Les organitzacions actuals se veuen obligades a establir avantatges competitius sostenibles per tal de prosperar en el mercat global. Les innovacions amb èxit han estat considerades àmpliament una base fonamental per generar avantatge competitiu (Dodgson et al., 2005). Aquestes innovacions les generen habitualment els equips (Brown i Eisenhardt, 1995). Liderar un equip d’innovació s’ha identificat com un dels factors clau d’èxit per als projectes innovadors (Amabile i Khaire, 2008). El lideratge no tan sols repercuteix en uns indicadors d’acompliment hard com el caràcter innovador del projecte, sinó que s’ha vist que també contribueix a millorar l’actitud de l’equip, les seves percepcions i creences (Gordon i Yukl, 2002). En concret, los líders d’equip eficaços són els que participen en activitats orientades a la substància de la tasca de l’equip, les relacions i el canvi (Yukl, 2010), les quals alhora faciliten els processos de grup i es demostra que repercuteixen positivament en uns resultats diversos pel que fa a l’acompliment (Burke et al., 2006). En la mesura que el lideratge s’orienta a influir en els processos d’equip pel que fa a construir condicions socials, estructurar les tasques de l’equip i obrir la mentalitat dels seus membres cap a coses noves (Yukl, 2010), és interessant estudiar un procés d’equip que es basi en les condicions creades per les activitats de lideratge. L’aprenentatge cooperatiu o en equip (team learning), que aquí es defineix com la interacció entre la reflexió i l’acció (Edmondson, 2002), és un procés que requereix interaccions personals, com també l’estructura de la tasca de l’equip. A més, l’aprenentatge cooperatiu millora molt quan algú de l’equip l’impulsa a mirar més enllà dels seus límits o en qüestiona l’statu quo. El motiu d’estudiar aquests conceptes no tan sols es justifica per les condicions necessàries per a l’aprenentatge que es generen a través del lideratge, sinó també pel fet que el lideratge com a factor d’input i l’aprenentatge cooperatiu com a procés de grup són dues precondicions crítiques perquè l’equip adopti un caràcter innovador (Amabile et al., 2004; Wong, 2004). Atès que l’aprenentatge cooperatiu és especialment important en aquells equips que participen en tasques creatives no rutinàries (Edmondson, 1999), m’he centrat en el lideratge compartit en aquest projecte de tesi doctoral perquè aquest enfocament del lideratge és especialment adequat per als equips que realitzen tasques creatives, complexes i no rutinàries (Pearce, 2004). A diferència del lideratge vertical, en el lideratge compartit tot l’equip, inclòs el líder del projecte, participa en el lideratge (Carson et al., 2007; Pearce, 2004). Aquest projecte de tesi doctoral és un primer pas cap a la construcció d’aquesta teoria centrant-se en el rol del lideratge compartit en l’aprenentatge cooperatiu. He presentat dades extretes d’un estudi observatori sobre el lideratge compartit i el procés d’aprenentatge en tres equips de projecte. Observant i entrevistant aquests equips, vam extraure les conclusions següents de les dades obtingudes. En primer lloc, cercant interrelacions entre cada una de les tres substàncies del lideratge i l’aprenentatge cooperatiu, proporcionem uns coneixements amb profunditat concretament sobre la relació existent entre la substància de la tasca i la del canvi, que afecten la reflexió i l’acció, per tal com aquestes relacions mai abans no s’havien estudiat (Edmondson et al., 2008). Les relacions i la substància del canvi primerament recolzaven la part reflexiva de l’aprenentatge, mentre que la substància de la tasca del lideratge bàsicament millorava la part activa de l’aprenentatge. En segon lloc, no tan sols he estudiat aquests tres categories de lideratge en l’aprenentatge cooperatiu individualment, sinó que també he analitzat el caràcter complementari d’aquestes tres substàncies del lideratge pel que fa a l’aprenentatge cooperatiu. Les conclusions empíriques han demostrat que, per participar en cicles de reflexió i acció amb èxit, l’equip necessita prendre part en activitats de lideratge com les tasques, les relacions i el canvi. / Las organizaciones actuales se ven obligadas a fijar ventajas competitivas sostenibles con el fin de prosperar en el mercado global. Las innovaciones de éxito han sido consideradas ampliamente una base fundamental para generar ventaja competitiva (Dodgson et al., 2005). Dichas innovaciones son generadas habitualmente por equipos (Brown y Eisenhardt, 1995). Liderar un equipo de innovación se ha identificado como