G. Raghuram and Pooja Sanghani
Rivigo, a new entrant in the trucking business in India, believed that a new paradigm in the trucking/logistics industry could be brought about that would not only improve the…
Abstract
Rivigo, a new entrant in the trucking business in India, believed that a new paradigm in the trucking/logistics industry could be brought about that would not only improve the quality of service dramatically, but also upgrade a truck driver's lifestyle. While the industry faced driver shortage largely due to long stays away from home, Rivigo hoped to attract drivers by offering them roles which would bring them back home in 24 hours. Drivers would be part of a relay, handing over the truck at pit stops. Further, they leveraged an IT-enabled IoT platform on a fleet of owned trucks. All this revolutionized most of the traditions then followed in the industry. The entrepreneur and his core team comprised professionals from premium institutes of the country, with experience in professional organizations in related domains. By offering services like assured delivery at half the time and full shipment visibility, Rivigo had to charge a premium to market segments that would value this. The case raises the question of sustainability in the future.
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Deepak Garg, Ankush Singhal and Kishen Neelam
This paper aims to investigate trainee doctors' experience of clinical audits and to explore solutions for identified problems.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to investigate trainee doctors' experience of clinical audits and to explore solutions for identified problems.
Design/methodology/approach
Psychiatry trainees from all the deaneries in the UK were invited to participate in a semi‐qualitative online survey. It focused on estimating the quantity and quality of the clinical audits done by the trainees, exploring their experience and possible solutions for identified problems. Descriptive statistics and framework analysis were used to analyse the data.
Findings
A total of 2,267 audits were carried out by 504 respondents. Of the respondents, 42 per cent completed at least one audit‐cycle. Nearly half of the audits were presented locally and 37 per cent were submitted to the local audit departments. Recommendations from two‐thirds of all the audits went unnoticed because of inadequate dissemination and implementation. Suggestions for improvement included: formal training, participation by non‐medical colleagues, emphasis on quality of audits rather than quantity, and better co‐ordination by audit departments.
Practical implications
Trainees identify that local audits do not result in service improvement. Suggested changes may lead to improved effectiveness of the local clinical audit programmes.
Originality/value
Audit activities by the trainee doctors lay the foundation of their involvement in clinical governance later on. To the best of the authors' knowledge, this study is the first of its kind to capture the clinical audit activities by the trainee doctors at the national level in the UK.
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Syntax-based text classification (TC) mechanisms have been overtly replaced by semantic-based systems in recent years. Semantic-based TC systems are particularly useful in those…
Abstract
Purpose
Syntax-based text classification (TC) mechanisms have been overtly replaced by semantic-based systems in recent years. Semantic-based TC systems are particularly useful in those scenarios where similarity among documents is computed considering semantic relationships among their terms. Kernel functions have received major attention because of the unprecedented popularity of SVMs in the field of TC. Most of the kernel functions exploit syntactic structures of the text, but quite a few also use a priori semantic information for knowledge extraction. The purpose of this paper is to investigate semantic kernel functions in the context of TC.
Design/methodology/approach
This work presents performance and accuracy analysis of seven semantic kernel functions (Semantic Smoothing Kernel, Latent Semantic Kernel, Semantic WordNet-based Kernel, Semantic Smoothing Kernel having Implicit Superconcept Expansions, Compactness-based Disambiguation Kernel Function, Omiotis-based S-VSM semantic kernel function and Top-k S-VSM semantic kernel) being implemented with SVM as kernel method. All seven semantic kernels are implemented in SVM-Light tool.
Findings
Performance and accuracy parameters of seven semantic kernel functions have been evaluated and compared. The experimental results show that Top-k S-VSM semantic kernel has the highest performance and accuracy among all the evaluated kernel functions which make it a preferred building block for kernel methods for TC and retrieval.
Research limitations/implications
A combination of semantic kernel function with syntactic kernel function needs to be investigated as there is a scope of further improvement in terms of accuracy and performance in all the seven semantic kernel functions.
Practical implications
This research provides an insight into TC using a priori semantic knowledge. Three commonly used data sets are being exploited. It will be quite interesting to explore these kernel functions on live web data which may test their actual utility in real business scenarios.
Originality/value
Comparison of performance and accuracy parameters is the novel point of this research paper. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this type of comparison has not been done previously.
