This book describes the water sector as it is structured in Italy, presenting innovative engineering, financial and managerial solutions implemented by the Italian water sector, through the experiences of its major stakeholders. The main themes addressed include water regulation, financing infrastructures, economic performance of the leading companies, abstraction, potabilization, distribution, treatment and purification technologies, energy production, and organizational restructuring. The last part of the work presents company profiles with important financial indicators, as well as future strategic postures. Written by leading Italian experts, the book reflects the remarkable advances that have been made in the field of water governance and environmental management. The book is especially valuable for researchers, water professionals, utility managers, as well as policy makers and foreign investors looking for opportunities. This work has been prepared as part of the research activities of the Observatory on Sustainable Water Industry, one of Agici's Research and Advisory units.

This book presents the proceedings of the 2nd EAI International Conference on Technology, Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Education (TIE' 2018), which took place at Ravensbourne University London, London, UK, on September 4, 2018. The central theme of the conference is emerging technologies in relation to business, education, social and political needs that make modern society flourish. The proceedings feature papers from a cross-disciplinary audience that explore the process of creativity and innovation. The goal is that the various disciplines can learn from each other and see how they might benefit from the cross-fertilization of practices.

This book discusses how systems thinking and approaches can aid management consultants in navigating the complexities of client advisory in current realities. It thereby brings to the forefront aspects of holism, flexibility and responsibility - the keys to success in today's world. Management consultants are called in to offer an independent expert view of an organisation/ a situation and are expected to address some of the most pressing problems businesses face. The client does not exist in a silo, but in a complex environment that lies at the intersection of a range of internal and external factors that are often unseen and unpredictable. The organisation itself presents an alien territory that the consultant is expected to acclimatise to within a very short period of time, and come up with solutions that "insiders" would not have been able to visualise. The book presents a range of ideas, concepts and reference cases that are relevant and topical for consultants in their daily work. It argues that systems thinking allows holism and flexibility in management consulting - while holism is about the ability to encompass the environmental and organisational complexity, flexibility is about the ability to think creatively and adopt different approaches to accommodate this complexity. With commentaries, case studies, conceptual models and perspectives that cut across multiple industries, sectors and countries, this book is a valuable resource for academics and professionals alike. The book's inner pages and its page on Springer.com contain additional comments providing perspectives of clients, industry experts and academia.

This book introduces and analyzes the models for engineering leadership and competency skills, as well as frameworks for industry-academia collaboration and is appropriate for students, researchers, and professionals interested in continuous professional development. The authors look at the organizational structures of engineering education in knowledge-based economies and examine the role of innovation and how it is encouraged in schools. It also provides a methodological framework and toolkit for investigating the needs of engineering and technology skills in national contexts. A detailed empirical case study is included that examines the leadership competencies that are needed in knowledge-based economies and how one university encourages these in their program. The book concludes with conceptual modeling and proposals of specific organizational structures for implementation in engineering schools, in order to enable the development of necessary skills for future engineering graduates.

This edited book offers further advances, new perspectives, and developments from world leaders in the field of through-life engineering services (TES). It builds up on the earlier book by the same authors entitled: "Through-life Engineering Services: Motivation, Theory and Practice." This compendium introduces and discusses further, the developments in workshop-based and 'in situ' maintenance and support of high-value engineering products, as well as the application of drone technology for autonomous and self-healing product support. The links between 'integrated planning' and planned obsolescence, risk and cost modelling are also examined. The role of data, information, and knowledge management relative to component and system degradation and failure is also presented. This is supported by consideration of the effects upon the maintenance and support decision by the presence of 'No Fault Found' error signals within system data. Further to this the role of diagnostics and prognostics is also discussed. In addition, this text presents the fundamental information required to deliver an effective TES solution/strategy and identification of core technologies. The book contains reference and discussion relative to automotive. rail, and several other industrial case studies to highlight the potential of TES to redefine the product creation and development process. Additionally the role of warranty and service data in the product creation and delivery system is also introduced. This book offers a valuable reference resource for academics, practitioners and students of TES and the associated supporting technologies and business models that underpin whole-life product creation and delivery systems through the harvesting and application of condition and use based data.

