Introduktion: Ökade transporter på den globala marknaden påverkar miljön negativt. Detta har lett till ett ökat intresse för mer hållbara logistiklösningar. Transportföretagen spelar en stor roll för att uppnå de satta miljömålen. Syfte: Syftet med studien är att undersöka hur transportföretag arbetar med hållbarhetsfrågor idag och vilka faktorer som kommer vara viktiga i framtiden. Metod: För att kunna svara mot syftet antogs ett angreppssätt i två steg. Litteratur samlades in och användes som grund för kunskap inom området. Samtidigt som intervjuer genomfördes med tre transportföretag. Deras svar jämfördes med varandra och ställdes mot den insamlade teorin i en analys. Utifrån denna analys drogs en slutsats. Resultat: De två mindre företagen hade inga kundkrav på sig angående hållbarhet, deras arbete kom främst inifrån. För alla deltagande företag innebär hållbarhet mest miljödimensionen. Fokus för alla ligger på att minska koldioxidutsläppen, främst genom val av miljöklassade fordon, val av drivmedel samt minskning av bränsleåtgången. Transportföretagen är miljöcertifierade och arbetar kontinuerligt med att bli bättre i sitt miljöarbete. De har utbildat sina chaufförer och satt in IT-system för direkt återkoppling, detta gör att förarna lättare kan tänka på miljön i sin körning. För att uppnå en hög fyllnadsgrad gäller det att utnyttja lastkapaciteten till max och undvika tomma körningar. Därför samarbetar företagen med konkurrenter och hämtar gods åt varandra. Slutsats: Det finns hjälpmedel att tillämpa för att erhålla hållbarare transporter. Dessa är val av fordon, val av bränsle, utbildning, IT-system, packningslösningar och samkörning. De viktigaste faktorerna för transportföretagen är idag val av fordon, drivmedel och bränsleåtgången. Inför framtiden händer det mycket på bränslefronten, bland annat en utveckling gällande elfordon och elvägar samt biobränslen. Även en attitydförändring gällande hållbarhet för uppköparna av transporttjänster behövs då det i dagsläget fokuseras för mycket på priset. / Introduction: Increased transports on the global market is effecting the environment negatively, which has led to an increased interest in sustainable logistics. The logistics service providers (LSPs) play a major role in achieving the set environmental goals. Purpose: The purpose of this study is to examine how LSPs can be more sustainable today and in the future. Methodology: In order to answer the purpose of the paper two phases were used. Literature was collected and used as the basis of knowledge in the field. At the same time interviews were conducted with three LSPs. Their answers were compared with each other and with the literature. From the analysis a conclusion was drawn. Results: The two smaller companies had no demands from customers regarding their work with sustainability. For all the involved LSPs sustainability mostly meant the environmental aspect. Their focus is on reducing carbon dioxide emissions, this is achieved by using environmentally certified vehicles, choice of fuels and reducing the fuel consumption. The three LSPs all have an environmental management system and work continuously to be more sustainable. They have trained their drivers and have set up an IT-system for direct feedback. This helps the drivers to see the impact their driving has on the environment. To achieve a high fill ratio the companies avoid empty runs and try to maximize the cargo capacity. The LSPs collaborate with competitors and pick up cargo for each other. Conclusion: There are tools to apply to obtain more sustainable transports. These are the choice of vehicle, the choice of fuel, fuel consumption, training, IT-systems, packaging solutions and collaboration. The most important factors for the LSPs today are the choice of vehicles, the choice of fuel and fuel consumptions. A lot is happening in the area of alternative fuels including the development of biofuels, electric vehicles and electric roads. Also a change of attitude from the transport buyers regarding the sustainability is needed because today they mainly focus on the price.

Wang, Jingjing. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2013. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 58-62). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstracts also in Chinese.

The National Health Laboratory Service is a single national entity to provide laboratory services to the public sector in SA. The NHLS came into being by amalgamating five large independent pathology service providers. The research will provide insight on how to manage change and stakeholder relations during mergers.

