Faculty of Logistics

Technological and organizational excellence is the key element for business success in any modern business and project environment. Post globalization and instable business environments demand permanent improvements and changes of business processes. "Open the boxes" and exchange information, ideas and set-up collaboration with stakeholders such as customers, end-users, clients, vendors, business partners, potential competitors — this is a challenge of current (project-) organizations and their innovative environments. The open innovation environment concept was born in 2003, presented by professor Chesbrough from Berkley. Since then, researchers and practitioners are searching for successful applications of this idea. How we can improve the performance of large infrastructure projects by using this concept of work will be presented in this paper. The theoretical introduction will be illustrated by practical example of the existing NETLIPSE knowledge network. NETLIPSE is t...

This document provides a guidebook for the constitution of the new robotics Competence Centres elaborated in the HORSE project.<br> A Competence Centre is a facility or an entity that provides leadership, evangelization, best practices, research, support and/or training for a focus area. Competence Centres are instruments promoted by the I4MS1 program to support the European leadership in manufacturing through the adoption of ICT technologies. HORSE project supported the creation and development of four Competence Centres dedicated to robotics in France (Paris-Saclay), Germany (Munich), the Netherlands (Delft) and Slovenia (Celje). The Competence Centres provide robotics equipment and services to facilitate the appropriation of robotics by manufacturing industries. All Competence Centres offer places to assess and enhance the capacities of the OSGi-based HORSE framework developed during the project.<br>

Technological and organizational excellence is the key element for business success in a modern business environment. In contemporary business environments, companies will restore and keep their competition capability not only by optimizing their own potentials, but mainly by utilizing capability of foreign resources and their connection to complete business process in the so called network organizations. Virtual organizations are a special form of network organizations. Among virtual organizations the so called Living Laboratory takes place. This chapter presents the findings of the research regarding the state of development and application of laser living laboratory management and governance system in Toolmakers Cluster of Slovenia.

In the modern business world, the networked organizational connections tend to become prevailing organizational form. However, virtual organizations represent a special form of network organization. The backbone of virtual organization is its information system. To obtain successful and efficient operating of virtual organization, its strategic information system is of key importance. Strategic Information System (SIS) is a type of Information System that is aligned with business strategy and structure. SIS is designed to support and increase the competitive strength of a VO. We have upgraded Anthony's paradigm, and taken into consideration the changes in the field of organization and management of modern network companies. This includes also the aspect of assuring the suitable information support to corporate management, which has to provide, at different levels and areas of operation, successful and effective management of corporate business processes in virtual environment. In the paper the aspect of defining possible fields of application of the SIS and the study of their characteristics are discussed. The theory is supported and illustrated by the LENS (Laser Engineered Net Shaping) Living Laboratory case study.

This paper provides a dynamic model for reducing the number of motorway accidents due to wrong-way driving. Motorway accidents are often fatal due to high speeds. It is therefore necessary to carry out all possible countermeasures in order to achieve adequate traffic management. One of the reasons for motorway accidents is driving in the wrong direction. Based on the analysis of the data on motorway accidents caused by driving in the wrong direction and based on the knowledge of individual project elements of junctions and slip roads, this paper will focus on this area. The possible countermeasures, presented here for preventing drivers from driving in the wrong direction on motorways drastically reduce the number of U-turn maneuvers that result in driving in the wrong direction and influence the level of safety on motorways. With the help of this model of system dynamics the countermeasures for reducing the number of such drivers will be confirmed and their effects will be shown.

The extent to which relationships in organizations are co-operative depends on the level of internal integration between functional and departmental groups. These relationships become even more critical in international businesses as well as in geographically dislocated subsidiaries. Cultural characteristics and different factors which managr, facilitatr and/or hinder internal integration present the basis for studying internal integration of different functions. Therefore, the following paper discusses various theories of internal integration and its role in organizations. More specifically, it focuses on logistics and marketing functions and explores studies that have investigated and examined the levels of internal integration of logistics and marketing functions. With the objective to identify potential implications, high/low levels of internal integration may have on intercultural communication which occurs in international business practices, the most prominent cultural frameworks are presented to identify implications different levels of internal integration may have for intercultural communication, in particular between Slovenian companies and their foreign subsidiaries.

