STUDENT NAME:

STUDENT ID:

SUBJECT NAME: APPLIED RESEARCH FOR INFORMATION SYSTEM

PROFESSIONALS

SUBJECT CODE: CIS8500

ASSIGNMENT: 2
 Abstract

The world is in such a time when all processes are being modernized. The world is seeing

technological innovations and revolutions in all sectors especially in business. One of the most

common technological innovation is the introduction of the Internet of things. It is a technology

that does not require human effort to operate successful. In detail, Internet of Things is a system

that entails digital and mechanical machines, computing devices, animals or people who are

provide with unique identifiers, objects, and abilities to convey data and information over a

network without the need of human to computer or human-to-human interactions. The research

proposal here will evaluate the impact of the technology of internet of things on supply chain

performance in the banking and food and beverage sectors of Australia. The research will

entirely focus on the supply chain even if the latter has impacts on other sectors of an enterprise.

The analysis will look at hypothesis of the research, the development of the research question,

the methodology, and the significance of the study. On top of that, ethical issues relating to the

implementation of the internet of things study will also be widely discussed as part of the

concluding remarks.

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 Table of Contents

Abstract .............................................................................................................................. 2

Introduction ....................................................................................................................... 5

Background ................................................................................................................... 5

Statement of purpose .................................................................................................... 5

Scope of the research .................................................................................................... 6

Research Questions ........................................................................................................... 6

General research question ............................................................................................ 7

Specific research questions........................................................................................... 7

Conceptual Framework .................................................................................................... 8

Internet of things ........................................................................................................... 8

Hypothesis.................................................................................................................... 10

Literature ......................................................................................................................... 10

Methods ............................................................................................................................ 12

Strategy and framework designs ............................................................................... 12

Sample .......................................................................................................................... 13

Data collection procedures and instruments ............................................................ 13

Data analysis ................................................................................................................ 14

Significance ...................................................................................................................... 14

3
Limitations and Delimitations ....................................................................................... 15

Ethical Issues ................................................................................................................... 16

Bibliography .................................................................................................................... 18

Appendix: Critical Review Journal and Reflection Report ........................................ 20

4
 Introduction

Background

The Internet of things can be defined as system that entails digital and mechanical

machines, computing devices, animals or people who are provide with unique identifiers,

objects, and abilities to convey data and information over a network without the need of human

to computer or human-to-human interactions. In the definition, the term “thing” could refer to a

farm animal that has a biochip transponder, an individual with heart monitor implants, manmade

objects assigned to an IP address that is able to transfer data over a certain network or

automobiles that have in-built sensors that alert drivers in the case of defect in the car. Kevin

Ashton first mentioned the technology in 1999 when he was presenting to P&G (Procter and

Gamble). The presentation was all about the introduction of Radio Frequencies ID in the

company. The latter has been improving and evolving especially with the convergence of

microelectromechanical systems, wireless technologies, the internet, and micro services. The

internet of things works under the incentives of smart devices that are enabled to connect to the

web and in most cases use processors that are embedded. The latter has sensors and

communication infrastructures that can gather, send, or act on various types of data they collect

from the environment.

Statement of purpose

It appears that various organizations in Australia have been trying to become more

competitive. That way they are discovering that there is need to reevaluate their supply chain

performance. This study will entirely focus on how various Australian organizations can

integrate Internet of things to improve the cost, delivery, flexibility, and quality of their supply

chains and later improved firm performance.

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 Scope of the research

The analysis will entirely evaluate and uses scholarly and per-reviewed studies and

articles that were conducted between 2015 and 2018. The reason being, the research wants to

investigate the current positive results of Internet of things integration. Another

Research Questions

This research has an aim of investigating how Internet of things can modify and improve

the supply chain performance of various organizations in Australia. This particular research was

highly inspired by the current nature of competitiveness in various industries in Australia. It

appears that there are new companies that are opened in various industries and the latter have

been producing alt of competition especially because of the technology that is integrated in some

of their processes. The research wants to find out how the technology of internet of things can

improve the perforce f new and conventional enterprises.

A major question that may arise is the essence of how Internet of things can

accommodate and improve the functioning of various technologies that are useful in the supply

chain performance of enterprises. The technology has been involving and it is important to know

and understand how it supports the operations of cloud computing, big data, wireless sensor

networks, artificial intelligence and distributed systems among others.

