In future electricity industry transferring high quality of power is essential. In this case, using Flexible AC Transmission System (FACTS) devices is inevitable. FACTS devices are used for controlling the voltage, stability, power flow and security of transmission lines. Therefore, finding the optimal locations for these devices in power networks is necessary. There are several varieties of FACTS devices with different characteristics, deployed for different purposes. Imperialist Competitive (IC) algorithm is a recently developed optimization technique, applied in power systems. IC algorithm is a new heuristic approach for global optimization searches based on the concept of imperialistic competition. In this paper, an IEEE 4-bus system is deployed as a case study in order to demonstrate the results of this novel approach using MATLAB.

This paper presents a survey to identify and rank the supply chain management factors influencing the quality of the products for small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in food industry. The study designs a questionnaire in Likert scale and distributes it among 238 randomly selected managers of SMEs in food industry in city of Tehran, Iran. Cronbach alpha is calculated as 0.851, which is well above the acceptable level. Using principle component with Varimax rotation, the study has determined four important factors including strategic management, product management, manufacturing process management, organizational resources, customer orientation, industry capacity, which influence the most on product quality improvement.

The outset of new technologies, systems and applications in manufacturing sector has no doubt lighten up our workload, yet the chance causes of variation in production system cannot be eliminated completely. Every produced/ordered lot may have some fraction of defectives which may vary from process to process. In addition the situation is more susceptible when the items are deteriorating in nature. However, the defective items can be secluded from the good quality lot through a careful inspection process. Thus, a screening process is obligatory in today’s technology driven industry which has the customer satisfaction as its only motto. Moreover, in order to survive in the current global markets, credit financing has been proven a very influential promotional tool to attract new customers and a good inducement policy for the retailers. Keeping this scenario in mind, the present paper investigates an inventory model for a retailer dealing with imperfect quality deteriorating items under permissible delay in payments. Shortages are allowed and fully backlogged. This model jointly optimizes the order quantity and shortages by maximizing the expected total profit. A mathematical model is developed to depict this scenario. Results have been validated with the help of numerical example. Comprehensive sensitivity analysis has also been presented.

Today, the retail industry has been overgrowing in offering various products to its customers. The retailer needs excellent support from the supplier to replenish the requirement based on the demand. This support can be achieved by using a secure and fast information system. Retailers, suppliers, and customers should be integrated using information technology and also practicing supply chain management for the benefit of all parties. This study examined the influence of supply chain practices on retailer performance and moderated by information technology. The study has surveyed eighty-six (86) retailer, using a questionnaire, domiciled in the city of Surabaya, Indonesia. Data analysis used SPSS software version 25 to examine the hypothesis. The results showed that supply chain practices had a direct impact on retailer performance; secondly, information technology moderated the effect of supply chain management practices on retailer performance with an increase of 14.70%. Finally, information technology had an impact on increasing retailer performance. This research has an impact on modern retailers to keep adjusting their business with the use of information technology. This finding also contributes to the current research in supply chain management.

In this paper, an inventory model is studied with ramp type demand rate where holding cost is expressed as linearly increasing function of time. The study includes some features that are likely to be associated with certain types of inventory, like inventory of seasonal fruits and vegetables, newly launched fashion items, etc. When stock on hand is zero, the inventory manager offers a price discount to customers who are willing to backorder their demand. The optimum ordering policy and the optimum discount offered for each backorder are determined by minimizing the total cost in a replenishment interval.

For measuring the efficiency of management of cash, cash holding is one of the most important financial decisions that the manager of the concerned organization, has to make in the organization. Basically, it is observed that the organization hold cash for future purposes is very negligible. If the organization invested cash in profitable securities then there is some flexibility but when it relates to the capital market holding cash is not advantageous. Generally two contradictory theories such as Trade-off theory and the Pecking order theory are considered for measuring the efficiency of cash management. In this study we generally observed measured the efficiency of Cash Management influenced by Cash Holding. We also measured whether cash holding of the organization is affected with the degree of financial leverage, size of the organization, investment and profitability. This study helps us to understand the influence of DFL, Investment and Size of the organization on Cash holding. Proper holding of cash in cash management can prevent the bankruptcy of any organization and also increases the efficiency of Cash or Liquidity management.