—The paper addresses an introduction to the structural equation modeling (SEM), the insight into the methodology, and the importance of this statistical technique for practical applications. SEM is a very powerful statistical modeling tool, which incorporates the measurements models and the path models into the comprehensive covariance structure analysis framework. Herein, the exploratory analysis (EFA) and the confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) are usually employed as the intermediate stages of the modeling design. The main intent of this work is to inform the interesting readers about all the potentials, which can be conducted when use this technique. For encouraging the interested researchers, who are new in this field, the main steps and characteristics of SEM methodology are briefly presented. A short overview of applications based on this advanced statistical methodology is also provided, with emphasis on supply chain (SC) management applications, which study the impact of integration between individual players on the SCperformance. An investigaton of Port Economics applications based on SEM is also inspected in this work.

The performance of the tourism supply chain depends on the efficiency of the members involved. A significant
role in the performance of the tourism supply chain is played by travel agencies. The level of travel agencies' integration
with transport service providers is an important indicator of a companies' performance, yet it has not
been sufficiently examined so far. The purpose of this study is to analyse the level of integration between travel
agencies and air carriers, rail carriers, water carriers, and bus operators. Based on the data obtained from
Slovenian travel agencies included in the survey, the study indicates that travel agencies most often cooperate
with bus operators, with which they achieve the highest level of integration, followed by air carriers, water
carriers and, lastly, rail carriers recording a low level of integration with travel agencies.

Interest in Intelligent Transportation Systems comes from the problems
caused by traffic congestion, road accidents and air pollution. Traffic congestion
continues to grow worldwide as a result of increased motorization, population growth,
changes in population density and urbanization. Interest in ITS can also be attributed to
reducing road accidents and increasing traffic safety. The most common causes for road
accidents are excessive speed, inattentive driving and ignorance of the right-of-way rules.
To eliminate these causes, experience, knowledge of traffic regulations and a new car are
not enough – vehicle safety systems have to take part as well. Therefore, the European
Union issued a directive on the installation of intelligent systems, whose functions are
active support during driving, warning the driver in dangerous situations and alerting
passengers of the car in case of irregularities in motor function or actions carried out by
the driver that may cause danger, such as swerving while falling asleep. These systems
help drivers to avoid accidents, and in the event of a collision, an emergency call is
automatically made. Furthermore, they can be used to regulate traffic patterns or to
reduce engine performance, which would reduce pollution. With these benefits in mind,
the EU has indicated to the automotive industry that installation of these new Intelligent
Transportation Systems should be mandatory in their new vehicles.

The logistics sector should strive for sustainability alongside productivity by protecting its order pickers’ health and welfare. Existing storage assignment models are mainly based on the criterion of order picking time and, to a lesser extent, the human factor. In the paper, a solution to a storage assignment problem using a multi-objective model based on binary integer linear programing is presented by developing a solution that considers order picking time, energy expenditure and health risk. The Ovako Working Posture Assessment System (OWAS) method was used for health risk assessment. The downside of solely health risk-optimization is that the average order picking time increases by approximately 33% compared to solely time-optimization. Contrary to this, the developed multi-objective function emphasizing time has proven to be promising in finding a compromise between the optimal order picking time and eliminating work situations with a very-high risk for injuries. Its use incr...

The outbreak of COVID-19 caused many changes in people’s life. One of the most significant is the travel behaviour and transport mode choice. This study focus on the changes that the inhabitants of Vienna made in their travel choices because of the virus. The same research about spatial modelling the transport mode choice of commuters in Vienna was completed in 2019 and is a topic addressed in our previous work. Based on our developed methodology, this article indicates that public transport is not a dominant transport mode choice as it was before the virus outbreak. The main result of this paper is geographically defined areas of application of individual alternatives shown on the final map of modal shift in Vienna, which could provide theoretical support for policymakers and transportation planners. For the city of Vienna, we found that the area of the city where cars are now used has increased, which certainly has a negative impact on air quality and life in the city. The advanta...