The Internet of things is a technology whose operations are widely based on the

incentives of artificial intelligence. It is therefore, important to analyze how the two can work in

harmony to improve supply chain performance in firms. It is also imperative to see how AI can

be used to unlock big data in the Internet of things platforms. Cloud storage is also an imperative

feature that also supports internet of things because in modern days it operates hand in hand with

6
Artificial intelligence. Wireless sensor networks are supposed to be there to facilitate the

methods and processes of conveying data from one section to another in the supply chain.

Essentially, the internet of things is supposed to boost efficiency, and make it easy for manager

in the supply chain to develop smart decisions. It is therefore imperative to find out the exact IT

architecture that can fully support the operations of the technology of Internet of things.

It would also be very essential to understand how the particular technology of internet of

things can be integrated in supply chains. The layouts and the conceptual designs of the

technological innovation should be well understood for better application and supply chain

integrations. Finally, it is also imperative to understand how the technology of internet of things

can support the performance of various stakeholders such as employees, customers and clients,

and the suppliers.

General research question

 How does the Internet of things improve firm performance?

Specific research questions

 How does integration of Internet of Things improve Supply chain performance within an

organization?

 In what ways does the Internet of things work in harmony with other technologies such as

Artificial intelligence, cloud computing, big data, wireless sensor networks, and

distributed systems?

 How can the internet of things benefit various stakeholders in an organization?

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 Conceptual Framework

Internet of things

The internet of things is a technology that is standing up to be the way forward in various

organizations. It has deep impacts in the supply chain performance of any particular firm that

implements it to the latter. According to Miorandi et al. (2012, 1498) “the Internet-of-Things is

embryonic as one of the major trends shaping the development of technologies in the ICT sector

at large. The shift from an Internet used for interconnecting end-user devices to an Internet used

for interconnecting physical objects that communicate with each other and/or with humans in

order to offer a given service encompasses the need to rethink anew some of the conventional

approaches customarily used in networking, computing and service provisioning and

management.” The internet of things builds on three pillars that are related to the abilities of

smart items to become identifiable, to communicate, and to interact from a conceptual point of

view. At any component level, the internet of things will be entirely based on the notion of smart

things that will complement the existing entities in the internet domains. Domains can include

terminals, hosts, and routers. The technology is supposed to stand always in a pole position of

collecting vast amounts of data from various types of environment. This is with the help or

artificial intelligence and data science. AI is the technology that changes this data into various

applications that are applied to analytics to the data to develop information that is used to make

various strategic decisions.

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 (Kanter, T., Rahmani, R. and Mahmud 2014,

p. 1404)

The main tasks of the framework are to provide an analysis and determine the smart

activities of these intelligent devices via processes that maintain dynamic interconnection among

the devices. This framework summarizes the internet of things infrastructure so that it can be in a

pole position of receiving eservices that are based on the context information that leaves the

existing infrastructures and layouts unchanged. An active collaboration of the heterogeneous

protocols and devices can lead to future ambient computing where the maximum exploitation of

cloud computing technologies will be certified. The model can divide various elements logically.

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The elements include placement of physical devices, the creation of virtual links in different

domains and networks, and collaboration among various applications without a specific

coordination system (Kanter, Rahmani, and Mahmud 2014). The connectivity layer entails all the

physical devices that are involved in the interconnection f frameworks. In the access layer,

context data will be reached to the internet through the internet of things gateway as captured and

collected by the short-ranged devices in the form of raw data. The access layers entail incentives

of network initiation, the creation of domains and the definition of topology. The abstraction

layer entails the capabilities of achieving reliability, robust routing, better bandwidth that often

leads to better quality of services. Finally, the service layer entails activities that involve data

storage and management. It completes tasks related to system supervision and business

operations and management

Hypothesis

HO1: Internet of things can improve the supply chain performance in Australian firms.

HO1: Internet of Things can improve the operations of other technologies such as Cloud

computing and artificial intelligence

HO3: Automation of various processes can speed up the supply chain operations

Literature

Numerous articles are available in the academic world that can be used to explain and

prove the hypothesis. The studies entirely communicate and give more information about the

operation of Internet of things. Vaas, Shee, and Miah (2018)have written an article “Internet of

Things for improving Supply Chain Performance: A qualitative Study of Australian Retailers “is

the chief academic resource that will be used in this particular study, a study that entirely focuses

on the organizational capability theory. In addition, it is a study investigates the use of Internet of

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things in the processes of enhancing the integration of all stakeholders and internal activities

within an enterprise. It gives a conclusion that the technology of IoT is capable of improving the

delivery, cost, flexibility, and cost of the entire supply chain alongside improving sustainable

performance with social, environmental, and financial outcomes.

