Structuring servitization-related research Rabetino, Rodrigo; Harmsen, Willem; Kohtamäki, Marko ...
International journal of operations & production management,
02/2018, Volume:
38, Issue:
2
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to organize and connect past research from different servitization-related scholarly communities.
Design/methodology/approach
This study reviews more than 1,000 ...articles by combining author co-citation and qualitative content analyses.
Findings
The structure and boundaries of the field are mapped, and the characteristics of the three identified servitization-related communities are assessed qualitatively. These three communities are product-service systems, solution business, and service science. The findings demonstrate that a narrow range of theories and qualitative methods dominate in existing research.
Originality/value
Through the lens of the sociology of science, this review critically evaluates servitization-related research and offers a list of themes that are considered important to the future development of the field. Regarding future research, the main recommendations are as follows: increasing the use of well-established theories from adjacent mature fields, borrowing ideas from different research communities to stimulate knowledge accumulation within and across communities, and reducing the level of description while increasing the number of confirmatory, quantitative, and longitudinal research designs. Finally, the development of formal structures for socialization (e.g. conferences and special issues) could allow the field to achieve a greater degree of scientific maturity and would influence the direction and pace of the development of servitization-related research.
The ability to manage, integrate and learn from strategic alliances is essential in today's interconnected and globalized economy. Despite the managerial relevance of alliance capability, there ...remain several open questions related to the conceptualization of alliance capabilities, their antecedents, processes and outcomes, and future research needs. We address these issues through a systematic review of 94 articles from top-tier journals focused on alliance capabilities. This study makes three contributions. The study (1) defines the concept of alliance capabilities when operating in a dyadic relational context by reviewing the rich alliance capability literature, acknowledging and bridging the works conducted in different fields. We (2) identify the main processes, antecedents and outcomes of alliance capabilities and, through this analysis, pave the way for (3) the creation of a comprehensive research agenda to direct future research efforts. Overall, this study extends the existing literature by providing an integrative view of alliance capability research in various fields.
•This study concentrates on reviewing the alliance capability literature.•Alliance capability is a firm’s ability to manage, integrate and learn in strategic relationships to achieve mutual benefit.•This study discusses the variety of concepts and definitions that have been used in existing literature.•The study maps a comprehensive array of antecedents, processes and outcomes of alliance capabilities.•The study presents a detailed research agenda for future studies that can advance research on alliance capabilities.
Energy ecosystems are under a significant transition. Local flexibility marketplaces (LFM) and platforms are argued to have significant potential in contributing to such a transition. The purpose of ...this study was to answer the following research question: how do market conditions and stakeholders shape emerging LFM platform governance choices? We approached this objective with an exploratory single-case study by conducting ten semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders in the Finnish energy ecosystem. The results of the content and pattern analyses revealed the key challenges to LFM implementation such as the current regulatory treatment of flexibility, high costs of gadget installations, and ensuring sufficient liquidity in the market. In addition, we also demonstrated that despite such barriers, the Finnish ecosystem is largely pragmatic about LFMs’ in its midst. All in all, we contributed to the non-technological streams of LFM literature by developing an exhaustive framework with four distinctive dimensions (i.e., ecosystem readiness, value-creation logic, platform architecture and governance, platform competitiveness) for LFM development, which helps academics, practitioners, and policy-makers to understand how novel platforms emerge and develop.
The study analyzes the coping practices that emerge when a manufacturer of standardized products and add-on services expands to provide customized solutions. Based on a comparative case study ...methodology conducted across four case companies, and an analysis of extensive documentary data, the study challenges the dichotomous ‘either-or thinking’ in servitization research and highlights ‘both-and thinking’ by identifying both paradoxes and coping practices. The study extends the literature by identifying four paradoxes in servitization: 1) effectiveness in the customization of solutions vs. efficiency in product manufacturing, 2) building a customer orientation vs. maintaining an engineering mindset, 3) organizing product and service integration vs. separated services and product organizations, and 4) exploratory innovation in solutions vs. exploitative innovation in product manufacturing. Moreover, the study identifies nine practices that manufacturing companies apply when coping with the paradoxical challenges that emerge during servitization. The findings may help manufacturing companies understand, accept, and address paradoxical challenges and balance tensions, as not all tensions can be resolved. The identification of these paradoxes allows us to understand the difficulties that manufacturing companies face during the servitization process and may help explain the servitization-deservitization trend among some manufacturing companies that some recent studies have identified.
