SLA management in federated environments

Increasingly, Internet services are being deployed over an infrastructure that spans multiple control domains. These services require cooperation between multiple organizations, systems and entities. Currently, few standard mechanisms exist to share selective management information between the various service providers or between service providers and their customers. Such mechanisms are necessary for end-to-end service management and diagnosis as well as for ensuring the service level obligations between a service provider and its customers or partners. This paper describes an architecture that uses contracts based on service level agreements (SLAs) to share selective management information across administrative boundaries. The design of a prototype implementation for automatically measuring, monitoring, and verifying service level agreements for Internet services is also described.     

A custom collaboration service system for idea management of mobile phone design

Customized collaborative service (CCS) systems are defined as the e‐services transforming a business process into a collaborative service model and aiming to facilitate interactions with customers and assist the providers in dealing with collaborative strategies and activities. The demand for such services has grown rapidly in a shift of people out of the manufacturing mindset into the service‐dominant mindset. For example, the mobile‐phone market now tends to customization rather than commoditization, and customer‐driven design strategies increasingly substitute for technology‐driven design strategies. This trend accordingly urges the mobile‐phone companies to center on a customer‐centric idea management process to assure customer idea originality but also sustain the process feasibility for realistic product design. However, a method to engineer such CCS systems has not been addressed. This article presents a prototype system named iMobileDesign to exemplify a CCS system. We present a new methodology to engineer this CCS system aiming to achieve semiautomated value coproduction with productivity and satisfaction. This method comprises two parts: simple service machine (SSM) and intelligent service machine (ISM). Usage of SSM and ISM would lead to the formation of analysis and design of the CCS system that joins the service provider efforts with their customers for ensuring a customer‐centric idea management process. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Model-based services convergence and multi-clouds integration

With the development of cloud computing, IT users (individuals, enterprises and even public services providers) are transferring their jobs or businesses to public online services provided by professional information service companies. These information service companies provide applications as public resources to support the business operation of their customers. However, no cloud computing service vendor (CCSV) can satisfy the full functional information system requirements of its customers. As a result, its customers often have to simultaneously use services distributed in different clouds and do some connectivity jobs manually. Services convergence and multi-clouds integration will lead to new business models and trigger new integration technologies that provide solutions to satisfy IT users’ complicated requirements. This paper firstly reviews the development of cloud computing from business and technical viewpoints and then discusses requirements and challenges of services convergence and multi-clouds integrations. Thirdly, a model based architecture of multi-clouds integration is provided. Business logic modelling for cross-organizational collaboration, service modelling and operation modelling methods with relative model mapping technology are discussed in detail. Some key enabling technologies are also developed. At last, case studies are presented to illustrate the implementation of the technologies developed in the paper.     

Risk in agreement networks

The current trend towards dynamic and highly scalable service provisioning fosters the rise of Software as a Service (SaaS) platforms and manifests the need for dynamic composition of services. In order to enable the combination of services and hence, the collaboration between different service providers, technical challenges like the compatibility of interfaces have to be dealt with. Additionally, economic issues concerning profit, reliability and risk have to be taken into consideration. This work covers economic considerations from the viewpoint of a service intermediary that offers complex services to customers and purchases services from supplying providers. The intermediary has to decide, which SLAs to offer to consumers and which SLAs have to be established with supplying providers. The decision support for the intermediary that is presented throughout this paper is an adaptation of security portfolio optimization stemming from finance. It is based on monitoring data of SLAs that the intermediary had established in the past with consumers and with supplying providers. Finally, the decision support is exemplified in a case-study.     

