Productive use of renewable energy supporting applied entrepreneurship – Lessons learned from a development project in rural Ethiopia (2017)

Selomie Daniel Elmar Steurer Bernard Wagemann

Access to affordable energy - for basic needs as well as for national economic development - is a crucial concern for developing countries. Access to modern and sustainable energy services in rural areas, where the majority of the population is living in poverty, is a particularly urgent challenge, and one which has been recognized as crucial within the global development agenda. The current dominant development model, focused on achieving macro-economic growth, gives priority to large-scale or centralized energy infrastructures for national growth or for meeting the urban demand. Rural areas of poorer countries are often at a disadvantage in terms of access to all types of services – roads, health facilities, markets, information and clean water. The high cost of providing these services in remote areas has led to new approaches being tried, based on self-help and the private sector rather than traditional government-led solutions. The missing access to electricity is primarily the reason for the poor operational environment of entrepreneurship especially in rural areas of developing countries, which poses many barriers to their development and limits their competitiveness. Energy services for household, agriculture and production serve as best examples as sectors exposed to enable entrepreneurship by productive use of renewable energy. This paper describes the line-up, the challenges and the outcome of a development project in rural Ethiopia to support entrepreneurship based on the usage of renewable energy, in this case mainly photo-voltaic technology. In particular, this study tries to show up key features which are required to enable sustainable energy access and foster implementation challenges of developed business models in practice. Based on this experience, the paper discusses implications and lessons learned for a further development.

Determinants of Non-Farm Micro and Small Enterprise Participation in Rural Ghana (2017)

Sylvester N. Ayambila

The non-farm sector is critical for the socio-economic development of Ghana especially the rural poor. Literature suggest that people engage in non-farm enterprises as a way out of poverty or a survival strategy, perhaps as a substitute for the landless. This paper analyses the determinants of individual participation in non-farm enterprises and the intensity of participation. The paper uses EGC/ISSER Socio-Economic Panel Survey data collected in 2009. The paper estimated the determinants of participation using a probit model and then estimated the intensity of participation using a truncated regression model. The results indicate that majority of women (about 73%) are engaged in non-farm enterprises in rural Ghana. The study found that females tended to participate more in non-farm self-employment and are less likely to participate in non-farm wage employment. The results further showed that individual characteristics such as the gender of the individual, being head of a household, being the spouse of a household head, having formal education, age of the individual, having access to credit, possessing a mobile phone, per capita landing holding and ownership of livestock influenced the participation of individuals in self-and wage employment. Results from truncated regression model for self-employed enterprises showed that having access to mobile phones, owning more livestock and electricity are important in determining the intensity of participation in self-employed enterprises. For wage-employment, being a household head, spouse of household head, having access to mobile phone and owning more livestock increased the number of days working on wage employment. Education is relevant for employment in the non-farm sector especially wage-employment. Government should play a lead role in making formal education accessible to the rural people. Deliberate policies should focus on addressing critical factors such as access to credit, mobile phone, electricity and education which are relevant for increasing participation intensity in rural enterprises.

Examining activities in the E-waste Sector: Evidence from Two Metropolis in Ghana (2017)

Rosemond Boohene Gloria Agyapong

Over the past decades, growing trends in social media, e-literacy and globalisation have led to the increased use of electrical and electronic equipment (EEE) in offices, schools, homes, hospitals and other institutions. Although, there are more efforts at introducing diversity, innovation and increased use of EEE, there had been limited effort at managing the end?of?life of these electronic devices. Evidence from previous research showed that the management of the end of life of electronic waste is highly dominated by Micro, Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (MSMEs) in the informal sector who employ more crude technology in their operations. This exploratory study therefore, sought to examine the activities of corporate bodies and MSMEs (formal and informal) in the e-waste sector in the Accra and Kumasi Metropolitan Areas in Ghana. Data was collected via questionnaires and interview from randomly selected respondents in the two metropolises. Results reveal that even though corporate institutions import a lot of electrical and electronic equipment, they do not have any policies on disposal of the e-waste generated. Thus, a high percentage of the e-waste generated is processed by the informal sector. The implications of the results are that policy makers and other stakeholders should encourage MSMEs to formalize their activities, support investment and green business development as well as funding and training for MSMEs operating in the sector.