Our study on interdomain traffic engineering focuses on AS Path Prepending (ASPP), a popular way for inbound traffic engineering. In order to improve the current situation that ISPs often practise this approach in a trial-and-error basis, we propose a greedy algorithm to help ISPs perform this approach systematically and efficiently. Then we demonstrate two fundamental issues of decentralized selfish traffic engineering, routing instability and global network performance degradation, based on an abstract model where ISPs perform traffic engineering for their individual load balance. We also present a real-world pathologic case of prepending instability from our measurement study. Some simple guidelines are given for ISPs to avoid such routing instability. / Our work on peering strategy is to help ISPs understand the economic implications of various traffic patterns and make proper decisions to optimize their business. We first conduct an economic analysis for an overlay streaming network to gain some insights on the free ride phenomenon. We further improve the analysis by taking the response of subscribers into consideration and formulate the dynamic market as a multi-leader-follower game to capture the Nash Equilibrium of the routing tussle among the major players of the Internet marketplace. Based on this framework together with a gravity traffic model, we present some important observations on the implications of overlays on ISPs' peering strategy. / Over the past several years, numerous types of "overlay" networks change the interdomain traffic pattern and ISPs lose the routing control of some interdomain traffic flows due to the application layer routing. As a result, some ISPs may provide unintended transit service for other local ISPs. It upsets the traditional business model and makes ISPs' peering strategies more complicated. / The Internet has quickly evolved into a vast global network owned and operated by thousands of interconnected Internet Service Providers. Each of these ISPs, as one autonomous system, has its individual economic interests. ISPs can achieve their objectives through peering strategy and interdomain traffic engineering. These two issues are important for ISPs' business and have significant implications on the Internet architecture. / Wang, Hui. / "September 2007." / Adviser: Dah Ming Chiu. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 69-08, Section: B, page: 4865. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2007. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 163-170). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. [Ann Arbor, MI] : ProQuest Information and Learning, [200-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstracts in English and Chinese. / School code: 1307.

Cheung, Yang. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 85-89). / Abstracts in English and Chinese. / Abstract --- p.i / Acknowledgement --- p.iv / Chapter 1 --- Introduction --- p.1 / Chapter 2 --- Related Works --- p.4 / Chapter 2.1 --- Pricing Mechanisms --- p.4 / Chapter 2.1.1 --- Current Situation --- p.4 / Chapter 2.1.2 --- Proposed Pricing Mechanisms --- p.6 / Chapter 2.1.3 --- Congestion Pricing --- p.9 / Chapter 2.1.4 --- Bandwidth Allocation Mechanism --- p.10 / Chapter 2.2 --- Revenue Distribution Mechanisms --- p.12 / Chapter 2.2.1 --- Current Situation --- p.12 / Chapter 2.2.2 --- Novel Revenue Distribution Mechanisms --- p.13 / Chapter 3 --- Problems in Revenue Collecting Stage --- p.16 / Chapter 3.1 --- Introduction --- p.17 / Chapter 3.1.1 --- Desirable Characteristics of Internet Pricing Mechanism --- p.19 / Chapter 3.1.2 --- Existing Solution --- p.21 / Chapter 3.1.3 --- Applying Insurance into Internet Pricing --- p.22 / Chapter 3.2 --- The Internet Pricing Model --- p.25 / Chapter 3.2.1 --- System Model --- p.25 / Chapter 3.2.2 --- Decisions Time Scales --- p.27 / Chapter 3.2.3 --- Micro Time Scale Pricing --- p.28 / Chapter 3.2.4 --- Macro Time Scale Pricing --- p.29 / Chapter 3.3 --- Actuarially Fair Coinsurance Function --- p.30 / Chapter 3.3.1 --- The Actuarially Fair Coinsurance Function --- p.32 / Chapter 3.3.2 --- Properties of the Actuarially Fair Coinsurance Function --- p.34 / Chapter 3.3.3 --- How Much Insurance Should a User Buy? --- p.35 / Chapter 3.3.4 --- Numerical Examples --- p.37 / Chapter 3.4 --- Premium Coinsurance Function --- p.40 / Chapter 3.4.1 --- Problems of Allowing Pull Insurance --- p.41 / Chapter 3.4.2 --- The Premium Coinsurance Function --- p.43 / Chapter 3.4.3 --- Properties of the premium coinsurance function --- p.44 / Chapter 3.4.4 --- Numerical Example --- p.46 / Chapter 4 --- Problems in Revenue Distributing Stage --- p.48 / Chapter 4.1 --- Introduction --- p.50 / Chapter 4.2 --- System Models --- p.52 / Chapter 4.2.1 --- Topology Model --- p.52 / Chapter 4.2.2 --- Traffic Model --- p.54 / Chapter 4.3 --- Settlement Model and Definition of Fair Price --- p.55 / Chapter 4.3.1 --- Bilateral Settlement --- p.55 / Chapter 4.3.2 --- Shapley Settlement --- p.58 / Chapter 4.4 --- Fair Price Achieving the Shapley Value: The Symmetric Case --- p.61 / Chapter 4.5 --- Properties of the Fair Prices in the Symmetric Case --- p.65 / Chapter 4.5.1 --- Sensitivity to traffic pattern α --- p.65 / Chapter 4.5.2 --- Sensitivity to network topology parame- ters p and d --- p.67 / Chapter 4.6 --- Fair Price Achieving the Shapley Value: The Asym- metric Case --- p.70 / Chapter 4.7 --- Distributed and Local Approximation of the Fair Price --- p.71 / Chapter 5 --- Conclusions --- p.74 / Chapter A --- Mathematical Proofs --- p.77 / Chapter A.l --- Mathematical Proof for Chapter 3 --- p.77 / Chapter A.1.1 --- Proof of Theorem 3.3.2 --- p.77 / Chapter A.1.2 --- Proof of Proposition 3.3.5 --- p.77 / Chapter A.1.3 --- Proof of Proposition 3.3.6 --- p.78 / Chapter A.1.4 --- Proof of Proposition 3.3.7 --- p.78 / Chapter A.1.5 --- Proof of Proposition 3.4.1 --- p.79 / Chapter A.1.6 --- Proof of Proposition 3.4.3 --- p.79 / Chapter A.1.7 --- Proof of Proposition 3.4.5 --- p.80 / Chapter A.2 --- Mathematical Proof for Chapter 4 --- p.81 / Chapter A.2.1 --- Proof of Theorem 4.4.2 --- p.81 / Chapter A.2.2 --- Proof of Theorem (4.6.1) --- p.83 / Chapter A.2.3 --- Terms Description of Equation (4.1) --- p.84 / Bibliography --- p.85