Internet of things and supply chain management: a literature review’ by Ben-Dava,

Hassini, and Bahroun (2017) is another literature that is imperative in this study. It is a piece of

literature that analyses the impact of IoT and how it can improve various supply management

with the use of excessive literature reviews. The latter is relevant and supports the discussions

explained in the main article. The impact of supply chain integration on company performance:

an organizational capability perspective by Huo (2012) is another literature that also supports the

discussion relayed in the main article of the study. The study has used various types of data

collected from about 617 enterprises in China. It looks at various incentives such as internal

integrations, supplier –oriented integrations, performance, and customer integrations. In addition,

the article answers the question of how other technologies such as AI and cloud computing work

under the Internet of things platform. The latter gives insights into the specific working of the

Internet of things. Implementation of IoT can also be well understood with the help of this

particular piece of literature.

The other article that is very useful in this research is “The impact of IT implementation

on supply chain integration and performance by Li et al (2010). The academic document

explores the implementation of IT in supply chain management. The latter shows how the sector

has managed to perform better in terms of better service delivery and achievements of

customers’ satisfaction. The author here has researched various incentives that have elevated the

knowledge of how various IT systems can operate in different departments of an organization

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and in detail in supply chain management. The research has gone ahead, given the relationship

that exists between the implementation of information technology, supply chain, and supply

chain integrations.

Miorandi et al (2012) has also provided a comprehensive research on the application and

operations of the Internet of Things technology. The literature, “Internet of things: Vision,

applications and research challenges’ is a document that provides various insights on the basics

and applications of IoT. In addition, it is a document is relevant in this study as it plays a role in

the development of the overall model of the Internet of things infrastructure.

Finally, there is the “literature Conceptual Framework for Internet of Things’ Virtualization via

OpenFlow in Context-aware Networks” by Carter, Rahmani, and Mahmud (2014). The latter is

imperative in this research as it explains various components that make up the conceptual model

of the Internet of Things infrastructure.

Methods

Strategy and framework designs

In this study, meta-analysis processes will be carried out on the literatures to determine

the impact of Internet of things on supply chain performance. The study will highly rely on

various peer-reviewed studies to cum up with solutions and recommendations in the field. It will

also make use of websites and organizational reports to develop a better understanding of the

topic in question. Publications used after 2010 were mainly used in the research even if others

were used to generate the idea and the history of Internet of Things. Some of the literatures used

defined the Internet of things concepts and others gave explanations on the solutions and benefits

of the technology in various firms.

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 Various terms and terminologies will be used widely in the research and they include

Internet of things, firm performance, supply chain performance, supply chain integration, and

several others. Critical analysis of the existing literatures will be conducted in a bid of answering

the research questions and solving the hypothesis.

Sample

In these research peer-reviewed articles, books, and organizational reports will be used in

a bid of sampling the exact benefits of the Internet of things technology. The technology and its

applications are still in its developmental stages meaning that, the most recent articles will be

highly considered. Exclusion-inclusion criterion will be used to find and use various sources that

will follow the incentives of the meta-analysis procedures. The articles used must be retrieved

from sources that are credible. On the other hand, they must have extensive literature on the

technology and application of the Internet of things. Additionally, the sources must also give

directions about the benefits of Internet of things in various enterprises and if possible show how

the latter can improve the performance of the supply chain department.

Data collection procedures and instruments

The research will entirely use google scholar and academic websites as instruments. It

will also follow the procedures of looking at the success stories given by various organizations

that have managed to integrate the concepts of Internet of Things in their operations. The

research will use firms in the banking and food and beverage industries to grasp the entire

integrations and benefits of the Internet of things. It will also evaluate critically the chief article

by processes of taking notes and then compiling them to come up with a better collection of

ideas and concepts that will make the research more successful.

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 Data analysis

The data used in this research is qualitative entirely. The Data entails interviews and

customer surveys. Content analysis is one of the data analysis methods that will be used in this

study. The method proves to be very useful especially when trying to understand surveys and can

give the research vivid illustrations on specific areas that should be improved. Narrative analysis

will also be used in this this research. It involves listening to various reviews given by the

stakeholders and can be used to fully understand the impact of internet of things in the supply

chain performance. The two methods will be useful and will help extract all information

surrounding the benefits of IoT in the performance of supply chain.

