Civil and maritime engineering systems must be efficiently managed to control the failure risk at an acceptable level as their performance is gradually degraded throughout the operational life, caused by fatigue and corrosion. Structural health monitoring develops a timely capability to assess the structural condition and performance metrics. However, using actual long-term monitoring data to guide the life-cycle management under stochastic environments has not been sufficiently studied. To realize an optimal maintenance strategy within the service life, an integrated monitoring-based optimal management framework is developed on the basis of the partially observable Markov decision processes (POMDPs) and Bayesian forecasting. In the proposed framework, the stochastic fatigue processes are quantified by the state transition matrix. The Bayesian dynamic linear model is embedded in POMDPs as a continuous observation part to forecast the cycling impacts and estimate the deterioration rate using long-term dynamic strain responses. In addition, making use of the special features of the problem considered in this paper, an adaptive discretization strategy is proposed to alleviate the complexity of large discrete observed spaces in the POMDP. The applicability and feasibility of the framework are evaluated by intelligent maintenance of fatigue-sensitive components with real-world monitoring data. After solving the POMDP by an efficient offline solver, the results obtained in this paper demonstrate that structural interventions are uneconomical to extend the life when a welded detail is approaching its end of life due to the normal service. Furthermore, if multiple interventions are available, the framework can find optimal maintenance actions based on the trade-off between long-term utility and the corresponding cost. This framework as the prototype could also be adjusted to aid life-cycle intelligent maintenance of other types of components under different deterioration scenarios.
In this study we examine the driving forces of customer loyalty in the broadband market in Hong Kong. We developed and empirically tested a model to examine the antecedents of customer loyalty towards Internet service providers (ISPs) in Hong Kong. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to evaluate the proposed model. A total of 737 valid returns were obtained through a questionnaire survey. The results show that customer satisfaction, switching cost, and price perception are antecedents that lead directly to customer loyalty, with customer satisfaction exerting the greatest influence. Although we found that service quality significantly influences customer satisfaction, which in turn leads to customer loyalty, we did not find a direct relationship between service quality and customer loyalty. Our results also reveal that corporate image is not related to customer loyalty. Our empirical investigation suggests that investing huge resources in building corporate image can indeed be a risky strategy for ISPs.
In this study we examine the driving forces of customer loyalty in the broadband market in Hong Kong. We developed and empirically tested a model to examine the antecedents of customer loyalty towards Internet service providers (ISPs) in Hong Kong. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to evaluate the proposed model. A total of 737 valid returns were obtained through a questionnaire survey. The results show that customer satisfaction, switching cost, and price perception are antecedents that lead directly to customer loyalty, with customer satisfaction exerting the greatest influence. Although we found that service quality significantly influences customer satisfaction, which in turn leads to customer loyalty, we did not find a direct relationship between service quality and customer loyalty. Our results also reveal that corporate image is not related to customer loyalty. Our empirical investigation suggests that investing huge resources in building corporate image can indeed be a risky strategy for ISPs.
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