This book covers all types of literature on existing trend analysis approaches, but more than 60% of the methodologies are developed here and some of them are reflected to scientific literature and others are also innovative versions, modifications or improvements. The suggested methodologies help to design, develop, manage and deliver scientific applications and training to meet the needs of interested staff in companies, industries and universities including students. Technical content and expertise are also provided from different theoretical and especially active roles in the design, development and delivery of science in particular and economics and business in general. It is also ensured that, wherever possible and technically appropriate, priority is given to the inclusion and integration of real life data, examples and processes within the book content. The time seems right, because available books just focus on special sectors (fashion, social, business). This book reviews all the available trend approaches in the present literature on rational and logical bases.

This book presents innovative research and its applications in the development of transportation infrastructure, and discusses the latest trends, challenges and unsolved problems in the field of transport technology. The book also presents a range of solutions to problems faced by the rapidly growing economies of the developing world. Core challenges confronting policymakers in the field of transport technology include traffic congestion, air pollution, traffic fatalities and injuries, and petroleum dependence. At the same time, the increased use of hybrid and electric vehicles is changing consumer needs and behaviors. The solutions discussed in this book will encourage and inspire researchers, industry professionals and policymakers alike to put these methods into practice.

This volume of selected articles is being released in light of the new economic, social and environmental challenges Europe and the United States have been faced with following the end of the Cold War and in the evolving era of globalization. National security, immigration and the provision of health and other key social services call for a radically different outlook in terms of policy discussions. The contributors of this book focus on seven key policy issues and challenges that currently affect the United States and Europe: income distribution, the gender pay gap, crime and security, unemployment, health care, the demographic question and environmental regulation. The purpose of this volume is to analyze how public policy within the European context is responding to the challenges posed by this new global era.

This book brings together original research on the role of networks in regional economic development and innovation. It presents a comprehensive framework synthesizing extant theories, a palette of real-world cases in the aerospace, automotive, life science, biotechnology and health care industries, and fundamental agent-based computer models elucidating the relation between regional development and network dynamics. The book is primarily intended for researchers in the fields of innovation economics and evolutionary economic geography, and particularly those interested in using agent-based models and empirical case studies. However, it also targets (regional) innovation policy makers who are not only interested in policy recommendations, but also want to understand the state-of-the-art agent-based modeling methods used to experimentally arrive at said recommendations.

Both society and markets have changed, and the art of innovation has changed with them, becoming increasingly complex. The book comprises the chapters of twenty-two European innovation researchers. The authors challenge existing innovation theory and management dogma and present new theoretical perspectives. Beginning with theoretical analysis of the innovation management field, the book turns to the institutional and geographic factors underlying innovation, and the potential posed by a 'soft' or organizational view of innovation management, before concluding with a section on the management of knowledge, information and appropriability.

The Yearbook on Space Policy is the reference publication analyzing space policy developments. Each year it presents issues and trends in space policy and the space sector as a whole. Its scope is global and its perspective is European. The Yearbook also links space policy with other policy areas. It highlights specific events and issues, and provides useful insights, data and information on space activities. The Yearbook on Space Policy is edited by the European Space Policy Institute (ESPI) based in Vienna, Austria. It combines in-house research and contributions of members of the European Space Policy Research and Academic Network (ESPRAN), coordinated by ESPI. The Yearbook is designed for government decision-makers and agencies, industry professionals, as well as the service sectors, researchers and scientists and the interested public.

This book is the fourth volume of the sub series of the Lecture Notes in Mobility dedicated to Road Vehicle Automation. lts chapters have been written by researchers, engineers and analysts from all around the globe. Topics covered include public sector activities, human factors and challenges, ethical, legal, energy and technology perspectives, vehicle systems development, as well as transportation infrastructure and planning. The book is based on the Automated Vehicles Symposium which took place in San Francisco, California (USA) in July 2016.

South Korea has attained spectacular economic success in recent decades. It has reached the status of a Newly Advanced Economy, with challenges increasingly mirroring those faced by other advanced economies. These include the necessary upgrading of the labor force, the frictions of switching to a national system of innovation adapted to leadership in R&D, market-based economic policies that reflect the government's difficulties in foreseeing future technological developments, and the consequences of social change for the innovation system and policy-making. In the forthcoming book the parallel challenges for innovation and technology for the Republic of Korea and other advanced economies will be analyzed more thoroughly with an international perspective in mind. This comparison and international benchmarking will allow policy makers and scholars to better appreciate how much the country has already moved into the circle of globally leading economies and what can be done to consolidate and strengthen its position.

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Engineers and scientists often need to sell an innovative idea for a new product to top management. Those who occupy product planning positions also need to be constantly scanning ideas for improving value. The engineer as product planner must learn to think like its major competitor using customer value as a guide. This book provides essential support for engineers and scientists who are required to make realistic business cases for new product concepts.

