New technologies, sustainability policies, protectionism and consumers preferences are pushing for the reorganization of the automotive cluster. (ILO, 2020) Due to recent technological advances derived from the application of AI in the domains of autonomous driving, connectivity, automation, and robotics, the automotive sector is evolving from the traditional, linear, product-oriented value chain to a mobility, service oriented one including new players (ILO, 2020). In fact, in the last years, several digital competences centers are supplying the automotive sector and have been installed in Portugal. These changes are put in place to enhance the product quality, to control costs and to improve productivity. The product shift is done to respond to new regulations on environmental protection, and to enable the control of some emergent market niches.
The paper will contribute to answer the question: what are the expectable changes in productivity due to the introduction of AI in the automotive sector and at new players in the automotive value chain in Portugal? Do they have impacts in traditional labour relations in the sector? Did the COVID-19 had an effect in the acceleration of such changes? Does the employment in the automotive sector changed with the recent automation trends in Portugal? Are there signs of improvement in qualifications with increases in automation? Or can we observe a clear job precarity in the automotive labour market with increased application of cyber physical systems in this sector? We want to develop this framework of questions to collect new data and obtain results that will be based on case studies from the automotive cluster. We will use, as well, secondary statistical analysis. Finally, changes in the productivity and labour market will be discussed in relation to the employment volume and skills in the automotive sector.
In this recently approved national project, we will focus on AI (cyber-physical systems, intelligent automation, robotics, IoT) as the most relevant emergent technology to understand the development of automation in this manufacturing sector (Geels et al., 2012; Moniz 2018). R&D investments in industrial processes in general may reflect productivity improvements derived from the increased automation process, but that may not be the general trend. Our empirical data are based until now on initial case studies from the automotive and components sector combined with database search by keywords that sign intelligence automation developments and AI applications selected from national R&D projects on robotics, machine learning, collaborative tools, human-machine interaction and autonomous systems, supported by European structural funds. The implications on industrial productivity and employment will be discussed in relation to automation trends in the automotive sector.

This report is the 3rd and final report elaborated for the project CrowdWork by the Portuguese team. The text provides the context in which digital platforms operate, as well as the main governmental initiatives in some of the sectors. Five case studies provide a description of each sector and an analysis of the existing / emerging collective
organisations, their promotors, rationale and extension. In the last chapter, the text presents our main conclusions and recommendations for policy making.

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The EU unveiled a stimulus package as part of the multiannual financial framework (MFF) for 2021–2027 and the temporary instrument designed to boost the economic recovery. This countercyclical response is aimed at avoiding a decline in the EU economy and protecting employment, vulnerable companies and necessity-driven entrepreneurs; however, it should also lay the foundations for a desirable entrepreneurial paradigm for the future that is driven by opportunity and embedded in a Circular Economy aligned to global well-being. We propose a new model that implies a different EU policy which puts entrepreneurship on the path toward and not away from development.

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The Late Triassic (Norian) outcrops of the Malmros Klint Formation, Jameson Land (Greenland) have yielded numerous specimens of non-sauropod sauropodomorphs. Relevant fossils were briefly reported in 1994 and were assigned to Plateosaurus trossingensis. However, continuous new findings of early non-sauropod sauropodomorphs around the globe facilitate comparisons and allow us to now revise this material. Here, the non-sauropod sauropodomorph Issi saaneq gen. et sp. nov. is described based on two almost complete and articulated skulls. The two skulls represent a middle-stage juvenile and a late-stage juvenile or subadult. Issi saaneq differs from all other sauropodomorphs by several unique traits: (1) a small foramen at the medial surface of the premaxilla; (2) an anteroposteriorly elongated dorsoposterior process of the squamosal; (3) a relatively high quadrate relative to rostrum height; (4) a well-developed posterodorsal process of the articular. These features cannot be explained by taphonomy, ontogeny, or intraspecific variation. Issi saaneq shows affinities to Brazilian plateosaurids and the European Plateosaurus, being recovered as the sister clade of the latter in our phylogenetic analysis. It is the northernmost record of a Late Triassic sauropodomorph, and a new dinosaur species erected for Greenland. Issi saaneq broadens our knowledge about the evolution of plateosaurid sauropodomorphs.

