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The purpose of this paper is to reveal the inner mechanisms of the role of industrial internet platforms in empowering the digital transformation of SMEs. This ROOTCLOUD-based case study shows that knowledge integration and knowledge sharing and driving play essential empowering roles in the impact of industrial internet platforms on the digital transformation of SMEs. The industrial internet platform promotes knowledge integration on the supply side, empowers cross-domain knowledge sharing and shapes the knowledge-driven digital supply chain system in the digital transformation processes of SMEs.

This paper presents a qualitative analysis of the knowledge empowerment role played by industrial internet platforms in the digital transformation process of SMEs. Based on theoretical sampling, this paper selects ROOTCLOUD as a typical case to analyse the implementation mechanism of the industrial internet platform in solving the digital transformation problems and challenges faced by SMEs.

Knowledge management (knowledge integration, sharing and driving) plays an important intermediary role between the empowerment of industrial internet platform and the digital transformation of SMEs. Specifically, the industrial internet platform empowers SMEs with knowledge, empowers supply-side knowledge integration, empowers cross-domain knowledge sharing and facilitates the formation of knowledge-driven supply chain systems.

This study clarifies the mechanism underlying the digital transformation of SMEs empowered by industrial internet platforms, that is, the empowerment of industrial internet platform enhances the level of knowledge integration and sharing of SMEs, thus improving the effectiveness of SMEs in achieving digital transformation. Further empirical studies should be conducted on the above mechanism.

Based on the theoretical perspective of knowledge management, this paper discusses the problems and challenges faced in the digital transformation of SMEs through knowledge empowerment by the industrial internet platform ROOTCLOUD and proposes that knowledge empowerment in the industrial internet platform helps supply-side knowledge integration, promotes cross-domain knowledge sharing and contributes to forming a knowledge-driven supply chain system, thereby promoting the digital transformation of SMEs. System architects and relevant policy departments should pay attention to data-centred system construction, improve the construction of data-based collaborative application ecology and encourage industrial internet platforms to provide more targeted knowledge empowerment solutions for SMEs.

Compared with the robotic manipulation in structured environment, high performance assembly of complex parts in extreme special environment is facing great challenges because of the uncertainty in the environment, and the decline of the control accuracy of the robot and the sensor accuracy. The assembly and construction of the space station is a typical case. An important step in the construction of the space station is the module positioning and docking with the auxiliary of the space manipulator. The operation of the manipulator is faced with many problems, such as low sensing information accuracy, large end position deviation and the requirement of weak impact in the docking process. The purpose of this paper is to design a docking method at the strategy level to effectively solve the problems that may be faced in the docking process.

Inspired by the research of robotic high-precision compliant assembly, this paper introduces the concept of Attractive Region in Environment (ARIE) into the space manipulator–assisted module docking. The contact configuration space of the docking mechanism and the existence of ARIE are systematically analyzed. The docking strategy based on ARIE framework is proposed, in which the impedance control is used to ensure the weak impact during the docking process.

For the androgynous peripheral spacecraft docking mechanism, a large range of attractive region exists in the high-dimensional contact configuration space. The docking strategy based on ARIE framework can be designed according to the geometric characteristics of the constraint region and the structural characteristics of the docking mechanism. The virtual models and the simulation environment are established, and the effectiveness of the proposed method is preliminarily verified.

Based on the research results of robotic precision compliant manipulation, in this paper, the theory of ARIE is first systematically applied to the analysis of spacecraft docking problem and the design of docking scheme. The effectiveness of the proposed docking method is preliminarily verified for the requirements of large position tolerance and weak impact. The research results will provide theoretical support and technical reference for the assembly and construction of space station and other space manipulator operations.

The paper aims to propose a method to build environmental constraint region online in complex-shaped peg-in-hole assembly tasks.

Compared with conventional way which using computer-aided design (CAD) models of assembly parts to construct the environmental constraint region offline, the paper provides an online approach that consists of three aspects: modeling assembly parts through visual recognition, decomposing complex shapes into multiple primitive convex shapes and a numerical algorithm to simulate the peg-in-hole insertion contact. Besides, a contrast experiment is performed to validate the feasibility and effectiveness of the method.