uno de los factores clave de éxito para los proyectos de innovación (Amabile y Khaire, 2008). El liderazgo no solo repercute en unos indicadores de desempeño hard como el carácter innovador del proyecto, sino que también se ha visto que contribuye a mejorar la actitud del equipo, sus percepciones y creencias (Gordon y Yukl, 2002). En concreto, los líderes de equipo eficaces son los que toman parte en actividades orientadas a la sustancia de la tarea del equipo, las relaciones y el cambio (Yukl, 2010), que, a su vez, facilitan los procesos de grupo y se demuestra que repercuten positivamente en unos resultados del desempeño diversos (Burke et al., 2006). En la medida que el liderazgo se dirige a influir en los procesos de equipo en lo relativo a construir condiciones sociales, estructurar las tareas del equipo y abrir la mentalidad de sus miembros hacia algo nuevo (Yukl, 2010), resulta interesante estudiar un proceso de equipo que se base en las condiciones creadas por las actividades del liderazgo. El aprendizaje cooperativo o en equipo (team learning), que aquí se define como la interacción entre la reflexión y la acción (Edmondson, 2002), es un proceso que requiere interacciones personales, así como la estructura de la tarea del equipo. Además, el aprendizaje cooperativo mejora mucho cuando alguien del equipo lo impulsa a mirar más allá de sus límites o cuestiona su statu quo. La razón para estudiar estos conceptos no solo se justifica por las condiciones necesarias para el aprendizaje que se generan a través del liderazgo, sino también por el hecho de que el liderazgo como factor de input y el aprendizaje cooperativo como proceso de grupo son dos precondiciones críticas para que el equipo adopte un carácter innovador (Amabile et al., 2004; Wong, 2004). Puesto que el aprendizaje cooperativo es especialmente importante en aquellos equipos que participan en tareas creativas no rutinarias (Edmondson, 1999), me he centrado en el liderazgo compartido en este proyecto de tesis doctoral porque este enfoque del liderazgo es especialmente adecuado para los equipos que realizan tareas creativas, complejas y no rutinarias (Pearce, 2004). A diferencia del liderazgo vertical, en el liderazgo compartido todo el equipo, incluyendo al líder del proyecto, participa en el liderazgo (Carson et al., 2007; Pearce, 2004). Este proyecto de tesis doctoral es un primer paso hacia la construcción de esta teoría centrándose en el rol del liderazgo compartido en el aprendizaje cooperativo. He presentado datos extraídos de un estudio observatorio sobre el liderazgo compartido y el proceso de aprendizaje en tres equipos de proyecto. Observando y entrevistando a estos equipos, extrajimos las siguientes conclusiones de los datos obtenidos. En primer lugar, buscando interrelaciones entre cada una de las tres sustancias del liderazgo y el aprendizaje cooperativo, proporcionamos unos conocimientos en profundidad concretamente sobre la relación existente entre la sustancia de la tarea y la del cambio que afectan a la reflexión y a la acción, tal como estas relaciones jamás se habían estudiado anteriormente (Edmondson et al., 2008). Las relaciones y la sustancia del cambio principalmente apoyaban la parte reflexiva del aprendizaje, mientras que la sustancia de la tarea del liderazgo básicamente mejoraba la parte activa del aprendizaje. En segundo lugar, no sólo he estudiado estas tres categorías de liderazgo en el aprendizaje cooperativo individualmente, sino que también he analizado el carácter complementario de estas tres sustancias del liderazgo en lo relativo al aprendizaje cooperativo. Las conclusiones empíricas han demostrado que, para participar en ciclos de reflexión y acción exitosos, el equipo necesita tomar parte en actividades de liderazgo como las tareas, las relaciones y el cambio. / Today’s organizations are forced to establish sustainable competitive advantages in order to outpace the global market. Successful innovations have been broadly considered a vital basis for the generation of competitive advantage (Dodgson et al., 2005). Such innovations are typically generated by teams (Brown & Eisenhardt, 1995). Leading an innovation team has been identified as one of the key success factors for innovation projects (Amabile & Khaire, 2008). Leadership does not only impact on hard performance indicators such as project innovativeness but is also shown to enhance a team’s attitude, perceptions and beliefs (Gordon & Yukl, 2002). Particularly, effective team leaders are those engaging in activities directed