Significance

The research for Internet of things is very significant in modern days. The technology is

becoming the way forward in development and its application is becoming very popular in

Australian companies. Additionally, industries are continuing to grow daily and the latter is

proving to be very beneficial for firms that want to become competitive. The research proves to

be very important for large and small enterprises; it all depends on the effort and the seriousness

that is given in the studies. The literatures discussed earlier have illustrated that this technology

is one that can improve the banking and food and beverage industries greatly. It does so by

looking specifically at the impact of the technology on the supply chain performance.

Additionally, the study tries to look how the technology conforms to the organizational

capability concepts.

Additionally, there are severally gaps in literature that will also be filled by this research.

Apparently, there are gaps because the existing literature does not explain explicitly how the

technology works in line with other modern innovations such as AI and Cloud computing. This

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research will explicitly try to examine the integration of such technologies with IoT to ensure

that the whole infrastructure operates appropriately. There is need to close these gaps so that it

becomes easier to fully implement the technology in various departments and processes.

The research is significant because it is going to become a top-up of all the discussed

relayed in the main article of study. The research will go into detail and explain all the

capabilities and strengths of the new technology. The research will also look at some of the

processes that can be implemented to improve the functioning of the internet of things. It will

also fill the gaps left in the discussions about organizational change, risk, and mitigation

processes.

Limitations and Delimitations

According to Price and Murnan (2004 p. 66), “The limitations of the study are those

characteristics of design or methodology that impacted or influenced the interpretation of the

findings from your research. They are the constraints on generalizability, applications to practice,

and/or utility of findings that are the result of the ways in which you initially chose to design the

study or the method used to establish internal and external validity or the result of unanticipated

challenges that emerged during the study.” One of the limitations of this study is that it will

entirely concentrate on the banking and food and beverage firms. It is a kind of a bias because

the latter should entirely work on the application of the new technology in a large number of

industries. This could help the research understand fully the level of impact the Internet of things

to specific firms.

Another limitation is that the research could suffer various forms of bias as it tries to

select various types of internet sources and books. The research might following the non-

inclusion-exclusion criterion and only use appealing resources. Such an issue can make the

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research use sources that are incomprehensive and weak and that often leads to incomprehensible

and conclusions that are not credible.

A major limitation here is that the study selected a primary kind of a data gathering

method. This research design of meta-analysis proves credible because it makes use of credible

data sources but in the actual sense, it is not the best for studies and researching. The research

lacks the ability of going out to the field to interact with managers, members of staff and Chief

Internet and communication managers who can provide the best information regarding the

application of Internet of Things in firms. The research will however be conducted using the

academic journals and books because of luck of enough time to complete the task of person-to-

person interviews.

Ethical Issues

A major ethical issue in this case is that the internet of things is a technology that would

often lead to the leakage of information to other business partners. In banks, there is a possibility

that critical information and data belonging to customers. The ethical issue presented here is that

the technology deals with many automation incentives, which become a loophole for malicious

attacks and leakage of critical information. The consideration of dealing with this ethical issue

entails improving IoT security, customer awareness and following the ethics code when making

various decisions (Popescul and Georgescu 2014).

Some of other characteristics of Internet of things that may lead to ethical issues include

its ubiquity and omnipresence nature of the technology. Users are always attracted to continue

using the Internet of Things, it scoffs them, and it gives a path of giving up using various

artifacts. Incorporated intelligence and ultra-connectivity are the rest.

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 Inappropriate management of the Internet of things technology can cause many dangers

from the ethics perspective. These are dangers that can affect contemporary organizations and

individuals. The technological solutions should always assure all stakeholders that their needs

would be protected. For further security and preservation of ethics, further research is supposed

to be conducted methodically on the interventions that are needed to prevent internet of things

from becoming a feared and intrusive issue.

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Bibliography

1. Abdel-Basset, M., Manogaran, G. & Mohamed, M. 2018, ‘Internet of Things (IoT) and

its impact on supply chain: A framework for building smart, secure and efficient

systems’, Future Generation Computer Systems, vol. 86, pp. 614–628.

2. Ben-Daya, M., Hassini, E. & Bahroun, Z. 2017, ‘Internet of things and supply chain

management: a literature review’, International Journal of Production Research, pp.

1–24.

3. Gunasekaran, Angappa, Subramanian, Nachiappan & Tiwari, Manoj Kumar 2016,

‘Information technology governance in the Internet of Things supply chain networks',

Industrial Management & Data Systems, vol. 116, no. 7, pp. 1298–1302.

4. Huo, B. (2012). The impact of supply chain integration on company performance: an

organizational capability perspective. Supply Chain Management: An International

Journal, 17(6), pp.596-610.

