Digital orientation and environmental performance in times of technological change

Digital transformation and European small and medium enterprises (SMEs): A comparative study using digital economy and society index data

In recent years, agriculture products have contributed to 28.75% of Thailand’s GDP. China, Vietnam, Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam are the main markets for agricultural products. The annual export volume exceeds 119,222 million THB. The majority of them are shipped over Thailand’s land borders to its neighbors. Small and medium-sized farmers make up more than 85% of those who produce agricultural items. Numerous scholars have studied the transportation methods used by the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) nations along the economic corridor, but the majority of them have concentrated on import–export operations involving sizable firms, which are not applicable to the transportation of agricultural products, particularly when attention is paid to small and medium-sized farmers. In this study, mixed-integer programming (MIP) is presented to design an agricultural product logistics network. In order to prolong the lifespan of the container used, the MIP’s primary goal is to maximize the total chain profit while maintaining the lowest container usage possible. The approach was developed to increase small and medium-sized farmers’ ability to compete. Small and medium-sized farmers bring their products to an agricultural product collecting center, also known as a container loading facility. After that, skilled logistics companies distribute the goods. In order to convey the goods to the final clients in neighboring nations, the proper locations of the containing loading centers, the correct transportation option and the borders must be decided. The issue was identified as multi-echelon location–allocation sizing (MELLS), an NP-hard problem that cannot be handled in an efficient manner. To solve a real-world problem, however, efficient techniques must be supplied. AMIS, an artificial multiple intelligence system, was created to address the suggested issue. AMIS was developed with the goal of leveraging a variety of methods for local search and development. There are several well-known heuristics techniques employed in the literature, including the genetic algorithm (GA) and the differential evolution algorithm (DE). With respect to the improved solutions obtained, the computational results show that AMIS exceeds the present heuristics, outperforming DE and GA by 9.34% and 10.95%, respectively. Additionally, the system’s farmers made a total of 15,236,832 THB in profit, with an average profit per container of 317,434 THB and an average profit per farmer of 92,344.44 THB per crop. The container loading center uses 48 containers, with a 5.33 container average per container loading center (CLC). The farmers’ annual revenues were previously less than 88,402 THB per family per year, so we can predict that the new network may increase customers’ annual income by 4.459% for each crop. 

/pdf/a-novel-artificial-multiple-intelligence-system-amis-for-1izra03q.pdf

A Novel Artificial Multiple Intelligence System (AMIS) for Agricultural Product Transborder Logistics Network Design in the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS)

Innovation is a necessary guarantee for the long-term survival of an enterprise, and Research and Development (R&D) is the source of enterprise innovation. In the situation where the government is comprehensively promoting the strategy of manufacturing power and digital China, it is becoming increasingly important for manufacturing enterprises to stimulate enterprise innovation through digital transformation. At the same time, the innovation achievements of enterprises are inseparable from its R&D activities. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to explore the influence mechanism of digital transformation on process innovation performance and product innovation performance of manufacturing enterprises. In this process, this paper puts exploratory R&D capability and exploitative R&D capability as mediating variables into the above research framework. The results show that digital transformation directly promotes the process innovation performance and product innovation performance of manufacturing enterprises. Moreover, the two types of R&D capabilities play the same mediating role in the process of digital transformation boosting enterprise innovation performance, but their indirect mechanisms are different. The above conclusions remain valid after the robustness test. In addition, the heterogeneity test results show that the promotional effect of digital transformation on the innovation performance of manufacturing enterprises has sectoral differences. Only the digital transformation of the mechanical equipment manufacturing sector has a positive effect on two types of innovation performance. In general, the higher the technology content of an enterprises is, the more obviously the digital transformation affects its innovation performance. The above findings have contributed to revealing the specific role and practical significance of Chinese manufacturing enterprises in improving innovation performance based on digital transformation.

