EMPAS 11 (3) 2019

Rapid changes in the contemporary business world impact on the understanding of the theory and practice of a company and its relationships with customers. Cognitive computing and Big Data Analytics have opened up new options for marketing solutions that allow for the integration of Internet technology into the business, industry sector and decision making process. The rapid development of the Internet of Things (IoT), as well as artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning solutions implemented by companies, facilitate increasingly more adequate and value-creating machine to machine (M2M) interactions. All of these changes in technology translate into opportunities for marketers. The theory and practice of B2B marketing require to carefully consider the influence of technology on value creation, including innovations. More research efforts are required into value creation and communication in the world of IoT, AI and M2M interactions with regard to relationships between customers and sellers. It can be helpful to analyse industry-specific contexts as well as contexts of the emerging vs developed markets.

The holistic approach to Industry 4.0 requires a broader look at the changes taking place in the area of marketing. Therefore, this article mainly aims to present an outline of changes in marketing for companies implementing the concept of Industry 4.0 in the context of Design Principles of Industry 4.0. The authors propose a conceptual framework for Marketing in Industry 4.0, deriving from the guidelines for designing strategies to implement Industry 4.0. The paper allows a better understanding of the Industry 4.0 phenomenon in the context of changes in the area of marketing in general and in industrial markets in particular. The conceptual framework presented in the article suggests a need for a new approach to shaping marketing strategies and the marketing mix in the Fourth Industrial Revolution and helps in identifying key areas for the marketing mix according to the Industry 4.0 concept.

Keywords:
Industry 4.0  digital marketing  digital transformation  Fourth Industrial Revolution 

Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) is an emerging paradigm and a novel approach to governing science and innovation with the aim of making them ethically acceptable and socially desirable. RRI concept has become a popular term as a result of making it a cross-cutting theme for the Horizon 2020 Framework Programme. Up to date, research on the topic has focused on conceptual problems (relation with similar concepts as well as ethical, moral, philosophical, cultural underpinnings and assumptions) and on the possibilities of making the concept relevant to the Research & Innovation community in Europe and worldwide. Despite some initial efforts, there is still a need to further develop methods and techniques that could make RRI a useful framework for conducting innovation activities, especially in the business environment. The aim of this paper is to propose a range of approaches that help operationalise RRI. The approaches employ methods such as weighted indicators, maturity models and scorecards.

Keywords:
Responsible Research and Innovation  responsibility  innovation  engineering  technology management  Technology Assessment 

This study focuses on the development of a specific type of Intelligent Agents — Business Virtual Assistants (BVA). The paper aims to identify the scope of collaboration between users and providers in the process of agent development and to define the impact that user interpretations of a BVA agent have on this collaboration. This study conceptualises the collaboration between providers and users in the process of the BVA development. It uses the concept of the collaborative development of innovation and sensemaking. The empirical part presents preliminary exploratory in-depth interviews conducted with CEOs of BVA providers and analyses the use of the scheme offered by Miles and Hubermann (1994). The main results show the scope of the collaboration between BVA users and providers in the process of the BVA development. User engagement is crucial in the development of BVA agents since they are using machine learning algorithms. The user interpretation through sensemaking influences the process as their attitudes guide their behaviour. Apart from that, users have to adjust to this new kind of entity in the market and learn how to use it in line with savoir-vivre rules. This paper suggests the need to develop a new approach to the collaborative development of innovation when Artificial Intelligence is involved.

Keywords:
Business Virtual Assistants  artificial intelligence  innovation development 

The article presents the study that mainly focused on the changes made as a result of collaborative innovations in business relationships developed during the period of digitalisation in the construction field of the Russian Federation. It is a conceptual piece of work based on the systematic approach to the analysis, literature review and comparative analysis. The digitalisation of investment and construction projects is technologically based on the integration of solutions, such as the building information model (BIM), high-performance IT-systems, cloud platforms and the Internet-of-Things, resulting in unified and constant connectivity, specialised mobile applications, robotic equipment, unmanned vehicles, additive technologies, AR/VR services for the analysis of Big-Data, and blockchain technologies. The integration of digital technologies is a radical innovation, which highlights collaborative innovations in business relationships and makes it possible to form a united digital ecosystem that allows firms to manage, control and regulate the full lifecycle of a construction project, and then, the property in real-time. The contribution of this work to the construction field is the offered model for the creation of a digital ecosystem and the described role of the government in the model. Also, this work can be used for the integration of BIM technologies in construction companies.