Modern complexity of management is associated with important decision making, confronting a great number of useless information. Selection of information-the choice of only quality, i.e. essential ones, is a big problem in managerial decisionmaking. Implementation of systemic approach i.e. systemic thinking can help dealing with it. It is known that decision-making based only on intuition is insufficient, especially nowadays, in the time of global business. Therefore, managers have to operate with adequate knowledge capital. It is synergetic composition of inborn talents, feelings, abilities as well as gained knowledge and experiences. DNT put this capital knowledge into function of management decisionmaking, thus easier and holistic information management needed for quality and efficient and successful problem solving. It enables managers to be creative, cooperative and interdisciplinary. It opens possibilities for combination of theory and practice in the decision making processes, as presented in our contribution. Quality, holistic management decision making, create competitive advantages. It can be proved by a practical example of decision making about preventive measures in the winter time (roads gritting and ploughing). Great importance of quality, timely and enough holistic information is presented with the model of Short Term Road Ice Prediction, which gives information for quality decision making.

The paper addresses the problem of optimal bus stop allocation. The aim is to achieve reduction of costs on account of appropriate re-design of the process of obligatory transportation of children from their homes to the corresponding schools in the Laško municipality. The proposed algorithm relies on optimization based on the Monte Carlo simulation procedure. The number of calculated bus stops is required to be minimal possible, which can still assure maximal service area within the prescribed radius, while keeping the minimal walking distances pupils have to go across from their homes to the nearest bus stop and vice versa. The main issues of the proposed algorithm are emphasised and the working mechanism is explained. The presentation of calculated results is given and comparison with some other existing algorithms is provided. The positions of the calculated bus stops are going to be used for the purpose of physical bus stops implementation in order to decrease the current trans...

This paper presents a new approach for hinterland modelling based on the results of port choice modelling. The paper follows the idea that the shippers’ port choice is a trade-off between various objective and subjective factors. The presented model tackles the problem by applying the AHP method in order to obtain ports’ preference rates based on subjective factors, and combine them with objective factors, which include port operation costs, sailing times, and land transport costs using MILP. The ports’ hinterlands are modelled by finding the optimal port of choice for different locations across Europe and merging the identical results. The model can be used in order to produce captive hinterland of ports and can also be exploited in order to analyse how changes in the traffic infrastructure influence the size of hinterlands.

The transport infrastructure is extremely important for economic development and the labour mobility and competitiveness of European economy. However it is becoming increasingly difficult for government to publicly fund transport infrastructures. Therefore the decision to implement toll roads in Europe as a transport-policy instrument is an important shift in the funding of infrastructure. Adoption of appropriate technology has implications on the efficiency of the system. The mathematical model developed upon and simulations were carried out on several scenarios given the different types of technology. The results suggest that DSRC technology employed on motorways to be the most efficient. BUDŻETOWY WYPŁYW ELEKTRONICZNEGO SYSTEMU POBORU OPŁAT NA EFEKTYWNOŚĆ DŁUGOTERMINOWĄ Streszczenie. Infrastruktura transportowa jest niezwykle ważna dla rozwoju przemysłowego, mobilności siły roboczej i konkurencyjności gospodarki Europejskiej. Jednakże coraz trudniejsze dla rządu staje się publicz...

The chapter deals with Bayesian structural equation modeling (SEM) for the case of travel agencies. The focus of research is the investigation of possible impacts of external integration with transport suppliers on the efficiency of travel agencies. In order to calculate the efficiency, the data envelopment analysis was used. For the construction of the measurement part of the model, the confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was conducted, while its structural part was developed by the means of SEM procedure. When conducting the CFA and SEM procedures, the Bayesian estimation method was employed. Its performance was also compared with the maximum likelihood method and the fit indices of both methods were inspected. The results show that the derived model fits well to the real data. The study confirms certain positive effects of the external integration on the efficiency. This finding could represent an important guideline for the managers of the travel agencies.