at the substance of the team’s task, relations and change (Yukl, 2010) which, in turn, facilitate group processes and are shown to positively impact diverse performance outcomes (Burke et al., 2006). As leadership is directed at influencing team processes in terms of building up social conditions, framing the team’s tasks and opening team members’ minds for something new (Yukl, 2010), it is interesting to study a team process which is based on the conditions created by leadership activities. Team learning, here defined as the interplay of reflection and action (Edmondson, 2002), is a process which requires personal interactions as well as a frame of the team’s task. Additionally, team learning is much enhanced when someone in the team is pushing the team to look outside its boundaries or challenging the status quo. Not only the required conditions for learning generated through leadership highlight the reason for studying these two concepts, but also the fact that leadership as an input factor and team learning as a group process are both critical antecedent conditions for team innovativeness (Amabile et al., 2004; Wong, 2004). Since team learning is especially important for teams engaging in creative non-routine tasks (Edmondson, 1999), I have focused on shared leadership in this PhD project because this leadership approach is especially suitable for teams in charge of creative, complex and non-routine tasks (Pearce, 2004). In contrast to vertical leadership, in shared leadership the team including the project leader is engaged in leadership (Carson et al., 2007; Pearce, 2004). This PhD project is a first step towards building up this theory by focusing on the role of shared leadership in team learning. I have presented data from an observatory study on shared leadership and learning process in three project teams. By observing and interviewing those teams, the following findings emerged from the data: Firstly, by researching interrelations between each of the three leadership substances and team learning, I provide in-depth knowledge, in particular concerning the link between the task and change substance affecting reflection and action as these links have not studied been before (Edmondson et al., 2008): Relations and change substance primarily supported the reflection part of learning, whereas the task substance of leadership basically enhanced the action part of learning. Secondly, not only have I studied these three leadership categories on team learning individually, but I have also provided insights into the complementary character of these three leadership substances as regards team learning. Empirical findings have shown that in order to engage in successful learning cycles of reflection and action, a team needs to engage in leadership activities of task, relations and change.

El paisatge competitiu ràpid i canviant ha desafiat les empreses a tornar-se més emprenedores. En comptes de caure a la trampa de les forces sempre canviants del mercat, algunes empreses mostres una gran agilitat, ja que llancen incansablement nous productes, serveis i processos. Aquestes empreses estan impulsades per una recerca continuada d’oportunitats que aportin un ús millor i més profitós dels seus recursos. L’habilitat d’orquestrar els recursos d’una empresa i la capacitat per crear oportunitats són el tema d’aquesta tesi. Aquesta habilitat, que he denominat “capacitat emprenedora” (CE), es defineix com la capacitat total d’una empresa per fer servir els recursos interns i externs amb l’objectiu de perseguir oportunitats de manera continuada. Per això, la finalitat d’aquesta tesi és proporcionar una comprensió minuciosa de la CE i analitzar-ne la variabilitat en cinc contextos diferents. Estudiar la CE permet examinar l’emprenedoria a escala d’empresa mitjançant l’aplicació d’una perspectiva de capacitat, que se centra en l’orquestració que fan les empreses dels seus recursos i de les seves capacitats per desenvolupar oportunitats. El desenvolupament d’oportunitats exigeix a les empreses que integrin les seves capacitats col•lectivament per transformar-les en accions. Promulgar oportunitats amb èxit no tracta de tenir diverses capacitats individuals que pertanyin a àrees funcionals diferents, sinó de saber reconfigurar-les, ja que així es vinculen els diversos recursos i s’incentiven noves oportunitats. Així doncs, a la tesi presento un enfocament sobre les capacitats i les accions de les empreses. La tesi està dissenyada com un compendi de publicacions i la formen set capítols. A més de la