Viability of alternative online news media in developing and transition countries (2017)

Christoph Schmidt

Media development cooperation has aimed for decades at enhancing free and independent media in developing countries as well as economies in transition. Within this field of activity, the concept of media viability has gained more and more attention in recent years. This is mainly due to a proposal of UNESCO`s intergovernmental Bureau of the International Programme for the Development of Communication (IPDC). The UNESCO, in partnership with DW Akademie, has drafted a list of indicators that delineate the influencing factors of media viability for media organizations in any given country (UNESCO 2015). As a consequence of the novelty of the media viability concept, the state of scientific research is restricted. It is frequently focused on isolated case studies without providing a scientific basis for comparison. Empirical studies and comparative analyses are limited to certain media sectors such as the print market, as well as for journalism startups and spin-offs in developed economies.

Intercultural challenges: University – Business Partnerships (2017)

Marc Ambrock Kingsley Lawal

In today’s business, culture plays a vital role or to a high degree influences the attitude, perception and decision making process of an individual. Culture is an unavoidable state of rules and regulations that defines people’s daily life in a particular environment or society. There are plenty examples of business failures or stagnation or failure of joint ventures, on account of the management's inability to recognize cross-cultural challenges and tackle them appropriately.

Do the approaches to entrepreneurship education matter in start-up intentions? (2017)

Nina Afriyie Rosemond Boohene

Entrepreneurship education serves a conduit for new venture creation as it provides the knowledge and skills needed to increase the self-efficacy of individuals to start and run new businesses and to grow existing ones. This study, therefore, sought to assess the relationship between the approaches to the teaching of entrepreneur-ship and entrepreneurial intention on a cohort of 292 respondents consisting of students who have studied entrepreneurship in three selected Universities. A structured questionnaire was used to obtain data randomly from students. The canonical correlation results indicate that education for and through entrepreneurship is the best approach to promoting entrepreneurial intensity among University students, if the aim of teaching entrepreneur-ship is to promote start-up activities. The findings provide valuable insights for institutions of higher learning and policy makers in Ghana with respect to the appropriate methodologies to be adopted in the teaching of entrepreneurship in our universities.

Constraints analysis of start-up business in Burundi (2017)

Gilbert Girukwishaka

Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) are engine of economy both for developed and developing countries. They play a significant role in income generation, job creation, poverty reduction and reducing income inequality. In Burundi, key stakeholders such as policy-makers as well as other international and national actors have made more effort to develop the segment of SMEs. Indeed, many start-ups have been created but are however, exposed to several challenges in their business operations. This paper aimed at investigating main critical barriers to SMEs growth and development in Burundi. The research was based upon a sample survey of small firms in Burundi and 314 small enterprises were surveyed. Rural start-ups’ critical barriers identified are mainly poor management, lack of access to market flow, lack of working capital, inadequate qualified workforce and low selling prices. On the other hand, five severe obstacles for urban SMEs identified are insecurity, access to financing, macroeconomic situation, lack of customers and unfair competition. A better understanding of all these barriers that SMEs are facing is useful to set up best strategies susceptible to increase their growth.

Managing Intercultural Practice Oriented Student’s Projects: Evidence from Kenya, Germany, Ghana and the United States (2017)

Regina Brautlacht Daniel Agyapong Joseph Owino Nils Rauhut

Culture is at the core of any social, economic and business interactions and relationships. The way people perceive the culture of others influences their decision to collaborate socially, politically and economically with them. It is therefore, imperative students appreciate the dynamics of cross-cultural interactions and collaborations, since it exposes them to a wider view of the world. In doing this, it is important they (students) are allowed to explore as much as possible with little interference by their teachers. Using the project students went through real-life experience in a self-directed enquiry. In the process, they were taught to solve problems encountered during the learning process. The focus of the intercultural communication project was to understand how people from different cultures speak, interact and perceive others’ culture. It was found students innovate if allowed to explore a certain phenomenon on their own. Furthermore, face-to-face meetings can be arranged between people in the different countries can be arranged using these Web 2.0 tools. Based on the experience from the project, it was observed that the success of a collaborative international project depends on the understanding of the crosscultural dynamics of partners. For such collaborations, it is imperative to establish personal relationships, be flexible and adaptable to situations and change as well as being swift resolving potential conflict situation.

Entrepreneurial Education, youth employability and economic development in Kenya (2017)