The experiment result indicates that online construction takes less time than the offline way under the same task conditions. Furthermore, due to the CAD models of the parts are not required to be known, the method proposed in the paper has a broader application in most assembly scenarios.

With the improvement of customization and complexity of manufactured parts, the assembly of complex-shaped parts has drawn greater attention of many researchers. The assembly methods based on attractive region in environment (ARIE) have shown great performance to achieve high-precision manipulation with low-precision systems. The construction of environmental constraint region serves as an essential part of ARIE-based theory, directly affect the formulation and application of assembly strategies.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of laser peening (LP) on mechanical and wear properties of 304 stainless steel sheet.

Three-dimensional morphology, micro-hardness and micro-structure of shocked samples were tested. The wear amount, wear track morphology and wear mechanism were also characterized under dry sliding wear using Al₂O₃ ceramics ball.

The LP treatment generates deformation twins that contribute to the grain refinement and hardness increase. The wear test displays that the wear mechanism of samples is mainly abrasive wear and oxidation wear at 10 N load. While at 30 N, the delamination and adhesion areas of treated sample are reduced visibly compared to untreated ones.

This study specifically investigates the mechanical and wear properties of 304 stainless steel after the direct action of LP on its surface, which shows an effective improvement on the wear resistance. For example, the wear loss of processed sample is reduced by 19% at 30 N, the friction coefficient decreases from 0.4714 to 0.4308 and the groove depth is reduced from 78.1 to 74.4 µm under same condition.

The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/ILT-01-2024-0007/

This study aims to investigate the influence of the gas-flow field distribution and design on the parts quality of 316L stainless steel and the vapor–spatter behavior.

Based on the hot-wire wind speed test method, the exact value of the gas velocity at different locations was accurately measured to establish the effect on the porosity and the mechanical properties of the parts. The influence of the placement of single or dual blow screens on the performance of the parts quality was also studied. Through scanning electron microscope and energy dispersive spectrometer, high-speed photography and other methods, the influence mechanism was explained.

It was found that too high or too low gas velocity both play a negative role, for 316L stainless steel, the range of 1.3–2.0 m/s is a suitable gas field velocity during the multilaser powder bed fusion process. And printing quality using dual blow screens is better than single.

The optimization of gas field design and optimal gas velocity (1.3–2.0 m/s) applied during laser melting can improve the quality of ML-PBF of 316L stainless steel.

This study showed the influence of the gas field on the spatter–vapor in the process during ML-PBF, and the unfavorable gas field led to the formation of pores and unmelted powders.

Asset specificity is a focal feature of buyer–supplier exchanges; however, whether unilateral asset specificity encourages opportunistic value expropriation or promotes trust-based value creation remains controversial. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how institutional forces shape the controversial roles of buyer asset specificity in supply chain relationships.

With a survey of 217 matched manufacturer–supplier dyads in China, the study adopts ordinary least squares regression analyses to test hypotheses.

The results show that two key institutional forces, guanxi importance and government intervention, play different roles in shaping the value expropriation and value creation roles of buyer asset specificity. As an informal institutional force, guanxi importance weakens the impact of buyer asset specificity on opportunistic value expropriation and facilitates trust-based value creation. Moreover, as a formal institutional force, government intervention amplifies the effect of buyer asset specificity on opportunism but strengthens its connection with trust.

By incorporating an institutional view to investigate how institutional forces affect this “valuable but vulnerable” dilemma of asset specificity, this study reconciles the controversy concerning value expropriation vs value creation and enriches understanding of the critical roles of institutional parameters in supply chain management.

Supernumerary robotic limbs (SRLs) are a new type of wearable robot, which improve the user’s operating and perceive the user’s environment by extra robotic limbs. There are some literature reviews about the SRLs’ key technology and development trend, but the design of SRLs has not been fully discussed and summarized. This paper aims to focus on the design of SRLs and provides a comprehensive review of the ontological structure design of SRLs.