Machines dominate our lives, from alarm clocks that wake us up in the morning to radios that lull us to sleep. Most of our interactions with automated machines and computers are problem-free, but more often than we would like, they can be irritating and confusing. This is frequently harmless, such as a VCR recording the wrong show, but when it involves a critical system like an autopilot or medical device it can be a matter of life or death. Taming HAL seeks to explain these miscommunications between humans and machines by exploring user interfaces. Degani examines twenty-five different systems for human use, including watches, Internet applications, automobiles, medical equipment, and autopilots onboard commercial airplanes. Readers will discover why interfaces between people and machines all too often do not work and what needs to be done to avoid potential tragedies.

Carbon Capture and Storage technologies (CCS) are moving from experiment toward commercial applications at a rapid pace, driven by urgent demand for carbon mitigation strategies. This book examines the potential role of CCS from four perspectives: technology development, economic competitiveness, environmental and safety impacts, and social acceptance. IEK-STE of Forschungszentrum Juelich presents this interdisciplinary study on CCS, based on methods of Integrated Technology Assessment. Following an introductory chapter by editor Wilhelm Kuckshinrichs, Part I of the book surveys the status of carbon capture technologies, and assesses the potential for research and development of applications that are useful at scales required for meaningful mitigation. Transportation, Utilization and Environmental Aspects of CO2 receive chapter-length treatments, and the section concludes with an examination of safe geological storage of CO2 based on the example of the Ketzin pilot site, not far from Berlin. Part II covers Economic and Societal Perspectives. The first chapter discusses the use of CCS in the energy sector, analyzing costs associated with electricity generation and CO2 mitigation on the basis of technology-specific cost and process parameters, along with a merit-order illustration of the possible implications of CCS facilities for energy costs. Later chapters outline the costs of CCS application in energy- and CO2-intensive industries; analyze system characteristics of CCS infrastructures, showing that the infrastructure cost function depends on the ratio of fixed to variable costs, as well as on the spatial distribution of CO2 sources and storage facilities; interpret cross-sector carbon mitigation strategies and their impacts on the energy and CO2 balance; and discuss awareness and knowledge of CCS, attitudes towards it, and how the risks and benefits of CCS are perceived. Part III discusses the Framework for Energy and Climate Policy, with chapters on acceptance and adoption of CCS policy in Germany, and the EU, and an assessment of international cooperation in support of CCS. The final chapter summarizes the central arguments, discusses the potential role of carbon capture and utilization as part of a German transformation strategy, and extrapolates the findings to European and international contexts.

This book attempts to link some of the recent advances in crowdsourcing with advances in innovation and management. It contributes to the literature in several ways. First, it provides a global definition, insights and examples of this managerial perspective resulting in a theoretical framework. Second, it explores the relationship between crowdsourcing and technological innovation, the development of social networks and new behaviors of Internet users. Third, it explores different crowdsourcing applications in various sectors such as medicine, tourism, information and communication technology (ICT), and marketing. Fourth, it observes the ways in which crowdsourcing can improve production, finance, management and overall managerial performance. Crowdsourcing, also known as "massive outsourcing" or "voluntary outsourcing," is the act of taking a job or a specific task usually performed by an employee of a company or contractors, and outsourcing it to a large group of people or a community (crowd or mass) via the Internet, through an open call. The term was coined by Jeff Howe in a 2006 issue of Wired magazine. It is being developed in different sciences (i.e., medicine, engineering, ICT, management) and is used in the most successful companies of the modern era (i.e., Apple, Facebook, Inditex, Starbucks). The developments in crowdsourcing has theoretical and practical implications, which will be explored in this book. Including contributions from international academics, scholars and professionals within the field, this book provides a global, multidimensional perspective on crowdsourcing.

Maximising reader insights into the theory, models, methods and fundamental reasoning of design, this book addresses design activities in industrial settings, as well as the actors involved. This approach offers readers a new understanding of design activities and related functions, properties and dispositions. Presenting a 'design mindset' that seeks to empower students, researchers, and practitioners alike, it features a strong focus on how designers create new concepts to be developed into products, and how they generate new business and satisfy human needs. Employing a multi-faceted perspective, the book supplies the reader with a comprehensive worldview of design in the form of a proposed model that will empower their activities as student, researcher or practitioner. We draw the reader into the core role of design conceptualisation for society, for the development of industry, for users and buyers of products, and for citizens in relation to public systems. The book also features original contributions related to exploration, conceptualisation and product synthesis. Exploring both the power and limitations of formal design process models, methods, and tools viewed in the light of human ingenuity and cognition, the book develops a unique design mindset that adds human understanding to the list of methods and tools essential to design. This insight is distilled into useful mindset heuristics included throughout the book.