/pdf/can-digital-transformation-promote-innovation-performance-in-26vj3aue.pdf

Can Digital Transformation Promote Innovation Performance in Manufacturing Enterprises? The Mediating Role of R&D Capability

The COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent increased use of digital tools can be seen as an incentive for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to adapt to the digital age. SMEs, whose resilience and adaptability had already been tested during the previous period of the global financial crisis, were called upon to face a new emergency. The aim of this paper is twofold: (i) to investigate the evolution of digital transformation in small and medium enterprises during the pandemic of COVID-19 and (ii) to highlight the main research trends of digital transformation in the post-pandemic era. To approach these issues, a bibliometric analysis based on R package was conducted and examined 765 articles that were published in the timespan of 2014–2022. In the current bibliometric analysis, a range of indicators were applied, such as co-citation analysis of both sources and institutions, the annual scientific production, country collaboration map, world tree map and Multiple Correspondence Analysis. The bibliometric software of Biblioshiny and VOSviewer were used as the main tools to process the data and contributed to the visualization of the results. Findings of the research show that emerging technologies such as blockchain, artificial intelligence, machine learning and 3D printing have started integrating SMEs in their business models. In addition, the technology–organization–environment framework (TOE) has emerged as a niche theme in the research field of digital transformation of SMEs. The above reveals the willingness and the effort of SMEs to adapt to the new circumstances created by the pandemic of COVID-19, by transforming their business models from conventional to digital one. The social media model is also highlighted, as a new product development of SMEs during the crisis of pandemic of COVID-19. The intention to adopt both TOE business model and social media are significantly influenced by emerging technologies and can raise the awareness of government to support SMEs in this effort.

/pdf/investigating-the-strategic-role-of-digital-transformation-porvb5zf.pdf

Investigating the Strategic Role of Digital Transformation Path of SMEs in the Era of COVID-19: A Bibliometric Analysis Using R

Digital platforms and SMEs' business model innovation: Exploring the mediating mechanisms of capability reconfiguration

Can green process innovation improve both financial and environmental performance? The roles of TMT heterogeneity and ownership

As an important factor in society development, human resource management is crucial to enhance the effectiveness of an organization. In this paper, the research focuses on the human resource management practice in knowledge-intensive teams, and studies the relationship between knowledge sharing and team innovation performance in combination with the practice of ability improvement, opportunity improvement and motivation improvement, aiming at verifying the various research hypotheses, practical policy suggestions are proposed to improve the enterprises management. A leadership substitution model is used to introduce empowerment leadership as the boundary condition to the analysis framework, and the regulatory effect of the empowerment leadership on human resource management practice and team knowledge sharing are discussed through the method of empirical analysis. The analysis results showed the substitution effect between cross-level empowerment leadership and human resource management practice and proved an alternative role between human resource management practice and empowerment leadership in a knowledge-intensive team, which provides a preliminary research basis for later research. The results fully demonstrate that for knowledge-intensive teams, more targeted human resource management practice is needed as the theoretical support. Based on leadership substitution theory, this study explored the relationship between human resource practice and innovation, trying to extend the reverse effect of leadership substitution theory. A cross-layer model is discussed as the paper distinguished implementation of human resource management practices and perceived human resource management practice.

https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/9/4801/pdf

Human Resource Practice Management for Knowledge Intensive Team: IMPACT on Team Innovation Performance and Substitution Effect of Empowerment Leadership

In recent years, following the advances in autonomous driving technology, low-speed autonomous service vehicles such as delivery, patrolling, and road-cleaning vehicles have started to emerge. As a promising future cleaning solution, autonomous cleaning vehicles are expected to address the workforce shortage many countries face in the near future. This paper describes the detailed design of an autonomous research platform for cleaning operations in mixed indoor & outdoor environments. An electric manual vacuum sweeper is retrofitted into an autonomous sweeper equipped with the Drive-by-Wire (DBW) system, computer, sensors, and actuators essential for autonomous driving. A complete autonomous driving software stack is also developed upon this hardware setup to enable the vehicle to navigate itself safely in various challenging operating environments. The system has been extensively tested in different environments on the National University of Singapore (NUS) campus, including private roads, car parks, warehouses, and public plaza areas.

Yuhang Han

Papers

Digital platforms and SMEs' business model innovation: Exploring the mediating mechanisms of capability reconfiguration

Can green process innovation improve both financial and environmental performance? The roles of TMT heterogeneity and ownership

Human Resource Practice Management for Knowledge Intensive Team: IMPACT on Team Innovation Performance and Substitution Effect of Empowerment Leadership

Autonomous Research Platform for Cleaning Operations in Mixed Indoor & Outdoor Environments