Event-Based Interaction Management for Composite E-Services in eFlow

The Web is rapidly becoming the platform through which many companies deliver e-services to businesses and individual customers. E-Services are typically delivered in their primitive forms, called basic services. However, today's business environment creates the opportunity for providing value-added, integrated services, delivered by composing existing e-services, possibly offered by different providers.In order to enable organizations to pursue this business opportunity we have developed eFlow, a model and architecture that support the specification, enactment, and management of composite e-services, modeled as processes that are enacted by a process engine. In this paper we focus on one of the most important and innovative aspects of eFlow: that of the integration between service composition and event management. In particular, we extend classic service composition model by allowing composite services to publish and receive events. This capability enables composite services to dynamically exchange data with other applications (in the form of event parameters), to synchronize service invocations with the occurrence of (external or internal) events, and to handle exceptions occurring during service execution. One of our main objectives has been that of defining a model that is easy to understand and easy to use. Indeed, all types of events are handled in the same fashion from the user perspective, and high-level constructs are provided to handle critical events such as those related to time management. Finally, we show how the proposed approach can be implemented by integrating existing technologies.     

Customer Integration during Innovation Development: An Exploratory Study in the Logistics Service Industry

Previous research has shown that though customer integration during innovation development can enhance companies' innovation performance, it can also harm innovativeness. A possible reason for these contradicting findings is that innovation development is a dynamic process that requires different tasks. Thus, a more fine‐grained picture of how customer‐oriented companies engage in customer integration throughout the entire innovation development process is necessary. This article contributes to the innovation and marketing literature by providing insights into how companies co‐create knowledge about customer needs relevant for innovation development. Using a multiple case study design, this study examines four substantive cases that illustrate the activities logistics service providers undertake to integrate customers during the process of idea generation, development and implementation. The results show that companies focus on both proactive and reactive customer integration during idea generation and implementation but refrain from reactive customer integration during development.     

Evaluating the service quality of software providers appraised in CMM/CMMI

Recently, several companies have decided to adopt maturity models such as the CMM/CMMI to ensure quality software processes. The state year report of the Software Engineering Institute (SEI) showed that more than three thousand CMMI appraisals have been conducted since 2002. Many of these were performed at software providers, i.e. companies that develop software for other companies. Although the costs of the implementation and appraisal of CMM/CMMI are high for the software providers, there is no formal study investigating whether this investment pays off or, in other words, whether their customers are measurably satisfied with the quality of the service provided. This article presents the results of a formal evaluation of customer perception of the service quality offered by the software providers appraised in CMM/CMMI. We developed an instrument based on a widely used service quality evaluation model (SERVQUAL) and applied this instrument to several customers of software providers appraised in CMM/CMMI. The results show a considerable discrepancy between customers’ expectations and their perceptions of the services provided.     

A methodical procedure for designing consumer oriented on-demand IT service propositions

IT providers are increasingly facing the challenge to adapt their previously resource oriented service portfolios in order to offer their customers services which explicitly support business processes. Such customer centric service propositions, however, seem to contradict the demand for standardized and automated operational IT processes more than traditional IT service offers, as they are even more subject to customer individual reengineering efforts due to permanently changing business requirements. In order to reconcile increased efficiency in operational processes and effectiveness in consumer oriented service propositions, we propose (1) to predefine all service propositions in consideration of both consumer oriented commitments and operational processes, and (2) to allow for standardized customization by offering a selection of complementary service propositions that extend commitments regarding customer oriented functionality and performance. Such service propositions are aligned with a company’s entities such as workplaces. Thereby the customer organization is enabled to trace, control and adjust commitments, value and expenses of IT services per entity in its business. We introduce a procedural model for designing and on-demand requesting this kind of service propositions, and we illustrate the model’s application and impact by examples taken from two large projects with an associated IT provider.     

IT-gestützte individualisierte Altersvorsorgeberatung

The paper outlines, how financial service providers can generate competitive advantages through innovative IT-support for their financial advisory processes. Therefore a generic concept for individualised financial advisory processes is enhanced by the consideration of tax and social contribution effects. This concept is operationalised for the important field of private retirement planning. Thus IT-support for the process of individualised advice is essential because of its high complexity and enables an individualised optimisation of customers’ portfolios. In cooperation with a German financial service provider this concept is already successfully implemented in a first release and will be extended and improved in the future.     