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A new plesiosaur partial skeleton, comprising most of the trunk and including axial, limb, and girdle bones, was collected in the lower Sinemurian (Coimbra Formation) of Praia da Concha, near São Pedro de Moel in central west Portugal. The specimen represents a new genus and species, Plesiopharos moelensis gen. et sp. nov. Phylogenetic analysis places this taxon at the base of Plesiosauroidea. Its position is based on this exclusive combination of characters: presence of a straight preaxial margin of the radius; transverse processes of mid-dorsal vertebrae horizontally oriented; ilium with sub-circular cross section of the shaft and subequal anteroposterior expansion of the dorsal blade; straight proximal end of the humerus; and ventral surface of the humerus with an anteroposteriorly long shallow groove between the epipodial facets. In addition, the new taxon has the following autapomorphies: iliac blade with less expanded, rounded and convex anterior flank; highly developed ischial facet of the ilium; apex of the neural spine of the first pectoral vertebra inclined posterodorsally with a small rounded tip. This taxon represents the most complete and the oldest plesiosaur species in the Iberian Peninsula. It is also the most complete, best preserved, and oldest marine vertebrate in the region and testifies to the incursion of marine reptiles in the newly formed proto-Atlantic sea, prior to the Atlantic Ocean floor spreading in the Early Cretaceous.

The Kap Stewart Group (Rhaetian-Sinemurian, Triassic–Early Jurassic) of the Jameson Land Basin in central East Greenland has traditionally been regarded as a strictly continental unit with delta and perennial lake sediments. New finds of plesiosaur bone remain in a thin storm deposited sandstone bed in the middle part of the Rhætelv Formation of the Kap Stewart Group, however, indicates a likely period of marine influence. At the study area at the eastern margin of the basin, the Rhætelv Formation is 300-m thick and overlies unconformably the Norian Fleming Fjord Group. The bone-bearing sandstone occurs 190 m above the base of the group and is closely associated with black laminated mudstones; palynological investigation of three samples from these mudstones indicates that they are of a younger Hettangian age. The Hettangian was a relatively short stage (201.3–199.5 Ma) and elsewhere characterized by two episodes of sea-level highstands. Assuming that the marine incursion in the Jameson land Basin evidenced by the plesiosaur fossil remains took place during the youngest of these sea-level highstands, the bone-bearing bed of the Rhætelv Formation can be dated to 200 Ma and thereby gives the first numerical age constraint of this hitherto poorly dated succession.

We propose a stochastic algorithm for global optimisation of a regular function, possibly unbounded, defined on a bounded set with regular boundary; a function that attains its extremum in the boundary of its domain of definition. The algorithm is determined by a diffusion process that is associated with the function by means of a strictly elliptic operator that ensures an adequate maximum principle. In order to preclude the algorithm to be trapped in a local extremum, we add a pure random search step to the algorithm. We show that an adequate procedure of parallelisation of the algorithm can increase the rate of convergence, thus superseding the main drawback of the addition of the pure random search step.

We propose and study a simple model for microcredit using two sums, with a random number of terms, of identically distributed random variables, the number of terms being Poisson distributed; the first sum accounts for the payments { the payables{ made to the collective vault by the participants and the second sum, subtracted to the first, accounts for the loans received by the participants, the receivables.
Under a global independence hypothesis we define, by mean of moment generating functions, an easily
implementable condition for the sustainability of the collective vault. That is, if, for all the participants and at any time, on average, the sum of the loans is strictly less than the sum of the payments to the collective vault then the probability of the collective vault failing can be made arbitrarily small, provided the loans only start to be accepted after a sufficiently large delay. We present numerical illustrations of collective vaults for exponential and chi-squared distributed random terms. For the practical management of such a collective vault it may be advisable to have loan granting rules that destroy independence of the random terms. We present a first simulation study that shows the effect of such a breaking dependence loan granting rule on maintaining the stability of the collective vault.

We formulate an optimization stochastic algorithm convergence theorem, of Solis and Wets type, and we show several instances of its application to concrete algorithms. In this convergence theorem the algorithm is a sequence of random variables and, in order to describe the increasing flow of information associated to this sequence we define a filtration – or flow of σ -algebras – on the probability space, depending on the sequence of random variables and on the function being optimized. We compare the flow of information of two convergent algorithms by comparing the associated filtrations by means of the Cotter distance of σ-algebras. The main result is that two convergent optimization algorithms have the same information content if both their limit minimization functions generate the full σ-algebra of the probability space.

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Studying the dynamics of deposits is important for three reasons: first, it serves as an important component of liquidity stress testing; second, it is crucial to asset-liability management exercises and the allocation between liquid and illiquid assets; third, it is the support for a liquidity at risk (LaR) methodology.

Current models are based on AR(1) processes that often underestimate liquidity risk. Thus a bank relying on those models may face failure in an event of crisis. We propose a novel approach for modeling deposits, using panel data and a momentum term.

The model enables the simulation of a variety of deposit trajectories, including episodes of financial distress, showing much higher drawdowns and realistic liquidity at risk estimates, as well as density plots that present a wide range of possible values, corresponding to booms and financial crises.

Therefore, this methodology is more suitable for liquidity management at banks, as well as for conducting liquidity stress tests.