a centro-symmetric crystal; second, by properly choosing the type and number of donor groups, one can design molecules in which the octupolar components of the β and γ tensors can be maximized, according to the proposal of Zyss et al. [7]. The advantages of octupolar crystalline structures over the dipolar ones have been extensively discussed by Zyss et al. [8]. Using this new approach several derivatives of C36 exhibiting large values of β have been designed [6]. However, since the chemistry of C36

Pharmaceutical Drug Marketing Strategies and Tactics

A variety of promotional strategies have been used to stimulate sales of pharmaceutical drugs. Traditionally, push techniques have been the predominant means used to encourage physicians to prescribe drugs and thus increase sales. Recently, the traditional push strategy has been supplemented by a pull strategy. Direct-to-consumer advertising is increasingly used to encourage consumers to request advertised drugs from their physicians. This research compares the attitudes of two of the most affected participants in the prescriptive sales processes; physicians and pharmaceutical sales representatives. The findings indicate differences between physicians and pharmaceutical sales representatives regarding the efficacy and ethical considerations of various promotional strategies.

AUTOMATIC REPLENISHMENT PROGRAMS: THE IMPACT OF ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE

Many firms have shifted to response‐based supply chain systems instead of traditional push systems. Research results are presented covering a specific type of response‐based system, Automatic Replenishment Programs (ARPs), in which inventory restocking is triggered by actual sales. The paper looks at the influence of organizational structure, i.e., centralization versus decentralization, on ARP performance and information systems capabilities. Results are mixed. Decentralized firms reported higher performance relating to specific ARP‐related goals. However, no differences were found at a more global level when ARP relationship performance and profitability were examined. Even fewer differences were found between centralized and decentralized firms with respect to their information systems capabilities.

Projet CORAIL

This article shows how a high-quality filtering architecture for targetted documents can be achieved by adapting the intex system to the domain (i.e. ‘economic intelligence’), when expressed in finite state automata filters. A push system named corail (‘request composition by linguistic intelligent agents’) is described, developed by a consortium comprising Thomson-CSF Corporate Laboratory (senior partner), Informatique-CDC, the University of Paris X/CRIS, and the ladl. Both practical and theoretical issues regarding the use of finite state automata are discussed, as for example the notion of the ‘automaton classes’ which are to be used as a paraphrasing agent in the process of document filtering. This project can be considered as an example of how linguistics and computer science can interact in anatural language processing task to meet high-quality standards, namely avoiding noise and reducing silence, thus offering an alternative solution to traditional push systems based on simple keyword-matching. A prototype of the corail system is now operational at Thomson-CSF Central Laboratory and Informatique-CDC.

Yield comparison of push and pull control methods on production systems with unreliable machines

In just-in-time manufacturing, the pull control method is used to coordinate feeding of work centers. It is reported to be responsible for the dramatic reduction of work-in-process inventory, which results in quick detection and correction of machine malfunctioning. As a consequence, production yield is increased and throughput time is decreased simultaneously. In this paper we analytically verify this premise and provide insight on its validity by using a tractable theoretical model of a simple production system. We show that, for a production system in which some machines may malfunction and produce defective parts, the just-in-time pull control method achieves a higher yield than the traditional push control method with equal production throughput.

The New Manufacturing Engineer

Modern day industry is becoming leaner by the day. This demands engineers with an in-depth understanding of lean philosophies. Current methods for teaching lean include hands-on projects and simulation. However, simulation games available in the market lack simplicity, ability to store the results, and modeling power. The goal of this research is to develop a virtual simulation platform which would enable students to perform various experiments by applying lean concepts. The design addresses these deficiencies through the use of VE-Suite, a virtual engineering software. The design includes user-friendly dialogue boxes, graphical models of machines, performance display gauges, and an editable layout. The platform uses laws of operations management such as Little's law, economic order quantity (EOQ) models, and cycle time. These laws enable students to implement various lean concepts such as pull system, just-in-time (JIT), single piece flow, single minute exchange of dies (SMED), kaizen, kanban, U-layout, by modifying the process parameters such as process times, setup times, layout, number, and placement of machines. The simulation begins with a traditional push type mass production line and the students improve the line by implementing lean techniques. Thus, students experience the advantages of lean real time while facing the real life problems encountered in implementing it.

Analysis in Manufacturing Systems Simulation: A Case Study

A case study of the transition of an electronics assembly manufacturing system from a traditional push production control system to a just in time (pull control system) is presented. Emphasis is on the unique simulation analysis aspects of the case study. The experimental design follows a dynamic programming formulation, representing the system transition through stages with the states at each stage representing combinations of stage-specific improvement possibilities and process control parameter values. Relationships between the primary performance measure, run time for a batch, and other performance measures are developed to identify process control variables and opportunities for system improvement. Actual production control data is employed for validation of system standard values, estimation of model input parameter values, and comparison with simulation results for validation purposes.

Identification of metrics and transition functions of pull system implementation

This research examines the problem of providing decision support for the transition from a traditional push production system to a pull system design. The methods presented include: a method for determining significant metrics of evolving production systems; a method for estimating associated transition functions; and a decision support system framework which gives guidelines for development of software employing these methods. An actual electronics assembly system provided a case study. Significant metrics for this system were determined to be quality, material flow congestion and system flexibility. Recursive equations for estimating these transition functions and a decision support system framework are given.

Integrated Materials Management: The Value Chain Redefined

The paper presents a new explanatory methodology designed to capture the role of Integrated Materials Management in the world's leading manufacturing companies. This methodology is explained via the Integrated Materials Value Pipeline drawing on the earlier Porter Value Chain/System. This new Pipeline describes the primary and secondary processes required in a leading edge company adopting a consumer led pull system rather than a traditional push system. In order to add some reality to the Integrated Materials Value Pipeline, the scope of this essentially micro model is broadened by taking into account the multitude of Materials Pipelines that exist in a typical supplier network. This macro model has been called the Ten Force Partnership Model. This second model is employed to help explain how the best companies can achieve wider supplier network development. In order to demonstrate that the Partnership Model can be applied outside Japan a brief case study of its (partial) application to a Welsh example is presented.