FCM-based customer expectation-driven service dispatch system

Maintaining long-term customer loyalty has been an important issue in the service industry. Although customer satisfaction can be enhanced with better service quality, delivering appropriate services to customers poses challenges to service providers, particularly in real-time and resource-limited dynamic service contexts. However, customer expectation management has been regarded as an effective way for helping service providers achieve high customer satisfaction in the real world that is nevertheless less real-time and dynamic. This study designs a FCM-based customer expectation-driven service dispatch system to empower providers with the capability to deal effectively with the problem of delivering right services to right customers in right contexts. Our evaluation results show that service providers can make appropriate decisions on service dispatch for customers by effectively managing customer expectations and arranging their contextual limited resources and time via the proposed service dispatch system. Meanwhile, customers can receive suitable service and obtain high satisfaction when appropriate services are provided. Accordingly, a high-performance ecosystem can be established by both service providers and customers who co-create value in the dynamic service contexts.     

Expectation-based coopetition approach to service experience design

Service experience design is a key issue in the service industry. Satisfactory service experiences provide customers with good memories and increase customer satisfaction, thus increasing customer loyalty and service provider profitability. However, providing customers with quality service experiences requires considering numerous factors, and thus is a complex and difficult issue both in academia and in real service contexts. Customer satisfaction results from the difference between customer perceptions and customer expectations. Hence, customer expectation management is important in delivering quality service experiences. Additionally, a competitive relationship exists among different service providers as well as between service providers and customers. The service experience delivery process can be regarded as a value co-creation process for service providers and customers who can implement either a competitive or cooperative strategy based on their goals and needs. This study accordingly presents an expectation based coopetition approach by using a real exhibition data of AutoTronics 2009 for simulations. The evaluation results show that this expectation-based coopetition approach can help service providers design and deliver quality service experiences and co-create value with customers, yielding a high performance ecosystem.     

Cloud computing adoption: an empirical study of customer preferences among start-up companies

Cloud computing represents a paradigm shift to utmost scalable and flexible IT services. However, research related to preferences of certain customers concerning cloud services is scarce. Especially start-up companies with their limited capacities to implement and operate IT infrastructure and their great demand for scalable and affordable IT resources are predestined as customers of cloud based services. In this study, we apply a multi-method approach to investigate customer preferences among start-up companies. Based on a literature review and a market analysis of cloud service models, we propose a set of cloud provider characteristics. These properties were examined among 108 start-up companies and analyzed in three steps using factor analysis to define customer preferences, cluster analysis to identify customer segments and discriminant analysis to validate the identified clusters. The results show that start-ups can be basically divided in five clusters each with certain requirements on cloud provider characteristics.     

A PSO-based intelligent service dispatching mechanism for customer expectation management

In the era of experience economy, service providers have to provide customers with high quality service experience in order to attract more customers and achieve higher customer satisfaction. Managing customer expectation is a critical approach for service providers to consider. Although customer expectation has been discussed across different research disciplines, to our knowledge, there is still no systematical and feasible way to apply customer expectation management into real environments. This study attempts to establish an intelligent service dispatching mechanism by using particle swarm optimization for customer expectation management. This mechanism can help service providers design and deliver satisfactory service experience to customers. In order to evaluate the effectiveness and robustness of this mechanism, this study employs micro- and macro-simulation experiments to confer and analyze its performance. The simulation results show service providers can gain benefit and raise customer satisfaction by managing customer expectation during service experience delivery. Meanwhile, customers can also receive memorable experiences and have positive responses to service providers and other customers. Consequently, a high performance ecosystem within service providers and customers can be formed.     

