Handbook of Service Science

Handbook of Service Science

As the service sector expands into the global economy, a new science of service is emerging, one that is dedicated to encouraging service innovation by applying scientific understanding, engineering discipline, and management practice to designing, improving, and scaling service systems. Handbook of Service Science takes the first major steps to clarifying the definition, role, and future of this nascent field. Incorporating work by scholars from across the spectrum of service research, the volume presents multidisciplinary perspectives on the nature and theory of service, on current research and practice in design, operations, delivery, and innovation of service, and on future opportunities and potential of service research. Handbook of Service Science provides a comprehensive reference suitable for a wide-reaching audience including researchers, practitioners, managers, and students who aspire to learn about or to create a deeper scientific foundation for service design and engineering, service experience and marketing, and service management and innovation.

Handbook of Service Science

GIS to Support Cost-effective Decisions on Renewable Sources

GIS to Support Cost-effective Decisions on Renewable Sources

Through the results of a developed case study of information system for low temperature geothermal energy, GIS to Support Cost-effective Decisions on Renewable Sources addresses the issue of the use of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) in evaluating cost-effectiveness of renewable resource exploitation on a regional scale. Focusing on the design of a Decision Support System, a process is presented aimed to transform geographic data into knowledge useful for analysis and decision-making on the economic exploitation of geothermal energy. This detailed description includes a literature review and technical issues related to data collection, data mining, decision analysis for the informative system developed for the case study. A multi-disciplinary approach to GIS design is presented which is also an innovative example of fusion of georeferenced data acquired from multiple sources including remote sensing, networks of sensors and socio-economic censuses. GIS to Support Cost-effective Decisions on Renewable Sources is a useful, practical reference for engineers, managers and researchers involved in the design of GIS, decision support systems, investment planning/strategy in renewable energy and ICT innovation in this field.

GIS to Support Cost-effective Decisions on Renewable Sources

Systemic Aspects of Innovation and Design

Systemic Aspects of Innovation and Design

The book provides a snapshot of a hot topic the systemic nature of innovation and its relevance to design with a trifold perspective: the academic level the literature on innovation studies and design is often neglected and a clear connection between the two topics taken for granted; the research level collaborative models are currently considered great opportunities for transforming consumption, production and distribution of goods, but a clear scholarly discourse is still forming; the political level the European Commission and the OECD are devoting much effort to understanding and measuring the impact of design in innovation processes and firms and a clear contribution would greatly support this path. Thus the book provides an informed, historical and nuanced perspective to the relationship between design and innovation to contribute to all three levels and to propose a point of view that goes beyond aesthetics and meanings.

Systemic Aspects of Innovation and Design