This book focuses on the evolving digitisation of the financial ecosystem and the associated impacts of digital technologies on the financial industry at large. Particular attention is given to the emergence of new technologies such as blockchain, smart contracts and AI, as well as the regulatory regime surrounding money, payments and data. The book explores the future of the financial sector as a Digital Financial Ecosystem, a term that encompasses an interconnected data-driven digital and partially decentralised financial sector and that includes many aspects of an individual's or organisation's life, ranging from marketplaces and utilities to payments and identity. We begin by providing an overview of key concepts to then develop a high-level framework and approach to what we call Redecentralisation. As next step, we delve into key technology areas that practitioners need to be aware of and that are changing the landscape of the financial system. Following on from that backdrop we explore the areas of money and payments that are at a turning point with the replacement of key infrastructural components necessary for the future of the Digital Financial Ecosystem. We then discuss the topics of digital identity and data privacy that are being revamped in an increasingly digitising world. Bringing it all together, we look to the future to consider some of the latest trends and 'what if' scenarios for what the future may hold for a new Digital Financial Ecosystem through a more practical approach towards applying the analysis of the previous chapters. It showcases examples of decentralisation that we are observing in the emerging future Digital Financial Ecosystem and forms recommendations on where the journey ideally should be going for practitioners, regulators, students, and researchers, including the open question of a digital social contract to support our digital lives.

Keep ahead of your competitors New Product Development will help you and your company overcome an expensive and common weakness: the lack of adequate new product development. This vital book examines the requirements of new product development in detail as well as in the context of corporate strategy. Packed with practical information that can immediately be put into effect, New Product Development can help you keep your company on the leading edge, no matter what type of industry you?re in This uniquely insightful volume will help you become a successful innovator by showing you how to plan and execute strategies for developing a continuous flow of new products and services to help you stay ahead of the competition. It demonstrates how innovation, far from being a staff function, is a dynamic line management task. It calls for the same aggressive thrust as marketing and sales, and every officer of the company, from the president on down, has a share in this responsibility.Medium size, small, and even large companies constantly face a mass of problems in achieving successful innovation. New Product Development will help you deal with issues including: inaccurate budgeting costs exceeding budgets faulty market and technical research findings flaws in design inadequately durable materials unforeseen consumer rejection caused by the lack of proper consumer trials leakage of plans to competition failure by outside suppliers missed opportunities for cooperation with outside specialists poorly coordinated development staff ineffective leadership and much more Beginning with an "executive summary" that will guide you quickly to the chapters most relevant to your business, this well-organized book should be on the shelf of every company officer who wants to see his firm prosper, innovate, and create new products that sell-now and for years to come

In this book, leading international scholars provide a timely reconsideration of how and why entrepreneurship matters for economic development, particularly in emerging and developing economies. The book critically dissects the evolving relationship between entrepreneurs and the state.

Over 12 years ago Logica started the development of TestFrame(r), a test method which enables organizations to develop and execute their tests in a structured way. Since then many new techniques have been developed, such as, most recently, "Service Oriented Architectures (SOAs)" or "Software as a Service (SaaS)," requiring updates to test procedures and processes that seemed well-established. These trends have prompted Logica to update and renew the TestFrame(r) method. Chris Schotanus new book takes into account the recent developments and his presentation is focused on supporting daily test practice. Every step within this structured test method is dealt with exhaustively, providing the reader with the necessary details for successful software testing. Yet his book will not only help test personnel to improve effectivity, it will also serve as a way to improve efficiency through its strong focus on reuse. This makes TestFrame the practical guide to testing information systems for everyone involved in software testing test developers, test managers, and staff charged with quality assurance."

This book introduces a paradigm of reverse hypothesis machines (RHM), focusing on knowledge innovation and machine learning. Knowledge- acquisition -based learning is constrained by large volumes of data and is time consuming. Hence Knowledge innovation based learning is the need of time. Since under-learning results in cognitive inabilities and over-learning compromises freedom, there is need for optimal machine learning. All existing learning techniques rely on mapping input and output and establishing mathematical relationships between them. Though methods change the paradigm remains the same-the forward hypothesis machine paradigm, which tries to minimize uncertainty. The RHM, on the other hand, makes use of uncertainty for creative learning. The approach uses limited data to help identify new and surprising solutions. It focuses on improving learnability, unlike traditional approaches, which focus on accuracy. The book is useful as a reference book for machine learning researchers and professionals as well as machine intelligence enthusiasts. It can also used by practitioners to develop new machine learning applications to solve problems that require creativity.