Combining DEA with location analysis for the effective consolidation of services in the health sector

One of the most important activities of strategic planning in a health-care system is the effective allocation of scarce resources. Most of such strategies are attempting to create more efficient systems based on better organizational and management structures. Therefore, it is necessary to develop systematic models and evaluation methods that will support a strategic planning process that addresses issues such as the location of services and the effective use of resources such as equipment, funds or workforce. Such modeling approaches need to quantify the effect of changes in the location of providers, the opening or closure of providers, and the dynamic transformations of the services offered at each provider. In this paper we propose a methodology that takes into account health service provider efficiencies based on multiple measures. These efficiencies are then employed to determine health providers' locations and service allocations, which include new services distribution as well as existing services redistribution. This approach employs data envelopment analysis (DEA) and integer programming (IP) location allocation models and can be used as both an immediate evaluation tool and a long-term planning aid.     

Performance and capacity evaluations of IP networks and systems

Whether you provide IP networks as a service for hire or run your company's in-house network, keeping the network humming is a major job. Performance and capacity are first on your list of items to measure and evaluate. And as if the IP network itself is not enough to be concerned with, you also have its operation support systems (OSSs)-those for billing, trouble ticketing, reporting, alarm management, and so on-to contend with. Initially, your job is to get an operational service out the door, whether to external or internal customers. The service must meet its promised quality of service (QoS) targets and fulfill service level agreements (SLAs). At this time, the emphasis is on making the service or product operational. Because a service provider normally starts with only a handful of users, performance problems arising from large volumes of traffic do not normally occur. In the long run, however, any network service provider must deal with how to achieve QoS for an entire (and growing) user base. As more users sign on, a service provider wants to fully use the capacity of all resources (contrary to the early stages, when plenty of spare capacity went unused). It will also want to offer new services and account for changes in usage behavior. To deal with these issues, a service provider must determine the performance and/or scalability of its network and OSSs to verify compliance with SLAs; know when to order and add more capacity; and develop a strategy to grow     

Strategic signaling through cloud service certifications: Comparing the relative importance of certifications’ assurances to companies and consumers

Cloud service certifications (CSCs) are assessed by practitioners to support strategic cloud adoption decisions with the aim to reduce information asymmetries. Both businesses and consumers scrutinize CSCs’ assurances as ex ante signals indicating a cloud provider’s future service quality. While some research has examined the aggregate effects of certifications on decision variables, recipients’ evaluations of certifications and their assurances before making IT-related decisions have received little attention. Furthermore, prior research has predominantly focused on privacy and security assurances in e-commerce certifications. Drawing on signaling theory, we propose that certifications are signals that recipients decompose into a set of fine-grained assurance signals that they weigh to evaluate certifications. We evaluate the responses of 113 company representatives and 317 consumers to a best-worst scaling survey to examine the relative importance these two groups attach to ten assurances from CSCs. Our results show that similar to other online contexts, security and privacy are important assurances, but additional assurances related to availability, the customer friendliness of contracts, and legal compliance are also demanded, particularly by companies. Privacy, security, and availability are most crucial to both companies and consumers, but their relative importance varies substantially between the two groups. Post-hoc subgroup analyses reveal significant differences in assurances’ relative importance for provider and user companies, adopter and non-adopter consumers as well as companies using different types of services and from different industries. Our findings indicate that recipients evaluate certifications as a bundle of signals with varying importance due to recipients’ characteristics and context. With this conceptualization, we contribute to an advanced understanding of the sense-making of certifications and lay out how it influences cloud service adoption theories. Our study has practical implications for certification authorities that design CSCs as well as for providing insights to cloud service providers on customers who draw on CSC assurances when making cloud service adoption decisions.     