Justus M. Munyoki Bitange Ndemo

This study sought to determine the relationship between entrepreneurial education and youth employability and economic development in Kenya. A descriptive cross sectional design was used to collect data, with the main data collection instrument being a semi structured questionnaire. The population of the study comprised the micro, small and medium scale enterprises in Nairobi, Kenya. Out of the 100 questionnaires issued, 93 were completed and returned giving a response rate of 93%. Descriptive analysis (means and standard deviations ) and inferential analysis was used to analyze the data. Regression and correlation analysis was done to test the hypotheses. It was found that several indicators of entrepreneurial education had a significantly positive influence on youth employability. For example, entrepreneurial education enhances opportunity recognition as an indicator of entrepreneurial education was statistically significantly correlated with the statement that entrepreneurship endeavor is an employment alternative as an indicator of youth employability (r = 331**, P = 0.01). Similarly, the statement that entrepreneurial education sharpens competitiveness had a significantly positive influence on the statement that entrepreneurship endevour is an employment alternative (r =.313** P = 0.01). The overall model for entrepreneurial education and youth employability had an R Square value of 0.151, and an F value of 3.086, (p = 0.013 < 0.05), indicating that the influence is significant at the 0.05 level. The study found that most indicators of youth employability had a significantly positive correlation with indicators of economic development. It was found that there was a significant positive correlation between entrepreneurial education enhances new product and service development and entrepreneurial education reduces youth unemployment (r =0.304**, P = 0.01), while entrepreneurial education enhances new product and service development also has a positive correlation with entrepreneurial education reduces youth unemployment (.304** , P = 0.01). The overall model for youth employability and economic development had an R square value of .087 and F value of 2.103, p =0.87 > 0.05, indication that although youth employability is responsible for 8.7% of economic development, the effect is not statistically significant. The implication for this is that entrepreneurial education should be encouraged as a way of enhancing entrepreneurial thinking among the youth, so that they can use this to venture into self employment. However, this study did not find a significant direct link between youth employability and economic development, and this can only be implied. We suggest increased government support for entrepreneurship training and for closer industry university collaboration and partnerships in order to accelerate economic development.

Wahrnehmung und Einstellung argentinischer Konsumenten zu biologischen Lebensmitteln (2017)

Nicolas Fuchshofen Wiltrud Terlau

m Rahmen eines Forschungsaufenthaltes an der Universidad de Buenos Aires (UBA) wurde in Kooperation mit der Fakultät für Veterinärwissenschaften und dem Zentrum für Interdisziplinäre Wasserforschung (CETA) eine Befragung unter Studierenden und Mitarbeitenden (wissenschaftlichen und Verwaltungsmitarbeitern sowie Professoren) durchgeführt. Diese Befragung befasste sich inhaltlich mit Themen zur Einstellung argentinischer Konsumenten zu nachhaltigen und biologischen Lebensmitteln. Dabei spielte ebenfalls die Wahrnehmung dieser Lebensmittel anhand von Siegeln eine Rolle. Ferner wurden auch Fragen zum Bewusstsein für zertifizierte Produkte gestellt, das ein Präjudiz für ein spezifisches Einkaufsverhalten ist.

Interfacial Tension and Related Properties of Ionic Liquids in CH 4 and CO 2 at Elevated Pressures: Experimental Data and Molecular Dynamics Simulation (2017)

Sandra Knauer Martin R. Schenk Thorsten Köddermann Dirk Reith Philip Jaeger

Experimental data on the interfacial tension of ionic liquids in CO2 and CH4 atmospheres at elevated pressures (up to 20 MPa and 353 K) are presented and discussed. In addition, molecular modeling is utilized to describe the thermophysical properties under process-relevant conditions. Molecular modeling has the potential to predict findings in order to avoid costly experiments in the future and to explain the principal behavior of the whole system in terms of simulated concentration profiles. The interfacial tension is recognized to be an important quantity in a number of processes, e.g., for describing multiphase flow. By dissolving within the liquid phase, gases reduce the interfacial tension, which in turn is closely related to the phase behavior. It is shown that the experimentally determined interfacial tension, which decreases from values of 50 mN·m–1 under atmospheric conditions down to 10 mN·m–1 in CO2 but still above 30 mN·m–1 in CH4 at 10 MPa, is appropriately reflected by molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. The obtained data are analyzed in view of literature data and by using experimentally determined pressure-dependent densities and solubilities of CH4 and CO2 within ionic liquids. The results form part of a database for the ongoing development of MD simulations.

Datenmodellierung für Einsteiger (2017)

Andreas Gadatsch

Andreas Gadatsch schließt mit dem vorliegenden essential eine Lücke in einführenden Werken zur Datenmodellierung. Diese Modelle gehören zum Basiswissen einführender Lehrveranstaltungen zur Wirtschaftsinformatik für Betriebswirte. Die Literatur dazu ist für diese Zielgruppe häufig zu speziell, da sie sich eher an Informatiker richtet. Der Autor bietet hier nun eine kompakte Einführung anhand eines durchgängigen Fallbeispiels in die klassische CHEN-Notation, auf der viele neue Modellierungsansätze aufbauen. Der Inhalt Die Datenmodellierung - vom Konzept zur Datenbank Erstellung von Fachkonzepten mit dem Entity-Relationship-Modell Erstellung von IT-Konzepten mit dem relationalen Datenmodell Implementierung von Datenmodellen in Datenbanksystemen Die Zielgruppen Dozierende und Studierende der BWL, angehende IT-Systemkaufleute und Fachinformatikerinnen und -informatiker (IHK), die im Rahmen von Studium bzw. Ausbildung eine Einführungsveranstaltung in die Wirtschaftsinformatik besuchen.