introducció i les conclusions, els cinc capítols restants representen cinc papers individuals que analitzen la CE en múltiples contextos. Això reflecteix un elevat grau de diversitat, que permet elaborar un estudi detallat sobre la CE en diversos contextos. Al seu torn, se centra en les diferències entre els tipus d’oportunitats que es persegueixen i les seves implicacions per integrar les capacitats de les empreses. / El rápido y cambiante paisaje competitivo ha desafiado a las empresas a volverse más emprendedoras. En lugar de caer en la trampa de las fuerzas siempre cambiantes del mercado, algunas empresas muestran una gran agilidad, puesto que lanzan nuevos productos, servicios y procesos incansablemente. Estas compañías son impulsadas por una continua búsqueda de oportunidades que aporten un mejor uso y un mayor provecho de sus recursos. La habilidad de orquestar los recursos de una empresa y la capacidad para crear oportunidades son el tema de esta tesis. Esta habilidad, a la que he denominado “capacidad emprendedora” (CE), se define como la capacidad total de una empresa para utilizar sus recursos internos y externos con el objetivo de perseguir oportunidades de forma continuada. Por eso, la finalidad de esta tesis es proporcionar una comprensión minuciosa de la CE y analizar su variabilidad en cinco contextos distintos. Estudiar la CE permite examinar el emprendimiento a nivel de empresa mediante la aplicación de una perspectiva de capacidad, que se centra en la orquestación que realizan las empresas de sus recursos y capacidades para desarrollar oportunidades. El desarrollo de oportunidades exige a las empresas que integren colectivamente sus capacidades para transformarlas en acciones. Promulgar oportunidades con éxito no trata de tener varias capacidades individuales que pertenezcan a distintas áreas funcionales, sino de saber reconfigurarlas, ya que así se vinculan los diferentes recursos y se incentivan nuevas oportunidades. Por lo tanto, en la tesis presento un enfoque sobre las capacidades y las acciones de las empresas. La tesis está diseñada como un compendio de publicaciones y formada por siete capítulos. Además de la introducción y las conclusiones, los cinco capítulos restantes representan cinco papers individuales que analizan la CE en múltiples contextos. Esto refleja un elevado grado de diversidad, que permite elaborar un estudio detallado sobre la CE en varios contextos. A su vez, se centra en las diferencias entre los tipos de oportunidades que se persiguen y sus implicaciones para integrar las capacidades de las empresas. / The rapidly changing competitive landscape has challenged companies to become more entrepreneurial. Instead of falling prey to ever-changing market forces, some firms have shown great agility as they relentlessly introduce new products, services, and processes. These companies are driven by a continuous quest for opportunities that put their resources to better and more profitable use. The ability to orchestrate firms’ resources and capabilities to realize opportunities is the topic of this dissertation. I refer to this ability as entrepreneurial capability (EC), which is defined as a firm’s overall capacity to use its internal and external resources to continuously pursue opportunities. Therefore, the purpose of this dissertation is to provide a fine grained understanding of EC and examine its variability across five different contexts. Studying EC allows the examination of firm-level entrepreneurship by applying a capability perspective, which focuses on firms’ orchestration of their resources and capabilities to develop opportunities. Opportunity development requires firms to collectively integrate their capabilities to transform them into actions. Successful enactment of opportunities is not about individual capabilities belonging to different functional areas but rather their reconfiguration, which links diverse resources and spurs new opportunities. Thus, this dissertation brings forward a focus on firms’ capabilities and actions. This dissertation is designed as a compendium of publications and is comprised of seven chapters. Besides the introduction and conclusion, the five remaining chapters represent five individual papers that examine EC in multiple contexts. This reflects a high degree of diversity, which allows a close investigation of the manifestation of EC in several contexts. In turn, this brings focus on the differences among the type of opportunities pursued and their implications for integrating firms’ capabilities.