5. Kanter, T., Rahmani, R. and Mahmud, A., 2014. Conceptual framework for internet

of things' virtualization via openflow in context-aware networks. arXiv preprint

arXiv:1401.7437.

6. Li, G., Yang, H., Sun, L. and Sohal, A. (2010). The impact of IT implementation on

supply chain integration and performance. International Journal of Production

Economics, 120(1), pp.125-138.

7. Miorandi, D., Sicari, S., De Pellegrini, F. and Chlamtac, I., 2012. Internet of things:

Vision, applications and research challenges. Ad hoc networks, 10(7), pp.1497-1516.

8. Ng, Irene, Scharf, Kimberley, Pogrebna, Ganna & Maull, Roger 2015, ‘Contextual

variety, Internet-of-Things and the choice of tailoring over platform: Mass

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 customization strategy in supply chain management’, International Journal of

Production Economics, vol. 159, no. C, pp. 76–87.

9. Popescul, D. and Georgescu, M., 2014. Internet of Things–some ethical issues. The

USV Annals of Economics and Public Administration, 13(2 (18)), pp.208-214.

10. Price, J.H. and Murnan, J., 2004. Research limitations and the necessity of reporting

them.

11. Vass, T., Shee, H. and Miah, S. (2018). Internet of Things for Improving Supply Chain

Performance: A Qualitative Study of Australian Retailers. Australasian Conference on

Information Systems 2018 Sydney, Australia, 1(1), pp.1-10

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 Appendix: Critical Review Journal and Reflection Report

Date Activity Time Self-reflection Self- Action plan

duration evaluation

5/27/2019 Reading the 20 hours This is the initial In this If I was given

assigned step of particular such a task,

article about conducting the step, I think I again I

Internet of research did my best. believe I

things and proposal. It would do the

taking notes. involved same unless

During this critically reading when the

period I also the assigned case study is

went through article. It was longer or

the task also at this stage shorter.

requirements where is went

through all the

instructions and

specifications of

the assignment.

The process

involved

scheming and

writing short

notes about the

20
 content of the

given article of

study and noting

down the

specific

requirements of

the assignment.

5/28/ 2019 Research 4 hours This was an To some If I am given

topic acute step extent I feel I such a task,

development that develop a again I will

prompted me viable and discuss with

to think credible my fellow

critically so research topic scholars and

that I could even if there lecturers

develop a is always some of the

research room to critical ways

topic that improve of developing

was viable. I an appealing

explored the research

case study topic.

and my

classroom

notes to

21
come up with

a research

question that

would be

viable. I

developed

the latter

after I

understood

the

instructions

and made use

of the key

words

developed

from the

study article.

This is the

point where I

reached a

point coming

up with the

research

22
 topic, “How

does

integration of

Internet of

Things

improve

Supply chain

performance

within an

organization?

Two days Researching At this stage, I This stage was I feel that if I

and went into the tedious and was given

assembling library and the time- more time to

various internet to look consuming work on this

pieces of for various but I feel I did study I would

literature. sources of my best have

information that analyzed

could help me more pieces

come up with of literature.

credible pieces

of literature.

These academic

23
 resources would

give me more

information

related to the

research topic.

The process took

quite some time

but after all, I

had a credible

list of literatures

that were waiting

to be used in the

research.

Ten hours Choosing My research I feel that I feel that I

and showed me that I depending on would go out

developing would only use the nature of and research

the research the meta- secondary other

methodology analysis type of data being experiments

analysis to used in the that would

complete answer study, the give me other

the research meta-analysis options of the

questions. it was methodologies methodology.

the best because were the best.

24
 all the data being

used in this

study was

ultimately

secondary

One day Outlining the Before the write I feel I did the I was given

proposal up I wrote down best another

the outline based research

on the specific proposal I

requirements would do it

given to me. the same

36 hours Writing the Now that I had I feel I did my Next time I

proposal all the best would

components, I improve a

spent 36 hours little bit

writing up the especially in

whole proposal. areas of in-

I would expound citation and

all sections of referencing.

the outline. In

my write-up I

used all the

references well

25
 and in-cited all

the resources

that I used using

the Harvard style

of referencing.

5 hours Proof- I then proof-read I feel I did the The

reading the entire best. assignment

research was engaging

proposal to and fun. I

remove all would once

possible errors again do

relating to much better

grammar and now that I

referencing. have more

experience of

completing

such tasks as

this one.

26