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Sabyasachi Dasgupta and Priyadarshani Jain
Board meeting was in full swing as an important announcement had been made by Manish Jain, MD FinMen Advisors Pvt. Ltd. ‘We need to get 5,000 clients by 2023’. Management board…
Abstract
Board meeting was in full swing as an important announcement had been made by Manish Jain, MD FinMen Advisors Pvt. Ltd. ‘We need to get 5,000 clients by 2023’. Management board members look at each other in wonder as they have only 500 clients in 2018. ‘That's a herculean task’, says a board member, ‘Besides, the clients’ fees are reducing in our business'. Manish interrupts to suggest that it is precisely the reason they want to enhance their client base. But the board members were still not convinced. Their questions revolved around whether they are equipped enough in terms of resources and infrastructure to reach to the number suggested by Manish. There were issues in the processes and systems of the company, there were issues in employees taking onus of leading certain verticals in the company, there were no branding exercise in terms of increasing awareness about the company. On the whole, in order to reach 5,000 clients, a total revamp of processes, systems and training employees needed to be given huge emphasis. But does the company have money for revamping all these issues? ‘I don't care’, says Manish, ‘Any client in any industry looking for credit ratings should be our client’. As Manish moves out of the board room, he says to himself that he was well aware of the facts questioned by the board members. But as a person ready to take up challenge and enjoy the perils of it, Manish was not ready to reconsider any of the points raised by the members. He thought whatever has to be done, has to be done to achieve targets set by him. However, sitting in his office and thinking about the future, Manish was still on the same dilemmic question as any employee in his company: how does he achieve the figure of 5,000 clients by 2023?
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Sathyajit Gubbi, Supraja Grandhi and Asma Soni
Upon completion of the case study, students should be able to understand how changes in a macro environment affect the competitive landscape in an emerging market; acquire a…
Abstract
Learning outcomes
Upon completion of the case study, students should be able to understand how changes in a macro environment affect the competitive landscape in an emerging market; acquire a granular understanding about the logistics industry in an emerging market and the various business models developed to service customer needs; determine the attractiveness and challenges of doing business in a fragmented but sunrise industry in an emerging market; and identify the drivers for growth and profitability in the logistics business.
Case overview/synopsis
Manisha Sharaf (she/her) and her co-founders conceived the idea of Truck Hall in 2011 to ride with the tide created by booming public investments in the infrastructure and transportation sector. Truck Hall aimed to improve the efficiency of the logistics industry in India by extensively using technology. However, the market research showed that technology-driven services in logistics faced many challenges owing to low internet penetration in the country, weak network connectivity during transportation and the low literacy rates of the truck drivers who were central to this industry. Between 2015 and 2018, Truck Hall experimented with several business models including load board, brokerage and integrated transporter with the sole purpose of achieving profitable growth in a highly fragmented industry with razor-thin margins. This case documented the dilemma faced by a startup in a high-growth but largely unorganized and unregulated industry in a developing economy. Should Truck Hall continue with the current business model of being a niche player or should it vertically integrate and control major segments of the value chain? Should it compromise on growth to become profitable or first scale up?
Complexity academic level
This case study can be used at the undergraduate, graduate and executive levels.
Supplementary materials
Teaching notes are available for educators only.
Subject code
CSS 11: Strategy.
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Swapnil Vyavahare, Soham Teraiya, Deepak Panghal and Shailendra Kumar
Fused deposition modelling (FDM) is the most economical additive manufacturing technique. The purpose of this paper is to describe a detailed review of this technique. Total 211…
Abstract
Purpose
Fused deposition modelling (FDM) is the most economical additive manufacturing technique. The purpose of this paper is to describe a detailed review of this technique. Total 211 research papers published during the past 26 years, that is, from the year 1994 to 2019 are critically reviewed. Based on the literature review, research gaps are identified and the scope for future work is discussed.
Design/methodology/approach
Literature review in the domain of FDM is categorized into five sections – (i) process parameter optimization, (ii) environmental factors affecting the quality of printed parts, (iii) post-production finishing techniques to improve quality of parts, (iv) numerical simulation of process and (iv) recent advances in FDM. Summary of major research work in FDM is presented in tabular form.
Findings
Based on literature review, research gaps are identified and scope of future work in FDM along with roadmap is discussed.
Research limitations/implications
In the present paper, literature related to chemical, electric and magnetic properties of FDM parts made up of various filament feedstock materials is not reviewed.
Originality/value
This is a comprehensive literature review in the domain of FDM focused on identifying the direction for future work to enhance the acceptability of FDM printed parts in industries.
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Monika Saini, Deepak Sinwar, Alapati Manas Swarith and Ashish Kumar
Reliability and maintainability estimation of any system depends on the identification of the best-fitted probability distribution of failure and repair rates. The parameters of…
Abstract
Purpose
Reliability and maintainability estimation of any system depends on the identification of the best-fitted probability distribution of failure and repair rates. The parameters of the best-fitted probability distribution are also contributing significantly to reliability estimation. In this work, a case study of load haul dump (LHD) machines is illustrated that consider the optimization of failure and repair rate parameters using two well established metaheuristic approaches, namely, genetic algorithm (GA) and particle swarm optimization (PSO). This paper aims to analyze the aforementioned points.
Design/methodology/approach
The data on time between failures (TBF) and time to repairs (TTR) are collected for a LHD machine. The descriptive statistical analysis of TBF & TTR data is performed, trend and serial correlation tested and using Anderson–Darling (AD) value best-fitted distributions are identified for repair and failure times of various subsystems. The traditional methods of estimation like maximum likelihood estimation, method of moments, least-square estimation method help only in finding the local solution. Here, for finding the global solution two well-known metaheuristic approaches are applied.
