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Towards Intangible Value Quantification: Scope, Limits & Shortages of Artificial Intelligence applications
Abstract
The application of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the realm of economic markets, particularly in the business and real estate sectors, has witnessed substantial growth. However, its effectiveness is curtailed by several limitations, especially in the context of the rising valuation of intangible assets. The intangible nature of assets such as brand value, environmental impact or social impact, among others, presents a challenge for AI, which relies on quantifiable data for analysis and decision-making. The intrinsic volatility and uncertainty of markets, heightened by the intangible asset valuation, further complicate the AI's predictive accuracy and adaptability throughout the time.AI models, primarily dependent on historical data, struggle to accurately forecast market movements influenced by intangible factors, which are often subjective and dynamically changing. This limitation is particularly pronounced in the real estate promotion sector, where the perceived value of properties can be significantly affected by intangible elements like location prestige or architectural uniqueness. Additionally, the ethical implications of AI deployment, such as data privacy concerns and potential biases in algorithmic decision-making, pose further constraints on its application in these sectors. While AI offers transformative potential for economic markets, its current limitations in handling the valuation of intangibles, market volatility, and ethical considerations necessitate a cautious and complementary approach to its integration into business and real estate promotion strategies, specially in the concern of life-cycle approaches.
Este artigo apresenta uma revisão no processo de avaliação e valorização de ativos intangíveis, no contexto da Indústria 5.0, destacando o papel da Inteligência Artificial (IA). A pesquisa descreveu o papel desempenhado por esses ativos na competitividade das organizações; também esclarece questões como a subjetividade das métricas e a falta de diretrizes padrão. Nesse contexto, a IA surge como uma tecnologia-chave de superação, se baseando principalmente no protagonismo do homem e sua valoração. Fomenta-se a aplicação de técnicas avançadas para análise, que corroborariam com a pretensão. Essas abordagens proporcionam precisão e confiabilidade, tornando-se ferramenta de auxílio a organização e estabelecendo base sólida para a avaliação desses ativos. Em tal situação, técnicas de análise e modelagem estratégica facilitariam a precisão e a confiabilidade na medição de tais ativos. Como parte da abordagem proposta, é estabelecida uma metodologia estruturada para redefinir os processos básicos de avaliação, que estabelecem assertividade, capacidade e transformação do desempenho organizacional. Os resultados indicam que a integração entre IA e modelos estratégicos fortalece a avaliação de ativos intangíveis e impulsiona a inovação e a sustentabilidade das organizações na era digital.
Construction sector is considered as one of the main sources of environmental pollution in the world. It has massive direct and indirect effects on the environment. Gaza Strip is witnessing widespread construction projects which increase the pressure on the ecosystem and generate various pollutants. Gaza Strip is suffering from weak and deteriorating ecosystems due to limited natural resources, deteriorating economic and political situation, escalating population growth, and lack of awareness of environmental issues. The aim of this paper is to assess the environmental impacts due to construction projects activities in Gaza Strip and propose some suggestions in curbing down these adverse impacts. A total of 50 questionnaires were distributed to professionals working in the construction industry. The environmental impacts are categorized into three safeguard subjects: ecosystems, natural resources and public impacts. The results of this study revealed that dust generation, noise pollution, operations with vegetation removal, and air pollution are the most significant environmental impacts of construction projects. The results also revealed that labors and those who are working in construction sector are the most slices of people exposing every day to health problems such as respiratory problems, liver, cancer, hearing impairment, hypertension, annoyance, sleep disturbance, and other cardiovascular adverse effects. In addition, the public impact was found as the most important category that affects the environment in Gaza Strip. It is recommended to enhance the knowledge and awareness of construction participants with regard to environmental impacts of construction and enact strict laws to attempt curbing down the adverse impacts of construction such as enforcing institutions to conduct environmental impact assessment (EIA) in the early stage of the projects. The results of this study can help decision makers to identify major construction impacts on environment and make environmentally friendly construction plans in the early stages of construction.