This study sought to determine the effect of business regulation on social progress. The dependent variable, social progress, was measured in terms of social progress index of the sampled countries. On the other hand, the independent variable, business regulation, was measured in terms of business regulation score. Consequently, the study used secondary data from a sample of 248 countries over a period of five years (2014-2018). In order to determine the appropriate model for analysis, the study conducted the Hausman test where it was established that the random effect model was more appropriate as compared to the fixed effect model. Using the Stata computer program to run multiple regression analysis of the random effect model, the study findings indicated that business regulation has a positive and significant effect on social progress as given across all the six models that were estimated in this study. However, the overall effect of regulation, as given by the estimated regression coefficients under the respective models, kept varying with the introduction of an additional control variable. These findings were in accordance with the study expectations that business regulation significantly affects social progress. Further, the findings implied that, governments should devote additional resources towards addressing the social indicators of progress to meaningfully improve the living standards of residents, instead of solely focusing on economic and environmental factors. On the other hand, considering that the current study did not categorize countries according to their levels of development, it recommends for further research to determine the effect of business regulation on social progress in low-income, middle-income, and high-income countries to allow for comparison of findings from countries that are at different levels of development.

In recent decays, there has been an extensive improvement in technology and knowledge; hence, human societies have started to fortify their urban environment against the natural disasters in order to diminish the context of vulnerability. Local administrators as well as government officials are thinking about new options for disaster management programs within their territories. Planning to set up local disaster management facilities and stock pre-positioning of relief items can keep an urban area prepared for a natural disaster. In this paper, based on a real-world case study for a municipal district in Tehran, a multi-objective mathematical model is developed for the location-distribution problem. The proposed model considers the role of demand in an urban area, which might be affected by neighbor wards. Integrating decision-making process for a disaster helps to improve a better relief operation during response phase of disaster management cycle. In the proposed approach, a proactive damage estimation method is used to estimate demands for the district based on worst-case scenario of earthquake in Tehran. Since such model is designed for an entire urban district, it is considered to be a large-scale mixed integer problem and hence, a genetic algorithm is developed to solve the model.

Servant Leadership is well known as an employee-oriented leadership style which is used by several major corporations. This work investigates the effects that Servant Leadership may have on the success of Information Technology (IT) projects. To estimate these effects via structural equation modelling (SEM) this study is based on already established models: the model of Servant Leadership developed by Van Dierendonck and Nuijten and the model of IT project success developed by Harwardt. Three of the Servant Leadership dimensions have positive impact on the success dimensions IT project. The Servant Leadership Dimension Accountability has a positive impact on the dimensions Project management success, Perception success and Result success. Authenticity has a positive impact on Project management success and Result success, whereas Forgiveness affects only Result success.

Due to environmental issues, social concerns, increased pollution and enforced regulations; organizations are focusing to include green practices in their supply chain. This can be accomplished by adoption of green supply chain management (GSCM) practices. Therefore, GSCM is now a proactive approach for firms to increase their ecological performance, corporate image, achieve competitive advantages and sustainable business practices. This study identifies, evaluate and analyze the critical factors (CFs) for successful implementation of GSCM practices. The proposed study uses hybrid Fuzzy DEMATEL model to prioritize the identified critical success factors (CSFs) for GSCM adoption. Fuzzy approach is integrated with DEMATEL to deal with uncertainty arises in decision making process. To demonstrate the application of the proposed approach a case study from electronic industry is considered. This approach investigates the cause and effect relationships among the CFs for successful adoption of GSCM practices in Indian electronic organizations.