Research Activities at the Faculty

Reports of the Institutes and Departments

Research Activities at the Faculty

Management

Research activities in business economics and management are aimed at selected subjects in which core competencies are to be established. Of central importance are services – firstly because several departments are already devoted to certain services (banking, real estate management, commerce and distribution, insurance), and secondly because services in general play a vital role for the Leipzig region. Research contributions to real estate management, for example, deal with the development of valuation methods tailored to the market conditions prevailing in eastern Germany. Moreover, a marketing project is presently tackling specific economic problems in the south of Leipzig, and is hence also focusing on the regional economic situation. This direction was reinforced by the appointment of a Professor of Service Management. New research projects in the field of personnel management concerning personnel services are to be mentioned.

In addition to the institutional focus of service management, accounting (including taxation) should be emphasised as a functional focus. Recent developments in financial and management accounting as well as in corporate tax law underline the high dynamics of this area of business economics and bring home the necessity of building up and extending competence in these fields. One important step in this direction was the appointment of a Professor of Controlling and Management Accounting last year. Moreover, a Professor of Auditing and Financial Accounting was taken on earlier this year. Research in these fields includes projects analysing new tax laws and projects by the Chair of Controlling and Management Accounting investigating performance measures for investment and profit centres.

The research activities by the Institute of Finance, which deals with questions of both public and corporate finance, should also be mentioned. One research project funded by the European Union studies the possibilities of supporting the development of small and medium-sized companies in the Leipzig district and was completed in the year 2000. Other projects are concerned with the financing of public broadcasting corporations and cultural institutions, as well as the development of financial services and financial instruments. Furthermore, a marketing project is focusing on empirical aspects of e-business.

Economics

Scientific work in economics is geared towards examining economic problems under theoretical and empirical aspects. It includes the macro and micro levels, economic theory and policy, specific branches of political economy such as public finance, money and currency, as well as foreign trade and economic integration. One topic of greater importance is empirical economic research. The main topics dealt with are as follows:

• Basic issues of economic policy are studied in a number of research projects. In particular, the Institute of Economic Policy and the Institute of Theoretical Economics have conducted research into the theoretical foundations of the social market economy, the results of which are publicised via colloquia and publications. Intensive research has been underway for a number of years into the transformation of economic systems, with special attention being paid to the problem of unemployment in transformation countries. Another topic is how to implement competition and competition policy in these countries. The aim is to conclude recommendations for the economic development of these countries.
• Economic integration (especially European forms and models) is addressed from a number of angles and institutes. One work focuses on basis features and on the specific aspects of an EU project to enhance competitiveness of small and medium-sized enterprises by means of innovation (ECOVIN). The Zermatter Symposia, an international committee for the interdisciplinary exchange of ideas, acts as a forum for discussion of basic problems.
• Greater emphasis is placed on empirical studies, which provide a basis for producing models and evaluating theoretical findings, as well as for concluding ways of developing economic policy. This work is mainly performed by the Institute of Empirical Economical Research, the Institute for Economic Policy, the Institute of Theoretical Economics, and the Department of Public Finance. One interdisciplinary area tackled is the analysis of regional data to provide a basis for recommendations.
• Microeconomic research is concentrated on the area of decision and game theory.

In future, the Department of Economics will deepen its involvement in the new research area of ecological economics. An additional department is to be set up, which will also be a centre of economic excellence for interdisciplinary and applied environmental research at the University of Leipzig working in conjunction with non-university institutions (e.g. the UFZ Centre for Environmental Research Leipzig-Halle). As well as intensifying research in this area of great future relevance, this move will also broaden the choice of economics degree programmes available. Furthermore, a concept is being developed to integrate empirical and theoretical studies more closely into teaching so that students can be provided with ‘ready-to-use' knowledge.

Business Computing

There are two institutes with three professorships dealing with selected fundamental issues of the application of IT as we approach the information society:

• The Institute of Software and System Development (ISS) focuses on application-oriented computer science as the basis for business computing, as well as on software and programming for the development of telematics applications;
• The Institute of Business Computing (IWI) deals with the fundamentals of business computing as a scientific discipline, as well as modelling and algorithms of business processes, and the conceptual design of information systems in trade and industry.

Within this division of labour, in which the IWI builds upon the work of the ISS, the Chair of Data Management which specialises in databases and data-modelling for economic institutions has an additional integrating function. Both institutes co-operate closely with the Institute of Computer Science of the Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science, which contributes to the IT fundamentals of business computing, and also uses the training services of the ISS in the field of software technology.

The subjects dealt with by the Institutes in recent years include:

• ISS: telematics/multimedia engineering with a European dimension within the European Commission's Telematics Applications Programme. Telematics/multimedia engineering within the business computing degree programme has been augmented by technologies for distributed multi-tier systems. The ISS develops telematics applications for the internet and public-access terminals.
• IWI: online training, data mining in the business sector, and the modelling and development of internet-based applications. The institute advises representatives of local government and the corporate sector during the conceptual phase of IT systems.

Civil Engineering/Industrial Engineering

The main fields of research are characterised by the combination of scientific theoretical and economic aspects. Accordingly, the methodology is strictly mathematical, experimental and quantitatively analytical, with the precise emphasis of work partly being decided by the co-operation partners and customers. Mainly integrated themes are dealt with.

The primary aims of research are the evaluation of the bearing capacity of various structures, the development of new building materials including patent applications, the modification of building codes, the optimisation and the modification of the usage of existing building structures, and the development of methods for project management and for controlling the financing of building projects.

Main subjects are:

• Self-compacting and self-cleaning concrete
• Hybrid building using high performance materials
• Development of high-strength and pumpable lightweight aggregate concretes
• Deformation capacity of reinforced concrete and prestressed concrete structures
• Safety concept for non-linear design procedures
• New types of reinforcement consisting of concrete bars and carbon fibre layers
• Verification of susceptibility to stress corrosion cracking by means of electrochemical noise
• Prestressing methods: external tendons, carbon fibre sheets, load transfer
• Combined pile-slab foundations
• European research on snow loads
• Adaptable tall buildings
• Non-linear structural analysis of slender wind-loaded cylindrical steel shells
• Non-linear structural analysis of single-supported cylindrical metal silos with a cone shaped discharge hopper
• Composite structures of masonry and wood
• Bearing behaviour of composite structures of wood and anhydrite screed
• Project management, calculation methods and financing of building projects
• Technical facility management and corporate real estate management with indoor installations, technical real estate management and computer-aided building management
• Optimisation potentials of office buildings considered as whole units
• Approaches for the sustainable development of the housing stock in Saxony
• Analysis of late-19th-century buildings in Leipzig
• Investigation of wave energy converters
• Optimisation of sewage treatment plants
• Reconstruction of former coal works railways for public passenger transport
• EDP-aided project control of traffic schemes