Strategy map of servitization Rabetino, Rodrigo; Kohtamäki, Marko; Gebauer, Heiko
International journal of production economics,
10/2017, Volume:
192
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
By representing the servitization of three leading corporations via a strategy map, this multiple-case study discusses how the strategic logic of servitization can be explained by linking the key ...practices adopted by manufacturers to support critical processes while shifting their focus to project-based customer solutions. The results draw on data collected from solution providers operating in the metal and machinery industries headquartered in Finland. By examining the strategic actions, tools, and processes behind the implementation of servitization, this study extends recent debates on the service-based business models of manufacturing companies. For servitization theory, this study develops a strategy map for a solution provider. For manufacturing firms, this study provides a framework and a tool for benchmarking, developing and implementing a strategy while mitigating the processes of long-term value creation and appropriation.
We evaluate the co-innovation trajectory of firms adopting different collaborative innovation networks (i.e., vertical, horizontal, and institutional). The results of the empirical applications are ...obtained from a multilevel regression, and a Nash bargaining model estimated via data envelopment analysis on a sample of 734 enterprises from seven OECD countries form Europe and Latin America. Findings point to important national and firm-level distinctions across the optimal co-innovation configurations: whereas vertical co-innovation strategies are characteristic of firms with the highest innovation efficiency, institutions are frequently found to be optimal for co-innovation success in less developed innovation systems that may be faced with structural deficiencies. However, digital competency is found to disrupt co-innovation configurations for successful innovation, facilitating the development of efficient vertical and horizontal co-innovation trajectories.
•Important national and firm-level distinctions are found across optimal co-innovation configurations.•Vertical co-innovation strategies are characteristic of firms with the highest innovation efficiency.•Digital competency facilitates the development of efficient co-innovation trajectories.•Digital competency facilitates the development of vertical and horizontal co-innovation trajectories.•Digital facilitation help firms to access innovation ecosystems better and engage in external co-innovation activities.
The present study analyzes how servitization delineates a manufacturer's boundaries. Based on interviews with 57 senior managers and extensive secondary data collected from four global solution ...providers, this study contributes by revealing how servitization shapes firm boundary decisions and repositioning practices. First, the results demonstrate that servitization changes a manufacturer's a) identity from technology-focused to customer-centric, b) capabilities to integrate technology development with customer value understanding, c) power position in the manufacturing ecosystem from upstream to downstream, and d) efficiency logic toward a service factory logic. Second, this study describes the interplay among these boundary lenses in servitization. The developed framework can assist managers in their strategy implementation when moving toward servitization.
•This empirical study exposes that a manufacturer’s transition from products to services requires firm’s boundary changes.•Manufacturers must consider the dynamic interplay among the four boundary lenses when moving toward servitization.•Firms should have a clear overall plan and rules concerning the actions and practices they will accomplish to drive that change.•Alliances/joint ventures are common practices in the upstream, whereas acquisitions/new investments are used in the downstream.
This study analyzes how regional manufacturing characteristics, i.e., specialization and the size of new manufacturers, and the entrepreneurial ecosystem, i.e., contextual factors driving ...entrepreneurial actions, impact the rate of new knowledge-intensive business service (KIBS) firms. Its spatial analysis of 121 European regions reveals that the entrepreneurial ecosystem plays a decisive role in supporting KIBS formation rates in territories with a solid industrial fabric. The economic potential of more attractive neighbouring regions can be detrimental to regional KIBS formation rates. The study offers valuable implications on how the entrepreneurial ecosystem can facilitate the interaction between manufacturing and KIBS firms.
Abstract Despite the valuable contributions of earlier learning studies, the specific analysis of how entrepreneurs and small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) learn has been sidelined in the ...literature. Significant research opportunities remain open in various unexplored realms. By adopting a multidisciplinary perspective that combines a variety of frameworks (i.e., organizational, economic, and innovation management), the collection of 11 studies of this special issue dedicated to learning delivers valuable insights into how entrepreneurs and SMEs capitalize on learning processes, while identifying how these processes are affected by the type of experience (i.e., success and failure). This paper first overviews the contributions of the 11 papers included in the special issue. Next, we discuss a number of yet unresolved topics that deserve academic attention, paying special attention to entrepreneurs’ direct and indirect experiences, knowledge obsolescence caused by technology upgrading, and the role of digital technologies—i.e., Internet-of-things and artificial intelligence—in the learning processes.
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