Keywords:
digital ecosystem  digital technologies  investment and construction project  BIM technology  collaborative innovation  digital economy 

Customer citizenship behaviour (CCB) is an important consumer trend observed in the contemporary market. It may be described as an extra-role, voluntary behaviour performed in favour of other customers or companies. One of the CCB dimensions, namely, providing customer feedback to company offering, overlaps with value co-creation as a booming marketing concept. Our knowledge about factors determining this behaviour is relatively week. Trying to fill the gap, this paper discusses inclination for value co-creation among customers on the basis of literature review and explorative research. This explorative study aims to identify some company-related and customer related antecedents to customer citizenship behaviour in the form of value co-creation in favour of companies. The theoretical deliberation is based on a critical literature review. The empirical part of the paper is based on explorative research in the form of a survey of 105 non-randomly selected customers. Aiming to identify the key drivers for customer inclination to participate in value co-creation, the exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was conducted; next, the quality of factor structure was assessed with the help of SmartPLS 3.0 using standard measures of validity; and finally, structural links between the inclination to co-create and distinct antecedents were estimated using the partial least square structural equitation modelling technique (PLS_SEM). The factor analysis suggested distinguishing two aspects of customer co-creation, i.e., either initiated by companies (Organised Co-Creation) or by customers (Spontaneous Co-creation). The estimated PLS structural model shows that only some casual paths were found statistically significant, i.e., the appreciation showed by companies towards customers engaging in the organised co-creation process (as extrinsic motivation) and customer innovativeness, as well as the fulfilment of the need for stability (as intrinsic motivation) with regards to spontaneous co-creation. The ex-post moderation analysis with the help of the PLS_MGA algorithm enabled to identify gender as the factor potentially explaining inter-group differences in the structural model.

Keywords:
customer citizenship behaviour  value co-creation  appreciation  gender 

The paper aims to explore consumer co-creation experience of new product development processes. Specifically, it is an attempt to determine the level of consumer engagement in an online co-creation process, identifying motives and reasons for the participation in new product development as well as understanding the types of Internet-based co-creation that are mostly preferred by consumers. The study used an online questionnaire and the CAWI method. The results of the research showed that consumers were interested in being involved in the co-creation of new product development. However, some consumers clearly expressed their reservations regarding participation because they felt lacking required knowledge.

Keywords:
consumer co-creation  new product development  open innovation  Internet-based co-creation  co-creation experience 

The current special section of Engineering Management in Production and Services consists of five articles devoted to topics of managerial reporting, open innovations, CRM and its influence on organisational performance, reengineering of production processes and comparison between governance mechanisms, and supply chain performance. These topics are undoubtedly important for countries in economic transition as well as for well-developed economies.

Corporate reporting on non-financial information has been currently gaining much more interest compared to the past. Most food enterprises believe that performing responsibly and showing an interest in society and the environment will produce a profit and benefit them as well as society. Such cases, in which enterprises report on non-financial information, were the subject of this research. The study aims to discover the managerial reporting of 2017 on the social and environmental effects of food companies in Slovakia to better understand problems in this regard. 2017 was the first year when enterprises were required to draft annual reports containing non-financial information following the amendment to the Slovak law that resulted from the European Union requirements. Across the world, reporting on non-financial information is regulated by voluntary guidelines. The paper presents conclusions of content analysis of annual food business reports in the Slovak Republic in the context of G4 (GRI) directives from social and environmental points of view as key elements in social responsibility reporting. Individual social and environmental aspects of the research are disclosed by an enterprise if the information in its annual report conforms to defined G4 activities (GRI). All the food enterprises operating in Slovakia that compiled annual reports for 2017 were included in the research. Therefore, 142 annual reports with economic activities in 26 subclasses in the food industry sector were selected. The results present a current and comprehensive (full) reporting overview of this industry in Slovakia and reveal several shortcomings in executive reporting. The analysis of the environmental information in the annual reports shows that food enterprises reporting on environmental protection mainly focus on waste, product services, wastewater, materials and energy, evidenced by information about ongoing monitoring of the environmental impacts of production. In the social category, the G4 (GRI) directive defines four main aspects: (i) labour relations and the environment, (ii) human rights, (iii) society and (iv) liability for products.