This volume explores emerging models, methods and tools in the management of research and development (R&D) in the knowledge era, with a particular focus on the challenges of the emerging technologies. The contributions are organized in five parts. Part I, Managing Emerging Technologies, provides methods and tools to understand the challenges created by the emergence of new technologies. Part II, Technology and Engineering Management Tools and Policies, explores different technology and engineering tools, including topics such as product concept development, design, selection and adoption, using technology roadmaps and bibliometrics. Part III, Technological Innovation and Entrepreneurship, explores R&D, knowledge transfer and entrepreneurial education. Part IV, Commercialization of Technological Innovations, explores the development and application of the technology transfer process which allows managers to succeed in commercializing the outcomes of R&D projects. Part V, Managing the Engineering Enterprise, explores the effect economic decision-making, leadership styles, change management and quality management have on an organization's ability to plan and execute initiatives and projects. Research and Development has always played a critical role in the engineering and technology focused industries. In an era of big data and smart applications, knowledge has become a key enabler for R&D. Managing R&D in the knowledge era requires use of key tools and methods. However, emerging technologies pose many challenges and cause uncertainties or discontinuities, which make the task of managing R&D even more difficult. This book will examine these challenges and provide tools and methods to overcome them. Exploring such industries as automotive, healthcare, business intelligence, energy and home appliances, this book is a valuable resource for academics, scholars, professionals and leaders in innovation, R&D, technology, and engineering management.

This volume focuses on the issue of change in democratic politics in terms of experimental or actual innovations introduced either within political parties or outside the party system, involving citizen participation and mobilization. Including a wide and diverse range of alternatives in the organization of groups, campaigning, conducting initiatives and enhancing practices, they not only question the relevance of traditional institutions in representing citizens' values and interests, but also share a common goal which is precisely - and perhaps paradoxically - to reshape and invigorate representative democracy This book is of key interest to scholars and students of party politics, elections/electoral studies, social movement and democratic innovations and more broadly to comparative politics, political theory and political sociology.

Since the turn of the century, technology transfer and innovation has played an increasingly important role in government policy for reinvigorating and supporting a country's industry. This has been fueled by technology transfer from third parties such as universities, but due to the rapid evolution of the external environment of technology, companies require regular upgrades to information systems and technical infrastructure and adjustments. University-Industry Technology Transfer in the UK: Emerging Research and Opportunities provides innovative insights into how technology transfer has operated in university-company projects undertaken in small- to medium-sized enterprises. Highlighting 19 different cases drawn from companies in the regions adjoining the University of Gloucestershire, UK, from a qualitative case study approach, the content within this publication analyzes contract packers, the manufacturing industry, and research organizations. It is a vital reference source for managers, business owners, education administrators, researchers, academicians, professionals, policymakers, and graduate-level students seeking coverage on topics centered on case examples of technology transfer projects in different industry sectors.

This book discusses skill formation, upskilling of workers, and their interaction with technological change in Gulf countries. Heavy dependence on oil, the 'Dutch Disease', and the high incidence of unskilled foreign workers have caused serious structural imbalances in the labour market in the Gulf. The author shows that success of economic development strategies to address such imbalances are all contingent upon the development of adequate and appropriate skills in the region. This book confirms the role and impact of the deficiencies in the educational system alongside the well established effects of the excessive use of uneducated foreign workers and lack of incentives in the labour market. A comprehensive investigation of the skill problem and an elaborate in-depth analysis to assess the causes, consequences and relationships between poor skills and technological performance are highlights of this book. This is an ideal resource for policy makers in the Gulf region and researchers of the topic.

Innovative actIvItIes on the development of which Russia puts its hopes for the preservation and successful reconstruction of the former USSR applied science are based on three key factors: funding, infrastructure and management. These factors are of equal significance, however, under today's economic conditions in Russian two latter ones become of critical importance. This determines the range of readers to whom the present book is addressed: - representatives of official institutions both Russian and international in charge of technological and scientific sphere reorganization, high-tech industry conversion, market transformations under transit economies; ~ Western experts, lecturers, consultants participating in the implementation of various bilateral and international programs according to the above mentioned directions; - Russian specialists establishing new high-tech enterprises and organizations and corresponding innovative infrastructure. This book brought to readers' attention includes edited presentations at NATO Advanced Research Workshop (ARW) "Concept of Management Training for in High-Tech, Science and R&D" (1-5 July, 1996, St.Petersburg, Russia).