In this paper, the related literature of SRLs is summarized and analyzed by VOSviewer. The structural features of different types of SRLs are extracted, and then discuss the design approach and characteristics of SRLs which are different from typical wearable robots.

The design concept of SRLs is different from the conventional wearable robots. SRLs have various reconfiguration and installed positions, and it will influence the safety and cooperativeness performance of SRLs.

This paper focuses on discussing the structural design of SRLs by literature review, and this review will help researchers understand the structural features of SRLs and key points of the ontological design of SRLs, which can be used as a reference for designing SRLs.

The purposes of this paper are to analyze whether digital finance can contribute to enterprises' innovation performance and to determine the mediating effect of government subsidies.

This paper empirically examines the impacts of digital finance on enterprises' innovation performance by looking at Chinese companies listed on the SME and GEM boards from 2011 to 2018 to build an econometric model to test our hypotheses. The mediating effect of government subsidies, the moderating effect of financial constraints are examined, as well as shareholding of the largest shareholders in each selected company and the asset-liability ratio.

The results show that digital finance has a significant promotional effect on firms' innovation performance and that government subsidies play a partial mediating role in digital finance's contribution to firms' innovation performance. In addition, financial constraints and the shareholding of the largest shareholders in each selected company have a negative moderating effect on the relationship between government subsidies and firms' innovation performance. On the contrary, the asset-liability ratio is found to positively affect the relationship.

There has been limited research to date on the relationship between digital finance and firms' innovation performance, particularly with regard to the extent to which digital finance can influence innovation performance and the mechanisms for doing so. Therefore, it is of great significance to examine the relationship between digital finance and enterprises' innovation performance, which can also provide guidance for both the Chinese government and enterprises.

This research aims at examining how authentic leadership impacts social workers' withdrawal behaviors through two intermediate mechanisms: sense of calling and job satisfaction.

A cross-sectional survey was distributed among social workers from 26 social work organizations in the cities of Guangzhou, Shanghai, and Shenzhen in China (N = 667). SPSS was used to conduct preliminary analyses and structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to test the hypotheses developed.

This study found that authentic leadership has a negative direct effect on social workers' turnover intention. In addition, social workers' sense of calling and job satisfaction mediate the relationship between their perceptions of authentic leader behaviors and turnover intention.

Based on this study's findings, the authors suggest social work organizations to invest in authentic leadership development to promote employees' psychological capacities and prevent employee turnover. Social work organizations need to foster employees' sense of calling to the field which improves the workplace outcomes.

This study is among those few empirical studies which help to validate the role of authentic leadership within social service organizations in China and shed light on understanding the underlying mechanisms through which authentic leaders affect organizational outcomes.

In the pursuit of co-exploration, the strength and brokerage dimensions of dyadic ties create a novelty–action trade-off: tie strength facilitates coordination but constraints novelty, while tie brokerage expands knowledge diversity but aggravates coordination difficulty. This study contributes towards a better understanding of this tension by comparing two dimensions of relational ties and examining their contingent values given different environmental factors and exchange characteristics.

The authors used survey data from 194 matched buyer–supplier dyads in China's high-tech industries and employed hierarchical moderated regression analysis to test the proposed hypotheses.

The authors find that compared with tie strength, tie brokerage has a stronger positive effect on co-exploration. Moreover, guanxi importance amplifies the effect of tie strength while decreasing the value of tie brokerage. As market uncertainty increases, the role of tie brokerage becomes more salient. Additionally, tie strength becomes less effective when buyer centralization is high, whereas tie brokerage exerts a stronger impact on co-exploration when an exchange is highly formalized.

This study contributes to the supply chain literature by adopting a relational perspective to integrate relational ties into the study of buyer–supplier co-exploration and by elaborating on the different implications of tie strength and tie brokerage in resolving the novelty–action trade-off. Furthermore, it provides a more nuanced understanding of when distinct dimensions of relational ties are effective, by clarifying boundary conditions in terms of environmental factors and exchange characteristics.