The computational aspects of estimating the efficiency of wireless networks' topology (2017)

Aye Min Thike Sergey Lupin Ba Hla Than Roustiam Chakirov

Wireless Network has become the critical part of the communication infrastructure in our environment. Nowadays, the using of mobile computing devices such as laptops and Wi-Fi enabled phones in the workplace is increasing. The design of wireless networks for enterprise environments remains a challenging task due to the problem of topological design. In this paper, we discuss the computational aspects of the task of calculation the various criteria of efficiency wireless networks' topology. These criteria determine the different characteristics of wireless networks - the access level of populations to network services, the level of the distributed signal and the level of signal accepted in the city. We use brute force algorithm for comparing the different criteria of efficiency the topology of wireless networks. The brute force algorithm has high computational complexity therefore in our experiments we use parallel computing to solve the problem. For illustration the results we use the task of optimization the Wireless network topology for fragment of Myanmar territory.

Internationale Märkte - Potenziale für deutsche Krankenhäuser (2017)

Jens Juszczak

Misuse Capabilities of the V2V Communication to Harm the Privacy of Vehicles and Drivers (2017)

Markus Ullmann Thomas Strubbe Christian Wieschebrink

A deployment of the Vehicle-2-Vehicle communication technology according to ETSI is in preparation in Europe. Currently, a policy for a necessary Public Key Infrastructure to enrol cryptographic keys and certificates for vehicles and infrastructure component is in discussion to enable an interoperable Vehicle-2-Vehicle communication. Vehicle-2-Vehicle communication means that vehicles periodically send Cooperative Awareness Messages. These messages contain the current geographic position, driving direction, speed, acceleration, and the current time of a vehicle. To protect privacy (location privacy, “speed privacy”) of vehicles and drivers ETSI provides a specific pseudonym concept. We show that the Vehicle-2-Vehicle communication can be misused by an attacker to plot a trace of sequent Cooperative Awareness Messages and to link this trace to a specific vehicle. Such a trace is non-disputable due to the cryptographic signing of the messages. So, the periodically sending of Cooperative Awareness Messages causes privacy problems even if the pseudonym concept is applied.

Aktuelle Entwicklungen in der Produktsimulation blasgeformter Kunststoffhohlkörper: Verbesserungspotenziale durch Berücksichtigung des zeit- und prozessabhängigen Materialverhaltens (2017)

P. Michels O. Bruch D. Grommes

Die Produktsimulation blasgeformter Kunststoffhohlkörpern ist trotz ausgereifter Software nach wie vor mit Unsicherheiten verbunden. Der Grund dafür ist vor allem in der unzureichenden Materialbeschreibung von Polymer-Werkstoffen zu suchen. Das komplexe zeit- und temperaturabhängige Werkstoffverhalten erfordert oftmals eine Abkehr von einfachen linear elastischen Materialmodellen hin zu komplexeren nichtlinear viskoelastisch-plastischen Modellen. Darüber hinaus hat auch der Verarbeitungsprozess maßgeblichen Einfluss auf die mechanischen Eigenschaften des Endproduktes. Eine Konsequenz daraus ist, dass lokale Materialparameter nicht mehr als konstant, sondern vielmehr als Funktion bestimmter Prozessparameter anzusehen sind. Im Rahmen des bereits abgeschlossenen Forschungsprojektes MatRes gelang es erstmals das prozessspezifische Materialverhalten blasgeformter Kunststoffhohlkörper zu identifizieren und in die Produktsimulation einzubinden. Diese Materialbeschreibung konnte dann im aktuellen Forschungsvorhaben ReBauVES dahingehend erweitert werden, dass auch Betrag und Richtung der lokalen Verstreckungen, sowie die damit verbundene Orthotropie berücksichtigt werden. Zukünftig soll es gelingen, durch die Verwendung prozessabhängiger viskoelastisch-plastischer Materialmodelle sowohl das Langzeitverhalten als auch das dehnratenabhängige Kurzzeitverhalten blasgeformter Hohlkörper mit hinreichender Genauigkeit zu beschreiben.