This book introduces a new notion of replacement in maintenance and reliability theory. Replacement Overtime, where replacement is done at the first completion of a working cycle over a planned time, is a new research topic in maintenance theory and also serves to provide a fresh optimization technique in reliability engineering. In comparing replacement overtime with standard and random replacement techniques theoretically and numerically, 'Maintenance Overtime Policies in Reliability Theory' highlights the key improvements to be gained by adopting this new approach and shows how they can be applied to inspection policies, parallel systems and cumulative damage models. Utilizing the latest research in replacement overtime by internationally recognized experts, the reader will be introduced to new topics and methods, and learn how to apply this knowledge practically to actual reliability models. This book will serve as an essential guide to a new subject of study for graduate students and researchers and also provides a useful guide for reliability engineers and managers who have difficulties in maintenance of computer and production systems with random working cycles.

The systematic approach to innovation development today is one of the world's most prominent scientific fields, and with good reason. When applied correctly, such system produces regular outcomes, which consistently drive lasting competitive advantage. Unfortunately, as much as it is beneficial, the orchestration of an undisturbed flow of multiple complex, dynamic, and flexible innovation development processes is structurally demanding. In this book, a recognised innovation management specialist sets the record straight, offering a comprehensive approach to the improvement of innovation efficiency with the use of management control system. Unlike other books on the subject, it proposes original representation - the CDI model - of the relationships between management control system, decision-making quality, and innovation system efficiency and explains why management control is fundamental to innovation management. In addition to that, inside the reader will find several original developments. These include: the info-deficiency (I-D) model, depicting the various parameters hindering decision-making in innovation development; the product innovation development (PID) system, offering the original function-based approach to innovation management; and the composite innovation index - specially designed tool intended to evaluate the efficiency of an innovation development system. It will be of interest to researchers, academics, practitioners, and advanced students in the fields of management, strategy, and innovation. Chapter 4 of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license available at http://www.taylorfrancis.com

Managing Live Innovation examines the innovation process from the line manager's perspective. This book identifies the skills needed to manage live 'real time' innovation in an environment where products and services are constantly refined, and where customer input is encouraged from an early stage.

The New Skills Portfolio is a groundbreaking new series, published in association with the Industrial Society, which re-defines the core management skills managers and team leaders need to be competitive. Each title is action-focused blending 20th century management initiatives/trends with a new flexible skills portfolio for managers constantly experiencing and managing organizational and marketplace change.
The Industrial Society is one of the largest public training providers in the UK. It has over 10,000 member organisations and promotes best practice through its publishing, consultancy, training and advisory serives. For more information contact their website on www.indsoc.co.uk.
Jean Lammiman has successfully combined a career as a senior front-line manager specialising in the effective development of staff at all levels with groundbreaking work as an academic and consultant. Both authors run their own consultancy, The LSK Group, which designs and implements workshops, seminars and forums for senior management teams.
Michel Syrett is an established business author, lecturer and consultant. For many years Editor of the Public Management and Management Education Pages at The Times, he contributes regularly to newspapers and journals covering business issues in Europe and Asia, including the Financial Times, Daily Telegraph, European, Management Today, Eurobusiness, Business Asia, Asian Business and South China Morning Post. He is also a Visiting Fellow at Roffey Park Management Institute and the Poon Kam Kai Institute of Management at the University of Hong Kong.
High profile authors with a presence in Asia and the UK
Helps line managers identify and develop new skills appropriate to fast moving
innovation
Published in association with the Industrial Society