Starting around the early 2000s, and especially after the 2008 crisis, the rate of capital accumulation for US nonfinancial corporations has slowed down despite relatively high profitability; indicating a weakening of the link between profitability and investment. While the literature mostly focuses on financialisation and globalisation as the reasons behind this slowdown, I suggest adding another layer to these explanations and argue that, in conjunction with financialisation and globalisation, we need to pay attention to the increased use of intangible assets by nonfinancial corporations in the last two decades. Intangibles such as brand names, trademarks, patents and copyrights play a role in the widening of the profit–investment gap as the use of these assets enables firms to increase market power and profitability without necessarily generating a corresponding increase in fixed capital investment. After discussing the ways nonfinancial corporations use intangible assets, I look at large corporations in the USA and find the following: (i) The ratio of intangible assets to the capital stock increased in general. This increase is highest for firms in high-technology, healthcare, nondurables and telecommunications. (ii) Industries with higher intangible asset ratios have lower investment to profit ratios. (iii) Industries with higher intangible asset ratios have higher markups and profitability. (iv) The composition of the nonfinancial corporate sector has changed and the weight of high-technology and healthcare firms has increased; but this increase did not correspond to an equal increase in their investment share. The decline in the investment share of durables, nondurables and machinery is matched by an increase in the investment share of location-specific industries with low intangible asset use, most notably firms in energy extraction. In general, these firms have steadier markups and higher investment to profit ratios. (v) Yet, intangible-intensive industries’ profitability has increased faster than their share of investment or total assets. All in all, these findings are in line with the suggestion that the increased use of intangible assets enables firms to have high profitability without a corresponding increase in investment.
An overview of current status of the available literature on Life Cycle Energy, Life Cycle Greenhouse Gases, and Conventional Life Cycle Assessment of commercial and residential buildings was presented with respect to their height. A narrative literature review was carried out to provide a comprehensive overview as well as to highlight the recent contributions related to the environmental evaluation of high-rise and low-rise buildings. The study was carried out by searching the databases of the Scopus and Elsevier in conjunction with ScienceDirect and Google Scholar databases. The reason for this was to cover the published papers in this field up to the highest degree of accuracy. By means of the search of publications quoting the use of LCA in construction sector for the period from 1997 to 2018, more than 230 peer-reviewed publications referencing the use of life cycle assessment in buildings have been identified. The review shows that low-rise buildings (1∼5 floors) compared to high-rise ones (≥ 5 floors) received significant attention as the studies focusing on the life cycle assessment of low-rise buildings were about twice in number more than the studies related to the life cycle assessment of high-rise buildings. In case of high-rise buildings, commercial buildings gained more attention by over 60% of the reviewed studies, while for low-rise buildings, residential buildings took the leverage by accounting to over 70% of the reviewed studies. The more frequently studied life cycle stages were those related to the manufacturing and use phases. Similarly, the most considered impact categories were the global warming potential and embodied energy. The reported values for embodied energy of high-rise buildings had a great variation ranging from 0.533 MJ/m² to 883.1 GJ/m², while the same values for low-rise buildings ranged from 0.21 to 374.4 GJ/m². In terms of global warming potential, high-rise buildings emitted 10 to 10,010 kg CO2-eq/m² per year, however, some studies revealed the potential of timber structure in emission reduction by values ranging from 234.8 to 1338 kg CO2-eq/m². The emissions associated by low-rise buildings ranged from 0.07 to 35,765 kg CO2-eq/m², and the respective values for emission reduction by timber structures were between 12.9 and 361 kg CO2-eq/m². The results also indicate that a wide range of building's lifespan varying from 20 to over 100 years were utilized in life cycle assessment of different types of buildings. Functional unit was also another parameter that showed a broad variation both in terms of unit and definition. While the majority of researchers considered “m²” as the functional unit (61%), “whole building” was also considered as the functional unit in almost 20% of the reviewed studies, indicating the lack of standardized definition for functional unit for more practical outcomes. Ecoinvent was the most referred inventory database (65%) for life cycle assessment of buildings followed by University of Bath ICE (11%), U.S. database (9%), and Australian material inventory database (7%). SimaPro dominated computer-aided softwares with 40% of citations among the reviewed studies. ATHENA Impact Estimator and GaBi software gathered the attention of the reviewed studies by 7.5% and 4%, respectively. The review finally highlights that the variations in building design (structure and materials), lifetime, functional unit, and scope restrict to compare the findings and results of studies with each other.
ISO/DIS 15686-5:2017
ISO. (2017). ISO/DIS 15686-5:2017, Building and constructed assets -Service life planning
-Part 5: Life Cycle Costing.