Product-service systems

Citation

Roy, R., Shehab, E. and Tiwari, A. (2009), "Product-service systems", Journal of Manufacturing Technology Management, Vol. 20 No. 5. https://doi.org/10.1108/jmtm.2009.06820eaa.001

Product-service systems

Article Type: Guest editorial From: Journal of Manufacturing Technology Management, Volume 20, Issue 5

Manufacturing industry is enhancing its offerings in the form of product-service systems (PSS) to generate more revenue through better satisfying and exceeding customer expectations. Use of new technology, better understanding of social systems and advanced management techniques are working together to enable a shift towards servitization of manufacturing. There is an increasing interest to understand the basic nature of the transition from a product centric organisation to a service or value proposition centric organisation. Selling a product and its functionality is different from selling an offering based on customer value. This requires deeper understanding of the customer and the relationship among the product, business processes, organisational structure and human factors. The relationships change based on business to consumer (B2C) or business to business (B2B) interactions. Several manufacturing organisations are going through this transformation and have good insight and knowledge about the challenge. There is a need to enhance multi-disciplinary research in the PSS area.

This special issue of the Journal of Manufacturing Technology and Management presents 11 selected papers that cover state of the art research in a number of PSS areas. This special issue starts with a review paper on the servitisation of manufacturing by T.S. Baines, H.W. Lightfoot, O. Benedettini and J.M. Kay. The paper presents an historic account of the transition to a more service based manufacturing environment and outlines the challenges it poses for the future. A number of papers address different aspects of PSS design. Nicola Morelli presents a methodological approach to design PSS based on an active participation of customers to the value production process. Value co-production with the customer is a key characteristic of any PSS offering. The methodology allows customisation of services for local needs of customers. J.C. Aurich, N. Wolf, M. Siener and E. Schweitzer present a framework to systematically configure PSS offering or solution. The paper employs a life cycle management approach to integrate different actors (e.g. customer and manufacturer) for a PSS solution. Ella-Mae Molloy, Carys Siemieniuch and Murray Sinclair present a process-based empirical study to understand the workings of PSS-based organisations. They present an analytical framework to assess decision processes within the organisation. It is observed that the PSS demands new processes to avoid ignorance of potential risks. Yee Mey Goh and Chris McMahon argue the case for in-service knowledge re-use in order to improve efficiency of a PSS solution. The paper proposes four strategies for the success of knowledge codification approaches. The next set of papers focus the importance of customer involvement in PSS. Mario Rese, Wolf-Christian Strotmann and Markus Karger present nine customer preference drivers that are relevant for PSS. They present a compass to evaluate PSS solutions against changing customer preferences. Koji Kimita, Yoshiki Shimomura and Tamio Arai also present a methodology to estimate customer satisfaction for a conceptual design of PSS. The methodology helps to compare designs and therefore improve the PSS design in an iterative manner. Oskar Rexfelt and Hiort af Ornäs argue that uncertainty reduction and relative benefits are the two most important factors that impact customer acceptance of a PSS solution within a B2C context. The goal of their research is to support PSS development that enable but do not force consumers, giving them choices without constraining their actions. On the other hand, A. Azarenko, R. Roy, E. Shehab and A. Tiwari present PSS business models within the B2B context for the machine tools industry. The paper evaluates economics of different business models and identifies their relative strengths. The next paper presents case studies on how product design could be changed for PSS by Erik Sundin, Mattias Lindahl and Winifred Ijomah. The paper identifies examples of additional requirements from PSS on the product design. In summary, the ten papers have presented an overview of the current challenges in the PSS research and a few directions for the future. And finally, Tomohiko Sakao, Gunilla Ölundh Sandström and Detlef Matzen present three crucial dimensions for service-orientation research, i.e. an offer dimension representing products and services, a provider dimension, and a customer/user dimension. The proposed approach is developed through extensive literature review. In summary, the 11 papers have presented an overview of the current challenges in the PSS research and a few directions for the future.

Rajkumar Roy, Essam Shehab, Ashutosh TiwariGuest Editors