i Interested in guest editing a special theme issue of IRMJ? Contact the editor at [email protected] Small and medium-sized firms (SMEs) are a vibrant part of all economies. Although the definition of an SME varies, for most economies, the focus is on firms with less than than 250 employees. The changes engendered by large corporations that focus on their core compe-tencies have fostered a re...

We present a new generic minimum cross-entropy method, called the semiiterative MinxEnt, or simply SME, for rare-event probability estimation, counting, and approximation of the optimal solutions of a broad class of NP-hard linear integer and combinatorial optimization problems (COP’s). The main idea of our approach is to associate with each original problem an auxiliary single-constrained conv...

Consumer use of Web 2.0 and social media is well documented. However, the use of such technologies by SMEs has received relatively little attention and the literature has focused on the major social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter. In this paper the focus is on a different type of social media website, which is termed SME Social Media Platforms. These are websites designed specific...

Received: 3 March 2005 Accepted: 21 September 2005 Abstract Regional electronic marketplaces (REMs) have been used to promote ecommerce uptake by small and medium enterprises (SMEs). However, the community and regional economic development motives underpinning REM creation can cause complexities. While REM development and management can be informed by existing theoretical frameworks, there is n...

Owner/managers of small-to-medium enterprises (SMEs) are an under-researched population in terms of psychological distress and the associated health and economic consequences. Using baseline data from the evaluation of the Business in Mind program, a mental health promotion intervention amongst SME owner/managers, this study investigated: (i) prevalence of high/very high psychological distress,...

The effects of extrusion conditions on cooking degree, flour dispersion viscosity and mineral potential availability of extruded bean flour were studied. Phaseolus vulgaris beans of the agronomic cultivar "Flor de mayo" were ground and dehulled to obtain grits and then extruded at different temperatures (140, 160 and 180 degrees C) and moisture contents (17, 20 and 23%), according to a bifactor...

BACKGROUND More than 90 % of exercise-related cardiac arrests occur in men, predominantly those aged 45 years and older with coronary artery disease (CAD) as the main cause. The current sports medical evaluation (SME) of middle-aged recreational athletes consists of a medical history, physical examination, and resting and exercise electrocardiography. Coronary CT (CCT) provides a minimally inva...

Previous research which consolidates the growing body of academic literature on small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and electronic business (eBusiness) has taken the form of meta-analyses which focus on analysing adoption factors, pre-2000 articles and a small number of journals. This paper makes a valuable contribution to the analysis of SME-eBusiness research by addressing the limitations of ...

Danshensu (DSU) and salvianolic acid B (SAB) are the primary water-soluble compounds of Salvia miltiorrhiza Bunge (Lamiaceae). In this study, we analyzed the effects of DSU, SAB and a S. miltiorrhiza extract (SME) on cell proliferation. Additionally, the effects of DSU and SAB on collagen synthesis in Detroit 551 human normal fibroblast cells and on melanin production in B16 melanoma cells were...