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This paper analyzes the relationship between religion and innovation in Europe. To the best knowledge of the authors, no paper has been published about the association of religion with innovation and innovative products and services, at an individual level, for all the countries that belong to the European Union. This is the main goal of our paper. The results show that the orientation of innovativeness depends on religion. This study contains a segmentation of the main religions in Europe, taking into account their innovative profile. Connecting the characteristics of the religious segments found and the innovations life-cycle concept, companies have a tool to manage different innovations' evolutive stages taking into consideration the religion of their customers. The European policy-makers, still dominated by a traditional innovation approach, gain a demand-side perspective to improve citizen's innovativeness awareness and acceptance. Finally, religiosity does not seem to have a very strong relationship with attitudes towards innovation once we control for religious affiliation.

AbstractProduct life cycle (PLC) is shown to be a special case of a more general concept, ecological succession, itself a special case of general succession. The attributes of ecological succession are described in both biological and social—economic spheres. PLC behavior is analyzed using attributes of ecological succession and it is demonstrated to be a special case of succession.

We investigate the timing of adoption of product and process innovation by using a differential game in which firms may invest in both activities. We consider horizontal product innovation that reduces product substitutability, and process innovation that reduces marginal cost. First, we demonstrate that the incentive for cost-reducing investment is relatively higher than the incentive to increase product differentiation. Second, depending on initial conditions, (i) firms activate both types of investment from the very outset to the steady state; (ii) firms initially invest only in one R&D activity and then reach the steady state either carrying out only such activity or carrying out both; (iii) firms do not invest at all in either type of innovation.

Sustainable production presented from an overarching perspective. The book provides information on the identification and assessment of footprints, concepts of sustainability practice in manufacturing companies, stakeholder management and communication. For the reader practical examples permit the analysis of the current situation and emerging developments. the current technical status of footprint analysis according to the Green House Gas Protocol is displayed. case studies with a focus on the manufacturing industry are discussed

ABSTRACTIn industrial purchasing contexts firms often procure a set of products from the same suppliers to benefit from economies of scale and scope. These products are often at different stages of their respective product life cycles (PLCs). Firms consider multiple criteria in purchasing such products, and the relative importance of these criteria varies depending on the PLC stage of a given product. Therefore, a firm should select suppliers and choose sourcing arrangements such that product requirements across multiple criteria are satisfied over time. The extant models in sourcing literature for evaluating and selecting suppliers for a portfolio of products have not considered this important and practical issue faced by firms. This article proposes a mathematical model that effectively addresses this issue and contributes to the sourcing literature by demonstrating an approach for optimally selecting suppliers and supplier bids given the relative importance of multiple criteria across multiple products over their PLC. The application of the model on a hypothetical data set illustrates the strategic and tactical significance of such considerations.

On the basis of technical and economic analysis of the properties of relations between design and technological solutions, a method for the integral assessment of production manufacturability by combining individual manufacturability coefficients at different stages of the product life cycle is suggested. Separate coefficients take into account the influence degree of various constituent stages on the labor intensity of production and maintenance, repair and disposal of the product structure. Design and technological solutions in design systems imply the use of properties such as reflexivity, symmetry and transitivity. As a result, it is proposed to understand the properties set of the product design that determine its adaptability to achieve optimal costs in production and disposal for specified quality indicators and work conditions. A list of manufacturability coefficients of manufacturing a product design has been determined, including coefficients of purchase, repeatability of details and connections, material hardness, borrowing, typing, precision, roughness, mass. An examination of the effectiveness assessment the use tools, equipment and other objects of the technological environment at the stages design and technological production preparation is formalized. The examination includes an analysis of the frequency and duration of the meeting of structural parts elements and the tools state at the stages of their manufacture, operation and disposal.