Findings
The reliability of the LHD machine after 60 days on the real data set is 28.55%, using GA on 250 generations is 17.64%, and using PSO on 100 generations and 100 iterations is 30.25%. The PSO technique gives the global best value of reliability.
Practical implications
The present work will be very convenient for reliability engineers, researchers and maintenance managers to understand the failure and repair pattern of LHD machines. The same methodology can be applied in other process industries also.
Originality/value
In this case study, initially likelihood function of the best-fitted distribution is optimized by GA and PSO. Reliability and maintainability of LHD machines evaluated by the traditional approach, GA and PSO are compared. These results will be very helpful for maintenance engineers to plan new maintenance strategies for better functioning of LHD machines.
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Manish Garg, B S Salaria and V K Gupta
– The purpose of this paper is to investigate steady state creep behavior of a functionally graded rotating disc under varying thermal gradient (TG).
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate steady state creep behavior of a functionally graded rotating disc under varying thermal gradient (TG).
Design/methodology/approach
The steady state creep in a rotating FGM disc with linearly varying thickness has been investigated by using von-Mises yield criterion. The disc under investigation is assumed to be made of FGM containing non-linear distribution of silicon carbide particle (SiCp) in a matrix of pure aluminum along the radial distance. The creep behavior of the FGM composite disc is described by threshold stress-based law. The stresses and strain rates in the FGM disc have been estimated for different kinds of TG.
Findings
The results indicate that when the FGM disc is subjected to a radial TG, with temperature increasing with increasing radius, the radial stress in the disc increases over the entire disc but the tangential and effective stresses increase near the inner radius and decrease toward the outer radius. The imposition of such a radial TG in the FGM disc leads to significant reduction in the radial and tangential strain rates. With the increase in magnitude of TG in the FGM disc, the inhomogeneity in creep stresses increases but the inhomogeneity in strain rates decreases significantly, thereby reducing the chances of distortion in the FGM disc.
Originality/value
The creep strain rates in rotating FGM disc could be significantly reduced when the disc is subjected to a radial TG, with temperature increasing with increasing radius.
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Amruta Rout, Deepak Bbvl, Bibhuti B. Biswal and Golak Bihari Mahanta
This paper aims to propose fuzzy-regression-particle swarm optimization (PSO) based hybrid optimization approach for getting maximum weld quality in terms of weld strength and…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to propose fuzzy-regression-particle swarm optimization (PSO) based hybrid optimization approach for getting maximum weld quality in terms of weld strength and bead depth of penetration.
Design/methodology/approach
The prediction of welding quality to achieve best of it is not possible by any single optimization technique. Therefore, fuzzy technique has been applied to predict the weld quality in terms of weld strength and weld bead geometry in combination with a multi-performance characteristic index (MPCI). Then regression analysis has been applied to develop relation between the MPCI output value and the input welding process parameters. Finally, PSO method has been used to get the optimal welding condition by maximizing the MPCI value.
Findings
The predicted weld quality or the MPCI values in terms of combined weld strength and bead geometry has been found to be highly co-related with the weld process parameters. Therefore, it makes the process easy for setting of weld process parameters for achieving best weld quality, as there is no need to finding the relation for individual weld quality parameter and weld process parameters although they are co-related in a complicated manner.
Originality/value
In this paper, a new hybrid approach for predicting the weld quality in terms of both mechanical properties and weld geometry and optimizing the same has been proposed. As these parameters are highly correlated and dependent on the weld process parameters the proposed approach can effectively analyzing the ambiguity and significance of each process and performance parameter.
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Manish Garg, Dharmpal Deepak and V.K. Gupta
The purpose of this paper is to investigate creep in an internally pressurized thick-walled, closed ends cylinder made of functionally graded composite, having linear and…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate creep in an internally pressurized thick-walled, closed ends cylinder made of functionally graded composite, having linear and non-linear distribution of reinforcement, using finite element (FE) analysis.
Design/methodology/approach
FE-based Abaqus software is used to investigate creep behavior of a functionally graded cylinder. The cylinder is made of composite containing linear and non-linearly varying distributions of reinforcement along the radius. The creep behavior has been described by Norton's power law. The creep stresses and strains have been estimated in linear and non-linear functionally graded materials (FGM) cylinders and compared with those estimated for a similar composite cylinder but having uniform distribution of reinforcement.
Findings
The radial stress in the composite cylinder is observed to decreases over the entire radius upon imposing linear or non-linear reinforcement gradients. However, the tangential stress in the cylinder increases near the inner radius but decreases toward the outer radius, on imposing linear or non-linear reinforcement gradients. The creep strains in the FGM cylinders are significantly lower than those observed in a uniform composite cylinder.
Originality/value
The creep strains in an internally pressurized functionally graded thick composite cylinder could be reduced significantly by employing non-linear distribution of reinforcement along the radial direction.