User Acceptance of Fully Autonomous Public Transport (2017)

Christina Pakusch Paul Bossauer

The development of fully automated vehicles is becoming more and more present in the social discussion. The image of fully automated cars is determined by automobile manufacturers and placed in the context of individual traffic. In contrast to fully autonomous private cars, fully automated public transport is already operating in some cities and is to be expanded in the future. Autonomous public transport offers great potential for the development and promotion of sustainable mobility concepts. However, the user acceptance is important for the enforcement and widespread use of these technical innovations. An online study on the acceptance of fully automated public transport based on quantitative data of a sample of N = 201 is presented. The results show a high level of familiarity with the topic and a very high level of overall intention to use fully automated public transport in the future.

Impact of Digitised Efficiency Map on Power Train Modelling (2013)

Michael Griebler Roustiam Chakirov Olivier Durieux Yuriy Vagapov

Power train models are required to simulate hence predict energy consumption of vehicles. Efficiencies for different components in power train are required. Common procedures use digitalised shell models (or maps) to model the efficiency of Internal Combustion Engines (ICE) and manual gearboxes (MG). Errors are connected with these models and affect the accuracy of the calculation. The accuracy depends on the configuration of the simulation, the digitalisation of the data and the data used. This paper evaluates these sources of error. The understanding of the source of error can improve the results of the modelling by more than eight percent.

Finding good Echo State Networks to control an underwater robot using evolutionary computations (2004)

Tijn van der Zant Vlatko Bečanović Kazuo Ishii Hans-Ulrich Kobialka Paul Plöger

The control of an underwater robot is difficult due to non-linear effects. Echo State Networks (ESNs) provide a way of dealing with non-linearity. The quality of an Echo State Network (ESN) (H. Jaeger, 2001, 2002) depends strongly on its topology. Usually an educated guess combined with a brute force method is used to obtain an ESN that, after training, produces a low error. In this article the authors suggest another way to find good topologies by using evolution. Two heuristics, evolutionary algorithms and evolutionary strategies, are compared. The proposed method outperforms standard ones like ARX and backpropagation networks on the data from the Twin-Burger underwater robot.

Universities, Entrepreneurship and Enterprise Development in Africa – Conference Proceedings 2016 (2017)

These proceedings are the outcome of the 5th annual joint conference on “Universities Entrepreneurship and Enterprise Development in Africa” between the University of Nairobi, Kenya, the University of Cape Coast, Ghana, and Bonn-Rhein-Sieg University of Applied Sciences, Germany, held on 10-11 November 2016 on Campus Sankt Augustin, Bonn-Rhein-Sieg University of Applied Sciences.

Dare – Democracy and Science (2017)

Effiziente Lösungen von Spezialfällen des Cutting sticks-Problems (2017)

Alexander Büchel Ulrich Gilleßen Kurt-Ulrich Witt

Das Cutting sticks-Problem ist in seiner allgemeinen Formulierung ein NP-vollständiges Problem mit Anwendungspotenzialen im Bereich der Logistik. Unter der Annahme, dass P ungleich NP (P != NP) ist, existieren keine effizienten, d.h. polynomiellen Algorithmen zur Lösung des allgemeinen Problems. In diesem Papier werden für eine Reihe von Instanzen effiziente Lösungen angegeben.

Ansätze für effiziente Lösungen von Cutting sticks-Problemen und deren Charakterisierung (2017)

Alexander Büchel Ulrich Gilleßen Kurt-Ulrich Witt

Das Cutting sticks-Problem ist in seiner allgemeinen Formulierung ein NP-vollständiges Problem mit Anwendungspotenzialen im Bereich der Logistik. Unter der Annahme, dass P ungleich NP (P != NP) ist, existieren keine effizienten, d.h. polynomiellen Algorithmen zur Lösung des allgemeinen Problems. In diesem Papier werden Ansätze aufgezeigt, mit denen bestimmte Instanzen des Problems effizient berechnet werden können. Für die Berechnung wichtige Parameter werden charakterisiert und deren Beziehung untereinander analysiert.

Closing the Gap: Potential Contribution of Social Assistance for Achieving Sustainable Development Goals (2017)

Franziska Gassmann Sri Wening Handayani

This brief discusses the fiscal requirements to meet the social protection-related targets of SDGs, particularly for social assistance programs in ADB’s 16 developing member countries in Asia.

A Blueprint for the Evolution of Perspectives: Planning Technology as a Basis for the Mass Customization of Robots (2017)

Iman Awaad

As the field of robotics expands beyond a critical mass with a view to advancing the public interest, a change in paradigm is needed that transfers the complexity of customizing some functions from those with deep technical competence to the users – a process of mass customization.