Keywords:
disclosure  food enterprises  Slovakia  non-financial information  CSR reporting 

The paper aims to analyse the relationship between different types of corporate strategy and open innovation in the contexts of the age, size and the operational range of enterprises. The research targeted companies in Poland that were surveyed from January to April, using traditional and electronic forms of a questionnaire. The questionnaire was developed based on a 5-point Likert scale. The level of “openness” of innovation processes in an enterprise was determined according to a 3-point scale, namely, a closed innovator, a hybrid or semi-open innovator, and an open innovator. The strategy implemented by an enterprise was classed into main three types used to achieve a competitive advantage, i.e. cost leadership, differentiation or diversification. There is a strong correlation between open innovations, the cost leadership strategy and the differentiation strategy (negative correlation). The relationship between the age, size and the range of a company and the opening of innovative processes was also observed. The research aims to fill the knowledge gap existing in the literature regarding the links between a particular type of strategy and the opening of innovation processes.

Keywords:
open innovations  diversification  differentiation  cost leadership 

Purpose. This article mainly aims to verify the role of IT reliability as the factor potentially strengthening the CRM influence on organisational performance and conclude whether the IT reliability is indeed an important factor shaping the CRM ability to generate value for an organisation. Methodology. The empirical research was conducted to verify the existence of such a relation. The research was carried out based on the survey performed among organisations, and the sample included 558 entities from Poland and 564 from Switzerland. The statistical analysis of the obtained results was carried out using regression analysis with the moderator. Results. The obtained models clearly show that IT reliability is a moderator of the relation between CRM time-of-use and the organisational performance. The theoretical contribution. The obtained results clearly confirm that the existing IT solutions should support CRM, and with such support, this management method is positively influencing the organisational performance. Such a conclusion seems to be an important contribution to the studied field of research, filling the research gap concerning the mechanism of IT support for CRM. It remains consistent with the views from the literature and contributes to their extension.

Keywords:
management  Customer Relationship Management  IT in an organisation  IT reliability  organisational performance 

The current competitive environment is only favourable to those companies that can cope with changes and use them to their advantage. The innovation of business processes is required to improve financial performance. Scientific works have not yet offered an effective solution to the monitoring of the impact made by process reengineering on corporate financial results. This work presents the case of a business process reengineering in a particular company to improve its performance. The results of implemented reengineering are analysed from the point of view of the impact made on the financial situation of the company. The paper aims to demonstrate the implementation of reengineering and evaluate its impact on the financial standing of a company and its performance. The practical application of reengineering was made according to Hammer and Champy methodology, which is based on the analysis of production processes in the company, the implementation of selected reengineered production processes and the evaluation of the reengineering impact on the corporate financial situation and performance. During the evaluation, the selected indicators of financial performance, activity indicators, the indebtedness indicator, business performance indicators as a cash flow to measure financial flows and the economic value-added (indicator EVA) were calculated and analysed. Subsequent to financial analyses and based on the selected indicators, the authors concluded that the implemented reengineering of the production process increased the performance and value of the company, which had a positive impact on the company’s financial situation. The funds spent on the proper implementation of the reengineering steps were effectively used, and the reengineering process was also timed. This contribution to the body of theoretic knowledge links the implementation of reengineering and the part of the financial analysis, which is related to the preparation, implementation and reengineering results.

Keywords:
process  process management  reengineering  business performance  business performance indicators 

The goal of the research is twofold. First, it aims to reveal the basic modes of governance run by the manufacturer across the examined triadic supply chains. Secondly, the paper compares the groups of triadic supply chains, applying certain modes of governance, including network governance, in terms of the relational benefits and supply chain performance. To investigate the relationship between network governance and the supply chain performance, the Principal Component Analysis (PCA) with Varimax Rotation was used, followed by the cluster analysis and non-parametric tests. The study showed that the triadic supply chains significantly differentiate in terms of the modes of governance. Further findings also indicated that the triadic supply chains that follow the network governance mode consider their performance to be significantly higher in comparison to the supply chains that do not run this type of governance mechanism. Firstly, the research showed that it is difficult to unequivocally reveal the pure mechanisms of governance, undistorted by the influence of another distinct mode in the triadic supply chains. On the contrary, they are more or less influenced by other modes of governance distinguished in the literature. Likewise, it is also important to highlight that the mechanism of governance is inseparably bound with a certain dyadic relationship established between two actors in the wider structure of supply chains. The study also showed that incorporating a clan as a social mechanism of governance together with a market and hierarchy results in increasing the relational benefits and overall performance for both dyads in the triadic supply chains.

Keywords:
network governance  triads  supply chain