The proliferation of new products has become a common phenomenon in today's business world. Most companies now offer hundreds, if not thousands, of stock keeping units (SKUs) in order to compete in the market place. Companies that expand their product and service varieties now face a new set of problems: accurate demand forecasts, controlling production and inventory costs, and providing high quality delivery performance. In addition, marketing managers will often advocate widening product lines for increasing revenue and market share, but increasing product lines can also decrease the efficiency of manufacturing processes and distribution systems. Hence, firms must weigh the benefits of increasing product variety against its cost and determine the optimal level of product variety to offer to their customers. Product Variety Management examines the interrelated problems between the marketing and production functions in industry, and through a series of research survey papers by leading scholars in economics, engineering, marketing, and operations research, the book addresses the following questions: Why do companies extend their product lines? Do consumers care about product variety? Will a brand with more variety enjoy higher market share? How should product variety be measured? How can a company exploit its product and process design to deliver a higher level of product variety quickly and cheaply? What should the level of product variety be and what should the price of each of the product variants be? What kind of challenges would a company face in offering a high level of product variety and how can these obstacles be overcome? The solutions to these questions are drawn frommultiple functions and a variety of disciplines. Product Variety Management is a state-of-the-art treatment of a multi-disciplinary approach to product variety.

This book analyzes the drug-discovery process in Japan, based on detailed case studies of 12 groups of 15 innovative drugs. It covers the first statin in the world up to the recent major breakthrough in cancer therapy, the recent immune checkpoint inhibitor, the scientific discovery for which a 2018 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded to Prof. Tasuku Honjo, Kyoto University. The book shows the pervasive high uncertainty in drug discovery: frequent occurrences of unexpected difficulties, discontinuations, serendipities, and good luck, significantly because drug discovery starts when the underlying science is incomplete. Thus, there exist dynamic interactions between scientific progress and drug discovery. High uncertainty also makes the value of an entrepreneurial scientist high. Such scientists fill the knowledge gaps by absorbing external scientific progress and by relentless pursuit of possibilities through their own research, often including unauthorized research, to overcome crises. Further, high uncertainty and its resolution significantly characterize the evolution of competition in the drug industry. The patent system promotes innovation under high uncertainty not only by enhancing appropriability of R&D investment but also by facilitating the combination of knowledge and capabilities among different firms through disclosure. Understanding such a process significantly benefits the creation of innovation management and policy practices.

Innovation and IT are intertwined. In order to understand how, this book takes an interdisciplinary view of innovation in an international and digital world. It addresses strategic and operational aspects of R and D and new product development, emphasizing knowledge management, configurational design, distance and diversity.

This book analyzes how companies and employees can endogenously, i.e., without hiring external experts or consultants, achieve competitive advantages by deviating from behavioral standards in a productive way. The study explores eight transformative behavioral innovations that shaped the development of sports and, by analogy, uses the findings to advance solutions for prevalent problems in business. By developing triggers to creativity and applying mechanisms on how to overcome innovation resistance, the book gives concrete advice on how to manage the difficult quest of human transformation beyond the imperative of technological innovation.

In todays industries, New Product Development (NPD) is often the focal point of competition. Companies that are able effectively to develop, produce and introduce new products are the key competitors in markets where variety and time-to-market play an increasingly important role. This examination into the organisation of Integrated Product Development aims to answer the question: Which integration mechanisms lead to effective co-ordination and overlap of New Product Development activities in which situations? The mechanisms, strat egies and goals, knowledge and skills, and organisational arrangements are presented, and their impact on the results of NPD projects and relationships is discussed. An in-depth understanding of the background and theory is provided, using detailed case s tudies to illustrate both the human and organisational issues in practice.

Time-based competition is here to stay. Firms wishing to compete successfully must reengineer every function within the value chain. Here is a blueprint, drawn on the author's extensive field research in over 50 companies, that addresses the practical problems and tactical issues faced by executives and managers. Scholars and students of business, operations management, strategic management, international business, organizational behavior, materials management, engineering management, purchasing, and logistics will also find this work an invaluable aid in understanding how to benchmark an organization against the best time-based competitors in the world.

Through visits and interviews with material managers, procurement managers, design engineers and sales personnel, the author has compiled an unparalleled set of benchmarks and best practices in supply chain management. Some of the strategic time-based initiatives discussed include supply chain management, integrated order entry systems, process capability, component life cycle management, electronic data interchange, time-based logistics, automated manufacturing technology, design for manufacturability, and global strategic sourcing. Extra attention is given to supply chain management, a new form of business process reengineering focusing on quick response, spanning the functions of sales, order entry, design engineering, purchasing, manufacturing, and logistics. An examination of how to create a time-based culture based on the experiences of Fortune 500 firms interviewed by the author concludes this richly detailed analysis of time-based competition.