In response to growing concerns about the negative impact of GHG emissions, several countries such as the European Union have adopted a cap-and-trade policy to limit the overall emissions levels. Alternatively, other countries including Argentina, Canada, the United Kingdom, and United States have proposed an intensity-based cap-and-trade system that targets emission intensities, measured in emissions per dollars or unit of output. Arguably,intensity regulations can accommodate future economic growth, reduce cost uncertainty, engage developing countries in international efforts to mitigate climate change, and provide incentives to improve energy efficiency and to use less carbon-intensive fuels. This work models and studies a carbon tax scheme where policy makers set a target emission factor, which is used as an intensity measure, for a specific industry and tax firms if they exceed that limit. The policy aims to promote energy efficiency, alleviate the impact on low emitters, and allow high emitters some flexibility to comply. We examine the effectiveness of the policy in reducing the emission factor due to manufacturing and transportation. The major objective of this research is to provide policy makers with a decision support tool that can aid in investigating the impact of an intensity-based carbon tax on regulated sectors and in finding the tax rate that achieves a target reduction. Therefore, we first propose a social-welfare maximizing model that can serve as a tool to evaluate the economic and environmental impacts of the policy. We compare the outcomes of the intensity-based tax and other existing environmental policies; namely, carbon tax imposed on overall emissions, cap-and-trade systems, and mandatory caps using case studies that are built within the context of the cement industry. The effectiveness of the policy is measured by achieving a balance between the target emission factor and the social welfare. To find the optimal tax rate that achieves a target reduction, we propose a bilevel programming model where at the upper level, the government sets a target emission factor for the industry and taxes firms if they exceed that target, and at the lower level, the industry sets output levels that maximize social welfare. In the design of the policy, the government takes into account the decisions of the producers regarding fuel types and production quantities as well as the decisions of the market regarding demand. To evaluate the effectiveness of the policy, we build case studies in the context of cement industry. The policy is found to be effective in reducing the CO2 emissions by opting for a less carbon-intensive fuel with a little impact on social welfare. To examine the effectiveness of the intensity-based carbon tax on reducing CO2 emissions from transportation, which is a major supply chain activity, we finally propose a bilevel program where at the upper level the government decides on the tax rate and at the lower level firms decide on the design of their supply chain and truck types. The policy is found to be effective in inducing firms to reduce their emission factors and consequently reducing the overall emissions.

The facility layout design problem is a fundamental optimization problem encountered in many manufacturing and service organizations that was originally formulated in 1963 by Armour & Buffa. This thesis derives a convex programming model, IBIMODEL, that is designed to improve upon the ModCoAR model of Anjos & Vannelli for the facility layout problem with unequal areas. The purpose of IBIMODEL is to find 'good' initial locations for the departments that a second model then uses to produce a detailed solution to the facility layout problem. The proposed model has four ideas behind it: unlike ModCoAR, it does not improve the objective function as the departments start overlapping, it takes into account the aspect ratio requirements, it introduces a systematic approach to making parameter choices, and it uses a new second stage recently proposed by Luo, Anjos & Vannelli to obtain the actual facility layouts. In this way, IBIMODEL efficiently generates a reasonably diverse set of superior solutions that allow the second stage to provide a wide variety of layouts with relatively low aspect ratios and total cost. The proposed methodology was implemented and numerical results are presented on well-known large layout problems from the literature. To demonstrate the potential of the combination of IBIMODEL with Luo, Anjos & Vannelli's model, our results are compared with the best layouts found to date for these well-known large facility layout problems. The results support the conclusion that the propose a methodology consistently produces competitive, and often improved, layouts for large instances when compared with other approaches in the literature.

