by Faisal Reza.; Thesis (B.S.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Program in Science, Technology, and Society, 2003.; Includes bibliographical references (leaves 73-74).

This dissertation addresses the issue of performance standards in developing nations, focusing on the role of local content requirements. It proposes a theoretical framework to understand the impact of this policy on the decisions of firms and the welfare of the domestic economy, and offers a methodology to apply the analysis to the context of the automotive supply chain. The central conclusion of the thesis relates to the existence of a gap between private and social opportunity returns and costs, an aspect that has been overlooked by previous literature. In a developing country, resources employed by foreign investors and their local suppliers often generate spillovers and learning effects that are not accounted for in the valuations of private economic agents. This creates an externality-from-entry, whereby positive economic effects of new domestic suppliers are overlooked in the sourcing decision of the foreign firm. This dissertation proposes a model to illustrate how this gap between social and private valuations justifies the enactment of domestic content requirements, which become welfare enhancing. The analysis also reveals that content requirements are a preferable policy to tariffs and subsidies as a means to increase domestic purchases and discusses the use of subsidies and requirements as incentive mechanisms to align firm decisions with government objectives. A case study of the automotive industry...

by Thomas F. Gallo.; Thesis (S.M.M.O.T.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management, Management of Technology Program, 2003.; Includes bibliographical references (p. 70-71).

by Jun Chen.; Thesis (S.M.M.O.T.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management, Management of Technology Program, 2003.; Includes bibliographical references (leaves 78-80).

by Federica Busa.; Thesis (S.M.M.O.T.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management, Management of Technology Program, 2003.; Includes bibliographical references (leaves 70-73).

by Uchida, Takashi.; Thesis (S.M.M.O.T.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management, Management of Technology Program, 2003.; Includes bibliographical references (leaves 99-102).

by Shivram Venkatasubramaniam.; Thesis (S.M.M.O.T.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management, Management of Technology Program, 2003.; Includes bibliographical references (leaves 62-63).

by Shih-Lung Wu.; Thesis (S.M.M.O.T.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management, Management of Technology Program, 2003.; Includes bibliographical references (leaf 60).

by Ali Yeyinmen.; Thesis (S.M.M.O.T.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management, Management of Technology Program, 2003.; Includes bibliographical references (leaves 58-59).

This thesis develops an approximate, analytically based environmental assessment method that provides fast evaluations of product concepts. Traditional life-cycle assessment (LCA) studies and their streamlined analytical versions are costly, time-consuming, and data intensive. Thus, they are not practical to apply during early concept design phases where little information is available and ideas change quickly. Alternatives currently used are mostly qualitative, ad-hoc approaches that often provide overly simplistic assessments difficult to trade-off with other design objectives. The Learning Surrogate LCA method is an alternative approach that uses simple, high-level, and accessible descriptive information about a product to provide approximate, yet useful, analytical LCA results during early concept design stages. The method relies on a general artificial neural network (ANN) trained on high-level product descriptors and environmental performance data from pre-existing detailed life-cycle assessment studies or related data. To quickly obtain an approximate environmental impact assessment for a product concept, the design team queries the trained artificial model with new set of descriptors, without requiring the development of a new model. The predicted environmental performance...

by Kellyn E. Roth.; Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Engineering Systems Division, Technology and Policy Program; and, Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Urban Studies and Planning, 2003.; Includes bibliographical references (p. 121-131).

by Nico Voigtlaender.; Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Engineering Systems Division, Technology and Policy Program; and, (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Civil and Environmental Engineering, 2002.; Includes bibliographical references (p. 159-161).

by Jeffrey H. Kim.; Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Engineering Systems Division, Technology and Policy Program, 2003.; Includes bibliographical references (leaves 43-44).

by Nathan E. Hottle.; Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Engineering Systems Division, Technology and Policy Program, 2003.; Includes bibliographical references (p. 87-88).

by Gemma Aymonne Heddle.; Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Engineering Systems Division, Technology and Policy Program; and, (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Civil and Environmental Engineering, 2003.; Includes bibliographical references.

by Andres Flores Montalvo.; Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Engineering Systems Division, Technology and Policy Program, 2003.; Includes bibliographical references (leaves 109-112).

by Sze Hwei Ong.; Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Engineering Systems Division, Technology and Policy Program, 2003.; Includes bibliographical references (leaves 84-86).

by Sophie Pochard.; Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Engineering Systems Division, Technology and Policy Program, 2003.; Includes bibliographical references (p. 77-80).

by Peng Zhang.; Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Engineering Systems Division, Technology and Policy Program; and, (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Aeronautics and Astronautics, 2003.; Includes bibliographical references (leaves 74-75).

by Tao Wang.; Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Engineering Systems Division, Technology and Policy Program, 2003.; Includes bibliographical references (p. 152-161).