This thesis presents a complete alternative service composition model named Service Trading Marketplace Network (STAMP-Net). The primary concept is to improve overall system scalability and introduce a fair business scheme for customers and providers. STAPM-Net focuses on designing an architecture based on both technical and business aspect. In STAMP-NET, users remain the ability to choose their preference service providers from potential-provider lists, and service providers are able to compete for the requested services that they can handle. For these purposes, STAMP-Net introduce a concept of 'Service Trading Marketplace Mechanism' which facilitates a problem of 'conflict of interest'; 'Indirect Service Discovery' which allows service providers to the learn existing of services being offered by other service providers; and 'Service Subcontract System' which allows service providers to subcontract any missing service to other potential service providers. In addition, this thesis also present monitor techniques, which are used to ensure the quality of services.

Traditionally human resource functions are performed in house, but recently the subject on outsourcing human resources is becoming more and more popular. According to an article published in 2004 by the INC. 500 magazine, 18 human resource service providers were chosen to be the most fast growing corporation in the US, in the mean time the Fortune 500 and Forbes 500 corporations listings both had human resource business process outsourcing firms listed inside. This research focuses on successful human resource service providers in Taiwan, the main objective will be finding out what current environment are they facing and what kinds of corporate resources do they possess to cope with their business operational needs. Using these findings as the basis, we employ the Transaction Cost Theory to do further analyze in their competitive and strategy model. Further more, by applying these strategies what economical profit can the service provider bring to there customers. In this research, we use a case study approach and employ the in-depth interview technique which includes five global human resource service provider¡¦s Taiwan branch as are research sample. Moreover, by using domestic and international references as auxiliaries, we can draw out the business model of the human resource service providers. The inference of this thesis is that corporate resources and brand can decrease the transaction cost triggered by outsourcing activities, and by decreasing transaction cost the service providers can establish trusting and cooperative relationships more successfully. When trusting relationships are in place, service providers can deliver more added value and economic profits based on their originally service content. Last but not least, by absorbing the feedback from satisfied customers, human resource service providers can accumulate solid professional knowledge and increase brand value.

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Recent years witness the proliferation of Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) cloud services, which provide on-demand resources (CPU, RAM, disk, etc.) in the form of virtual machines (VMs) for hosting services of third parties. As such, the way of enabling scalable and dynamic Internet applications has been remarkably revolutionized. More and more Application Service Providers (ASPs) are launching their applications in clouds, eliminating the need to construct and operate their owned IT hardware and software. Given the state-of-the-art IaaS offerings, it is still a problem of fundamental importance how the ASPs should rent VMs from the clouds to serve their application needs, in order to minimize the cost while meeting their job demands over a long run. Cloud providers offer different pricing options to meet computing requirements of a variety of applications. The commonly adopted cloud pricing schemes are (1) reserved instance pricing, (2) on-demand instance pricing, and (3) spot instance pricing. However, the challenge facing an ASP is how these pricing schemes can be blended to accommodate arbitrary demands at the optimal cost. In this thesis, we seek to integrate all available pricing options and design effective online algorithms for the long-term operation of ASPs. We formulate the long-term-averaged VM cost minimization problem of an ASP with time-varying and delay-tolerant workloads in a stochastic optimization model. An efficient online VM purchasing algorithm is designed to guide the VM purchasing decisions of the ASP based on the Lyapunov optimization technique. In stark contrast with the existing studies, our online VM purchasing algorithm does not require any a priori knowledge of the workload or any future information. Moreover, it addresses the possible job interruption due to uncertain availability of spot instances. Rigorous analysis shows that our algorithm can achieve a time-averaged VM purchasing cost with a constant gap from its offline minimum. Trace-driven simulations further verify the efficacy of our algorithm. / published_or_final_version / Computer Science / Master / Master of Philosophy

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