The deregulation of energy markets around the world, including power markets has changed the way operating assets in these markets are managed. Independent power asset owners and even utilities operating in these markets no longer operate their assets based on the cost of service approach that prevailed under regulation. Just as in other competitive markets, the objectives of asset owners in power markets revolve around maximizing profit for their shareholders. To this end, financial valuation of physical assets in power markets should incorporate different strategies that are used by asset operators to maximize profit. A lot of observed strategies in power markets are driven by a number of factors, the key among which are: • asset operators are no longer obligated to supply service or manage their assets in certain prescribed ways, rather they have rights to operate, within applicable market rules, using techniques that maximize their profits, • revenues are driven by uncertain market factors, including power price, cost and/or availability of fuel stock and technical uncertainties, and • power assets have physical operating and equipment constraints and limits. Having flexibilties (“options”) to optimize their assets (inline with shareholders’ objectives), rational asset managers react strategically to gradual arrival of information , given applicable equipment constraints, by revising previous decisions in such a way that only optimal (or near optimal) decisions are implemented. As a result, the appropriate approach to valuing power assets in competitive markets must account for managerial flexibilities or “real options” in the presence of uncertainties and technical constraints. The focus of this work is to develop a robust valuation framework for physical power assets operating in competitive markets such as peaking or mid-merit thermal power plants and baseload power plants. The goal is to develop a modeling framework that can be adapted to different energy assets with different types of operating flexibilities and technical constraints and which can be employed for various purposes such as capital budgeting, business planning, risk management and strategic bidding planning among others. The valuation framework must also be able to capture the reality of power market rules and opportunities, as well as technical constraints of different assets. The modeling framework developed conceptualizes operating flexibilities of power assets as “switching options’ whereby the asset operator decides at every decision point whether to switch from one operating mode to another mutually exclusive mode, within the limits of the equipment constraints of the asset. As a current decision to switch operating modes (in the face of current realization of relevant uncertainty factors) may affect future operating flexibilities of the asset and hence cash flows , a dynamic optimization framework is employed. The developed framework accounts for the uncertain nature of key value drivers by representing them with appropriate stochastic processes. Specifically, the framework developed conceptualizes the operation of a power asset as a multi-stage decision making problem where the operator has to make a decision at every stage to alter operating mode given currently available information about key value drivers. The problem is then solved dynamically by decomposing it into a series of two-stage sub-problems according to Bellman’s optimality principle. The solution algorithm employed is the Least Squares Monte Carlo (LSM) method. The developed valuation framework was adapted for a gas-fired thermal power plant, a peaking hydroelectric power plant and a baseload power plant. This work built on previously published real options valuation methodologies for gas-fired thermal power plants by factoring in uncertainty from gas supply/consumption imbalance which is usually faced by gas-fired power generators. This source of uncertainty which has yet to be addressed in the literature, in the context of real options valuation, arises because of mismatch between natural gas and electricity wholesale markets. Natural gas markets in North America operate on a day-ahead basis while power plants are dispatched in real time. Inability of a power generator to match its gas supply and consumption in real time, leading to unauthorized gas over-run or under-run, attracts penalty charges from the gas supplier to the extent that the generator can not manage the imbalance through other means. A savvy gas-fired power plant operator will factor in the potential costs of gas imbalance into its operating strategies resulting in optimal operating decisions that may be different from when gas-imbalance is not considered. By considering an illustrative power plant operating in Ontario, we show effects of gas-imbalance on dispatch strategies on a daily cycling operation basis and the resulting impact on net revenue. Results show that a gas-fired power plant is over-valued by ignoring the impacts of gas imbalance on valuation. Similarly, we employ the developed valuation framework to value a peaking hydroelectric power plant. This application also builds on previous real options valuation work for peaking hydroelectric power plants by considering their operations in a joint energy and ancillary services market. Specifically, the valuation model is developed to capture the value of a peaking power plant whose owner has the flexibility to participate in a joint operating reserve market and an energy market, which is currently the case in the Ontario wholesale power market. The model factors in water inflow uncertainty into the reservoir forebay of a hydroelectric facility and also considers uncertain energy and operating reserve prices. The switching options considered include (i) a joint energy and operating reserve bid (ii) an energy only bid and (iii) a do nothing (idle) strategy. Being an energy limited power plant, by doing nothing at a decision interval, the power asset operator is able to time-shift scarce water for use at a future period when market situations are expected to be better. An illustrative example considered shows the impact of the different value drivers on the plant’s value and dispatch strategies. Results show that by ignoring the flexibility of the asset owner to participate in an operating reserve market, a peaking hydroelectric power plant is undervalued. Finally, the developed valuation framework was employed to optimize life-cycle management decisions of a baseload power plant, such as a nuclear power plant. The applicability of real-options framework to the operations of baseload power plants has not attracted much