IaaS云服务定价机制的仿真研究

定价机制是影响云计算用户利益和云服务提供商收益的关键因素。本文以IaaS云服务定价机制为研究对象,首先将IaaS云服务定价机制分为固定定价和动态定价2大类,其中固定定价细分为即用即付费和预订定价2种,从理论上分析2类定价机制对IaaS云服务提供商收益的影响;然后,分别建立即用即付费和预订定价机制下IaaS云服务提供商的收益模型,并用启发式算法构建动态定价机制下IaaS云服务提供商的收益模型;最后,基于Repast Simphony建立多主体仿真模型,比较分析3种不同定价机制下IaaS云服务提供商的收益。研究结果表明,随着服务时长和顾客数量的增加,动态定价机制更能为IaaS云服务提供商带来更多收益,同时IaaS云服务提供商可以通过改变服务等级和资源价格等相关参数,改变顾客行为,使顾客数量增加,从而提高收益。     

From self-service to super-service: a resource mapping framework for co-creating value by shifting the boundary between provider and customer

Improved understanding of how interactions between service providers and customers create value, along with advances in technology, can expand and redefine the roles of both provider and customer in the service delivery process. The traditional boundary between provider and customer can shift toward self service, with the customer performing many of the tasks previously done by the provider, as in self-service check-in at the airport or self-serve salad bars in restaurants. Alternatively, the boundary can shift in the opposite direction—toward what we define as super service—with the provider performing many tasks previously done by the customer, such as a car rental company that delivers vehicles to customers or automatic bill paying services provided by banks. Why do providers shift this boundary in one direction or the other? Increased competition, changing customer attitudes, and new technologies all contribute to the development of new self-service and new super-service delivery configurations. But these new configurations are only effective when they can create additional value for both provider and customer. In this paper, we introduce a resource mapping framework for shifting the service boundary effectively. This framework allows us to examine the continuum of options from self service to super service from a service systems perspective to identify conditions under which shifting the provider-customer boundary creates value.     

Service interaction design: A Hawk-Dove game based approach to managing customer expectations for oligopoly service providers

In the “experience economy”, effectively delivering memorable and exciting customer experiences has become a key issue for service providers. Service experience delivery involves service encounters through which interactions between service providers and customers can be shaped into interactive artifacts managing customer expectations and dynamically delivering suitable services. Service interaction design aims to optimize customer interactions with services to match customer expectations and yield satisfactory service experiences. On the other hand, service providers typically make profits and cost the priority, despite knowing that high service quality can maximize satisfaction, particularly in markets served by an oligopoly, resulting in customers only accepting existing limited-value services. Hence, the oligopoly market can be regarded as a value-bounded context. Additionally, understanding customer expectations regarding a wide range of interactions is crucial to service providers selecting and designing services that match customer expectations. Therefore, this paper presents a service interaction design mechanism to help oligopoly service providers systematically and effectively manage customer expectations in dynamic interactions, even in value-bounded contexts. The proposed mechanism models this service interaction design problem as a series of Hawk-Dove games that approach an evolutionary stable state. The evaluation results suggest that oligopoly service providers should change their mindsets and design service interactions to manage customer expectations associated with service delivery, not only to ensure high satisfaction and profit but also to engage customers in co-creating value.     

4CaaSt marketplace: An advanced business environment for trading cloud services

As Clouds mature and become ubiquitous, marketplace environments are developed facilitating the provision of services in a manner that emphasizes on the modular composition of individual services across different providers that crosscut the cloud service stack layers (i.e. composition of XaaS) to fulfil customers’ requirements. Besides acting as intermediaries for the search, selection and trading of services, such marketplaces should also support the complete service lifecycle and the consolidation of offerings from different providers with varying and often contradicting business goals. In this paper we present a one-stop cloud marketplace solution that addresses the aforementioned challenges while enabling the simulation of different business cases to optimize service offerings according to a wide and dynamic set of parameters. Moreover, the proposed solution introduces advanced aggregated price models and integrates a new resolution approach that incorporates business intelligence into the search and selection processes. We also demonstrate the operation of the implemented approach and evaluate its effectiveness using a real-world scenario, based on a taxi fleet management application.