Assessment of brand competitiveness which influences consumer trends and company’s sales performance contributes to business development. This paper elaborates the theories and the main investigations of brand competitiveness, and formulates a comprehensive hierarchical structure integrating multi-attribute indexes, i.e., social, technical, managerial, environmental and cultural criteria. An integrated multi-criterion decision-making (MCDM) model combining with analytic hierarchy process (AHP), grey relational analysis (GRA) and VIKOR is presented to determine the weights of influence criteria and to evaluate brand competitiveness. The utilized integrated methodology has been proved to be valid and practical by the empirical application on three enterprises. The results provide an accurate and effective tool for MCDM problem and also a new guideline for the enterprise development.

BZ25-1 oilfield is located in the southeast of Bohai bay which geographically lies between 119°00′ to 119°15′ east longitude and 38°10′ to 38°20′ north latitude. It has two oil blocks, including Shahejie (SHJ) waxy oil and Minghuazhen (MHZ) heavy oil, with six wellhead platforms WHPA∼WHPF and six submarine pipelines. Therein, the WHPC-WHPB and WHPB-SPM (Single Point Mooring) pipelines transport the mixture of the two produced crude oils. However, the mixing of the two oils will certainly bring out a change in their components and properties, which directly affects the safe operation of the submarine pipelines and offshore production facilities. Therefore, this paper compounds three kinds of MHZ/SHJ mixed oils with blending ratios of 1:1, 3:1 and 9:1, mainly studies how the components, rheological and thermophysical properties of the oil mixtures change with the blending ratio. The major objective of this study is to evaluate the compatibility of the two crude oils and provide a theoretical basis for the production optimization and risk elusion of the oilfield. The results of the study show that the components and properties of SHJ crude oil are quite different from those of MHZ oil, the flow behavior of SHJ oil is more sensitive to temperature. As MHZ oil in the compounds increases, the contents of asphaltene, resin, sulfur and carbon residue will increase except wax contents, their viscosities, densities and flash points will also increase, but their pour points, yield stresses, calorific values and other major thermophysical parameters will decrease. A blending ratio of 2∼7:1 for MHZ to SHJ crude oil can be concluded to make the properties of the compounds meet the safe and economic requirements of the subsea pipeline and offshore facility operations and ensure the compatibility of the mixed oils. In actuality, the field operations have confirmed that the recommended blending ratio is reasonable and practicable.

To explore the impact of corporate patent characteristics and patent strategic value on innovation performance, this study provides an empirical analysis of 339 automobile companies in China. The results show that the patent characteristics have a positive impact on the patent strategic value and innovation performance, and the impact of patent characteristics on innovation performance depends on the patent strategic value. This study also shows that when the corporate leadership supports innovation and have strong patent management capability, the patent characteristics and patent strategic value will have a stronger effect on innovation performance.

The study of ocean bottom pressure (OBP) is useful for understanding the barotropic processes variability that contribute to sea level rise. Previous studies have reported the strong OBP anomalies in the Southern Ocean on different time scales. In this study, the characteristic and mechanisms of the energetic interannual OBP variability in the southeastern Pacific are examined using 14 years of GRACE data. It is found that the OBP anomalies are positive (negative) related to the convergence (divergence) of Ekman transport forced by local winds variability. The sea level pressure (SLP) anomalies shows a wavenumber-3 structure in the high latitude of the South Pacific, which benefits a strong and persistent anticyclone over the southeastern Pacific, leading to the positive OBP anomalies there. Such SLP anomalies are similar to the second Pacific-South American (PSA2). Moreover, El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) plays an important role in the austral spring (August-November) OBP variability and leads the austral autumn (March-June) OBP variability by 1 season. These results highlight the influence of atmospheric variability on OBP anomalies and are validated by a mass conservation (non-Boussinesq) ocean model, which is expected to not only better understanding of OBP mechanisms in a longer time, but also predict OBP variation in the global scale.