attention in the literature given their inflexibility with respect to short-term operation. However, owners of baseload power plants, such as nuclear plants, have the right to optimize scheduling and spending of life cycle management projects such as preventative maintenance and equipment inspection. Given uncertainty of long-term value drivers, including power prices, equipment performance and the relationship between current life cycle spending and future equipment degradation, optimization is carried out with the objective of minimizing overall life-cycle related costs. These life-cycle costs include (i) lost revenue during planned and unplanned outages (ii) potential costs of future equipment degradation due to inadequate preventative maintenance and (iii) the direct costs of implementing the life-cycle projects. The switching options in this context include the option to shutdown the power plant in order to execute a given preventative maintenance and inspection project and the option to keep the option “alive” by choosing to delay a planned life-cycle activity. Results of an illustrative example analyzed show that the flexibility of the asset owner to delay spending or to suspend it entirely affects the asset’s value accordingly and should be factored into valuation. Applications can be found for the developed framework and models in different areas important to firms operating in competitive energy markets. These areas include capital budgeting, trading, risk management, business planning and strategic/tactitcal bidding among others.

Psychological attachment to an entrepreneurial opportunity may motivate the entrepreneur to persevere but can also bias decisions made in the entrepreneurial process, especially on market entry. This thesis investigates how psychological attachment to an entrepreneur’s idea influences decision making at the commercialization stage with special emphasis on control tendencies. Data collected from 106 fourth-year students from the Engineering Design Program at a top engineering-focused Canadian university revealed some interesting results. In the model estimated, the higher the subject’s psychological attachment to the opportunity, the more control oriented the subject was. Interestingly, psychological attachment is a strong predictor of control tendency even when subjects’ perceptions of projected returns (value) are statistically controlled in the analysis. Furthermore, psychological attachment correlates with proxy measures of the level of cognitive evaluation: the indication, affective constructs like psychological attachment elicit affect-laden evaluation of outcomes in a way that is divergent from the cognitive evaluation of commercialization situations. Within a framework of financial decision making, even as subjects generally acknowledged outside investor expertise in a potential commercialization partnership, the main finding was that high levels of attachment are more likely to lead to control-oriented funding preferences over optimal financing preferences. Further, alternative research explanations for control tendency failed to hold, as individual personality-type factors were not significant in explaining the variability in control tendency. Therefore, control tendency may be dependent on attachment to the creative process as opposed to an individual’s personality construct. The results provide insight into the role that affective constructs like psychological attachment and control tendency may play in important decision making in the entrepreneurship process.

Supply chain management is the set of tasks through which businesses acquire, process, and move raw materials and final products from suppliers through factories and distribution points to customers. The mathematical problems encountered in supply chain optimization models are difficult to solve. Free Trade Agreements can simplify the models of inter-company trade between countries. Another way to make these models more tractable is to decompose the complete supply chain into a set of small, manageable units representing businesses or business processes and optimize the system by controlling the interactions between these units. We illustrate such a model and optimize it with genetic-algorithm-controlled Multidisciplinary Design Optimization

The ambulance offload delay problem is a well-known result of overcrowding and congestion in emergency departments. Offload delay refers to the situation where area hospitals are unable to accept patients from regional ambulances in a timely manner due to lack of staff and bed capacity. The problem of offload delays is not a simple issue to resolve and has caused severe problems to the emergency medical services (EMS) providers, emergency department (ED) staff, and most importantly patients that are transferred to hospitals by ambulance. Except for several reports on the problem, not much research has been done on the subject. Almost all research to date has focused on either EMS or ED planning and operation and as far as we are aware there are no models which have considered the coordination of these units. We propose an analytical model which will allow us to analyze and explore the ambulance offload delay problem. We use queuing theory to construct a system representing the interaction of EMS and ED, and model the behavior of the system as a continuous time Markov chain. The matrix geometric method will be used to numerically compute various system performance measures under different conditions. We analyze the effect of adding more emergency beds in the ED, adding more ambulances, and reducing the ED patient length of stay, on various system performance measures such as the average number of ambulances in offload delay, average time in offload delay, and ambulance and bed utilization. We will show that adding more beds to the ED or reducing ED patient length of stay will have a positive impact on system performance and in particular will decrease the average number of ambulances experiencing offload delay and the average time in offload delay. Also, it will be shown that increasing the number of ambulances will have a negative impact on offload delays and increases the average number of ambulances in offload delay. However, other system performance measures are improved by adding more ambulances to the system. Finally, we will show the tradeoffs between adding more emergency beds, adding more ambulances, and reducing ED patient length of stay. We conclude that the hospital is the bottleneck in the system and in order to reduce ambulance offload delays, either hospital capacity has to be increased or ED patient length of stay is to be reduced.