Written for marketing executives, new product/service managers, and marketing research professionals, Designing Winning Products (DWP) focuses on design and market testing issues/solutions for new business-to-business products and services. The first three chapters synthesize the product innovation literature; the objective of these chapters is to increase marketing and product managers' technical skills for testing customer acceptance of alternative new product/service designs. Detailed examples of applying these skills are described in seven later chapters - these chapters describe how to apply conjoint analysis and choice experiments with B-to-B customers in specific European and North American markets. A chapter is devoted to describing how superior new products sometimes fail to attract known customers - the nitty-gritty nuances behind the innovator's dilemma.
More than 50 diagrams, tables and figures support the text; the chapter discussions and end-of-chapter references include more than 300 complete citations to additional sources.

This book analyzes the social capital of the growing knowledge economy, from both theoretical and empirical points of view. The theoretical section discusses social capital as an economic concept, developing a theory of the social capital of the enterprise. The empirical section compares aspects of the social capital of three different socio-economic systems: the US, Japan and Sweden. The book discusses a number of issues for further research.

Innovation is the driving force behind economic growth. The knowledge that f- ters innovation builds on both systematic research and serendipity. The availability of new knowledge-be it technological or organizational (social)-is, however, - suf?cient. An institutional structure must be in place that enhances mutual learning among the actors involved and that stimulates cooperation, as well as competition. This recognition has inspired this volume, which focuses on national innovation s- tems and sectoral (technology) innovation systems that differ widely between co- tries, due to their diverse historical paths and distinctive cultural and societal f- tures. With regard to theory, most chapters incorporate a mix of endogenous growth theory and evolutionary thinking. Endogenous growth theory places an emphasis on the interplay between technological knowledge and various structural charact- istics of the economy and society, as well as on the results of economic growth. Concepts related to technology development, accumulation of knowledge on te- nology, and technology diffusion feature prominently here. In evolutionary thi- ing, and in particular coevolutionary thinking, the focus is on close links between technology and institutions, whereby the functionality of technology is in?uenced by certain dynamic interactions with institutional systems. Information technology turns out to be a clear example of such a development.

This textbook arms the reader with powerful techniques of Modern TRIZ self-training and real problem solving. It is designed as a simple and efficient, step-by-step crash course in primary TRIZ models based on the author's methods of extraction and reinvention, or retrieval of invention models from any real-life objects. Special content addresses the psychological support of the person during problem solving and promotion of the new idea to realization. The book introduces the so-called Theory of Developing the Creative Personality (TDCP), initiated but not completed by Genrikh Altshuller, father of TRIZ and TDCP. The textbook continues to develop a simple standard model presentation of the problem solving process with a four-step Meta-Algorithm of Invention (MAI) T-R-I-Z.

The book covers both theory and applications of locational analysis (LocAn). The reader will see the power of LocAn models in various real-world contexts varying from communication design, robotics, mail delivery, etc. As such it is a valuable source for practitioners, lecturers and students. The book is divided into two parts: The first part contains chapters in which an overview of some of the LocAn methodologies is given. The second part describes in more detail some selected applications. The book is well-suited as source for a graduate course, but also for students, lecturers and practitioners who want to learn about LocAn through self-study. It gives researchers a state of the art review of available location models.

New Product Development (NPD) is about the ideation, formulation, and implementation of new and superior solutions in the market. Beyond the obvious need for organizations to innovate in order to compete, embedded in any NPD program are knowledge, technological expertise, and the social networks that convert these capabilities into offerings that create value at every level-for customers, industries, communities, and regions. This volume provides an array of knowledge perspective in NPD across multiple levels of analysis and geographic regions, including Europe, the United States, China, Japan, and India, to explore the dynamics of NPD in today's global environment. Presenting case studies from such industries as ICT services, semiconductors, software development, bio-technology, higher education, and even safety for children's toys, and drawing from a variety of theoretical perspectives, including technology and knowledge management, sociology, economic geography, and organizational behavior, the authors highlight critical success and failure factors in NPD. Among the topics covered: New product development teams, including multi-functional and multi-site teams De-localization and off-shoring of tasks and processes Individual competencies and organizational capabilities University-industry interactions, high-tech clusters, and technology transfer Technology policy