This book provides--for the first time in a single source--a complete--and systematic treatment of the varying perspectives and dimensions of product management. Onkvisit and Shaw focus on product management and decision making within a product life cycle context, integrating theory, applications, and managerial implications to provide product managers, corporate planners, and entrepreneurs with a balanced, meaningful framework for strategic decisions. Throughout, examples of actual products and company strategies are used to illustrate the authors' points.

Following an introductory chapter on the nature and types of products--such as product vs. commodity--and what constitutes a product from the consumer's and management's viewpoint, the authors demonstrate how to formulate appropriate marketing strategies for a variety of market situations. Unusually comprehensive in scope, the book devotes separate chapters to demographic trends and their marketing implications, the evolution of pricing and marketing strategies as the product moves through its life cycle stages, the diffusion of innovations and the adoption process for new products, and the international product life cycle and strategies for meeting foreign competition. An important resource for product managers and marketing professionals, this book is also an ideal text for business school courses in product and marketing management.

Enterprise Level Security 2: Advanced Topics in an Uncertain World follows on from the authors' first book on Enterprise Level Security (ELS), which covered the basic concepts of ELS and the discoveries made during the first eight years of its development. This book follows on from this to give a discussion of advanced topics and solutions, derived from 16 years of research, pilots, and operational trials in putting an enterprise system together. The chapters cover specific advanced topics derived from painful mistakes and numerous revisions of processes. This book covers many of the topics omitted from the first book including multi-factor authentication, cloud key management, enterprise change management, entity veracity, homomorphic computing, device management, mobile ad hoc, big data, mediation, and several other topics. The ELS model of enterprise security is endorsed by the Secretary of the Air Force for Air Force computing systems and is a candidate for DoD systems under the Joint Information Environment Program. The book is intended for enterprise IT architecture developers, application developers, and IT security professionals. This is a unique approach to end-to-end security and fills a niche in the market.

With rapidly evolving emerging technologies, the business world is entering a phase of reform. Within times of change, transformative and disruptive environments as well as uncertain futures have created a difficult landscape for leaders within business. Exploring the landscape and providing valuable insight into the leadership among these challenging times, mean that business leaders can rely on Leading within Digital Worlds to provide them with a robust analysis of leadership practices and process to take them forward in the digital age. Pete Grindrod presents Leading within Digital Worlds in a way that will ensure this is an important text for business leaders in remaining at the forefront of the business world in these times of technological and digital evolution.The results of an in-depth study are presented in this title drawing on much of Pete's expertise in leading in the digital world.

The book begins with an introductory chapter that sets the parameters of the technology assessment process. Subsequent chapters explore the relationship between technology and science and examine the changes wrought by technological advances. The central chapter gives general principles to assist the reader in identigying key technologies and their applicability to corporate value chain activities. White demonstrates how product development, manufacturing, and sales activities can be evaluated for possible improvement. He also shows how the goals of reducing cost, blocking competition, restructuring one's industry, and improving the idea flow among staff members can be achieved through technological innovations. At the same time, the human element is not ignored. White notes that organizational effectiveness versus efficiency, acceptance of change, political threats created by technology, holistic approaches to problem solving, and learning to learn are key organizational development issues that must accompany technological innovations. Finally, he looks at key technologies in the company of the future, including powerful microprocessors, communications networks, and artificial intelligence systems. The detailed appendix provides an introduction to computers, terminology and systems applications for readers without a technical background.

This book uses machine-learning to identify the causes of conflict from among the top predictors of conflict. This methodology elevates some complex causal pathways that cause civil conflict over others, thus teasing out the complex interrelationships between the most important variables that cause civil conflict. Success in this realm will lead to scientific theories of conflict that will be useful in preventing and ending civil conflict. After setting out a current review of the literature and a case for using machine learning to analyze and predict civil conflict, the authors lay out the data set, important variables, and investigative strategy of their methodology. The authors then investigate institutional causes, economic causes, and sociological causes for civil conflict, and how that feeds into their model. The methodology provides an identifiable pathway for specifying causal models. This book will be of interest to scholars in the areas of economics, political science, sociology, and artificial intelligence who want to learn more about leveraging machine learning technologies to solve problems and who are invested in preventing civil conflict.