Less-Than-Truckload (LTL) carriers generally serve geographical regions that are more localized than the inter-city routes served by truckload carriers. That localization can lead to urban freight transportation routes that overlap. If trucks are traveling with less than full loads there may exist opportunities for carriers to collaborate over such routes. That is, Carrier A will also deliver one or more shipments of Carrier B. This will improve vehicle asset utilization and reduce asset-repositioning costs, and may also lead to reduced congestion and pollution in cities. We refer to the above coordination as “collaborative routing”. In our framework for collaboration, we also propose that carriers exchange goods at logistics platforms located at the entry point to a city. This is referred to as “entry-point collaboration”. One difficulty in collaboration is the lack of facilities to allow transfer of goods between carriers. We highlight that the reduction in pollution and congestion under our proposed framework will give the city government an incentive to support these initiatives by providing facilities. Further, our analysis has shown that contrary to the poor benefits reported by previous work on vehicle routing with transshipment, strategic location of transshipment facilities in urban areas may solve this problem and lead to large cost savings from transfer of loads between carriers. We also present a novel integrated three-phase solution method. Our first phase uses either a modified tabu search, or a guided local search, to solve the vehicle routing problems with time windows that result from entry-point collaboration. The preceding methods use a constraint programming engine for feasibility checks. The second phase uses a quad-tree search to locate facilities. Quad-tree search methods are popular in computer graphics, and for grid generation in fluid simulation. These methods are known to be efficient in partitioning a two-dimensional space for storage and computation. We use this efficiency to search a two-dimensional region and locate possible transshipment facilities. In phase three, we employ an integrated greedy local search method to build collaborative routes, using three new transshipment-specific moves for neighborhood definition. We utilize an optimization module within local search to combine multiple moves at each iteration, thereby taking efficient advantage of information from neighborhood exploration. Extensive computational tests are done on random data sets which represent a city such as Toronto. Sensitivity analysis is performed on important parameters to characterize the situations when collaboration will be beneficial. Overall results show that our proposal for collaboration leads to 12% and 15% decrease in route distance and time, respectively. Average asset utilization is seen to increase by about 5% as well.

This paper investigates how the size of a firm affects its licensing strategy for patented technologies through empirical analysis of the characteristics at the technological, firm, and industry levels. Only firms with commercialization capabilities are considered in this study in order to compare the incentives of utilizing technologies internally with the incentives of selling them for licensing revenue. Focusing on licensing motivated by non-strategic purposes, empirical analysis shows that large companies are less willing to license patents that fit into their business focus, as well as those which have a low technological value in general. On the other hand, small firms are more inclined to license patents which are more relevant to their business focus, but less innovative on average. This study also finds that market share and competition intensity are important factors in their licensing decisions: the more competitive and the smaller the market share of the patents owned by large firms, the higher the chance that firms will list them on the market. In line with the revenue versus competition framework by Arora and Fosfuri (2003), this paper concludes that large firms are generally more concerned about the rent dissipation effect over the revenue effect from licensing, while the opposite is true for smaller firms.