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1 – 10 of over 19000Sarah Lai-Yin Cheah, Yinping Yang and Ozcan Saritas
This paper aims to discuss a foresight study conducted in Singapore’s national R&D agency to help science and technology decision makers identify key capability areas of R&D…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to discuss a foresight study conducted in Singapore’s national R&D agency to help science and technology decision makers identify key capability areas of R&D investment to support the manufacturing industry’s growth in the country and the region.
Design/methodology/approach
Using horizon scanning, scenario analysis and expert opinion, nine capabilities are identified as core areas to be developed to support the country’s future growth of product-service systems.
Findings
The results of a Delphi survey involving 30 industry and academic thought leaders recommend priorities of these capabilities. This paper concludes with a discussion of the study implications for theory, research and practice in the domain of servitisation and product-service systems.
Research limitations/implications
The foresight study presented here on the future of servitisation in Singapore demonstrates one of the first fully fledged applications of foresight in constructing a coherent vision of future product-service system markets. In this study, the authors applied systemic foresight methodology (SFM) comprising the first six phases: initiation (scoping), intelligence (scanning), imagination (scenarios), integration (priorities), interpretation (strategies) and implementation (action).For future research, an ideal step would be to proceed with the final phase of the SFM, impact, to develop indicators for servitisation and to monitor and evaluate the transition process.
Practical implications
Manufacturing and services are no longer distinct concepts with a clear divide. Manufacturing firms not only become more service dependent but also produce and provide services for their consumers. This transformation towards servitisation implies fundamental re-organisation of the production and management practices. Furthermore, through new business models, new and loyal customers will be gained, which will in turn bring additional income, while making the companies less prone to economic and business fluctuations.
Social implications
The results of this study have practical implications for policymakers of public and private sectors that are interested in playing a key role in future product-service system innovation. These have implications for developing the human and intellectual capital that are required for supporting the future innovation. Institutes of higher learning and vocational institutes should also consider incorporating new curricula and modules to build the capabilities for knowledge creation and transfer.
Originality/value
The findings of the present study on strategic growth areas and relevant critical capabilities provide new directions for research in the field of servitisation. Among the nine capabilities identified, the top three were advanced customer intelligence capability, socio-physical service quality, traceability and maintainability and integrated strategic decision-making. From the results, it is apparent that advanced customer intelligence capability is both an area of importance to Singapore and the world.
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Haihua Zhu, Jing Li, James Gao and Weihua Lu
With the customers’ increasing expectation on the product value, manufacturing enterprises around the world have made significant efforts to provide high value-added services in…
Abstract
Purpose
With the customers’ increasing expectation on the product value, manufacturing enterprises around the world have made significant efforts to provide high value-added services in addition to their traditional product development and manufacturing business. For this reason, it is of great importance to research product service system. The purpose of this paper is to research on the key problem of integrated product service system (IPSS) design.
Design/methodology/approach
A value-oriented IPSS is developed, which is set up based on “requirements-functions-processes-structures” mapping model to give full consideration to customer value and service functions. An extended product-service blueprint, which stems from the service blueprint, is developed to describe product behaviors, service deliver processes, stakeholders’ activities and supporting activities. An ontology-based design support system is proposed to improve design efficiency and help designers making better-informed decisions. A computer-aided prototype system has been developed, and an initial attempt has been made to demonstrate the role of IPSS in the aerospace industry.
Findings
Many traditional design methods cannot effectively address the objects and processes integration problem of products and services. Moreover, both product and service should be considered in IPSS design, and both of them extremely depend on designers’ own experience and knowledge. Thus, a broader range of knowledge is required to understand product-service system (PSS) design.
Research limitations/implications
This research provides a solid foundation for PSS C and promotes an effective means for PSS design.
Originality/value
A customer value-oriented IPSS is presented. Customer requirements are considered during the design phase of PSS as well as both product and service knowledge.
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Elif Küçüksayraç and Layıka Ney Ece Arıburun Kırca
Although the methods and approaches of sustainable design have been developing for more than 20 years, their application in design education and the design process is still…
Abstract
Purpose
Although the methods and approaches of sustainable design have been developing for more than 20 years, their application in design education and the design process is still under-examined. This study aims to investigate how to integrate sustainability into project-based undergraduate courses in industrial design education, where sustainability has recently been introduced into the curriculum.
Design/methodology/approach
Two workshops were carried out as pilot studies within two different elective courses. The scope of the study included sustainable design approaches at both the product and product-service system innovation levels.
Findings
The findings show that choosing between the two levels and the sustainable design approach is the most important challenge that students face during the design process. Moreover, the project brief influences the choice of the approach.
Originality/value
Following the findings, a sustainable design process model for the project-based undergraduate design courses was proposed. Finally, a new course curriculum on sustainable design was developed based on the findings from the study.
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Federico Barravecchia, Fiorenzo Franceschini, Luca Mastrogiacomo and Mohamed Zaki
The paper attempts to address the following research questions (RQs): RQ1: What are the main research topics within PSS research? RQ2: What are future trends for PSS research?
Abstract
Purpose
The paper attempts to address the following research questions (RQs): RQ1: What are the main research topics within PSS research? RQ2: What are future trends for PSS research?
Design/methodology/approach
Twenty years of research (1999–2018) on product-service systems (PSS) produced a significant amount of scientific literature on the topic. As the PSS field is relatively new and fragmented across different disciplines, a review of the prior and relevant literature is important in order to provide the necessary framework for understanding current developments and future perspectives. This paper aims to review and organize research contributions regarding PSS. A machine-learning algorithm, namely Latent Dirichlet Allocation, has been applied to the whole literature corpus on PSS in order to understand its structure.
Findings
The adopted approach resulted in the definition of eight distinct and representative topics able to deal adequately with the multidisciplinarity of the PSS. Furthermore, a systematic review of the literature is proposed to summarize the state-of-the-art and limitations in the identified PSS research topics. Based on this critical analysis, major gaps and future research challenges are presented and discussed.
Originality/value
On the basis of the results of the topic landscape, the paper presents some potential research opportunities on PSSs. In particular, challenges, transversal to the eight research topics and related to recent technology trends and digital transformation, have been discussed.
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Juliana Hsuan, Marin Jovanovic and Diego Honorato Clemente
This study shows various pathways manufacturers can take when embarking on digital servitization (DS) journeys. It builds on the DS and modularity literature to map the strategic…
Abstract
Purpose
This study shows various pathways manufacturers can take when embarking on digital servitization (DS) journeys. It builds on the DS and modularity literature to map the strategic trajectories of product–service–software (PSSw) configurations.
Design/methodology/approach
The study is exploratory and based on the inductive theory building method. The empirical data were gathered through a workshop with focus groups of 15 servitization manufacturers (with 22 respondents), an on-site workshop (in-depth case study), semi-structured interviews, observations and document study of archival data.
Findings
The DS trajectories are idiosyncratic and dependent on design architectures of PSSw modules, balancing choices between standardization and innovation. The adoption of software systems depends on the maturity of the industry-specific digital ecosystem. Decomposition and integration of PSSw modules facilitate DS transition through business model modularity. Seven testable propositions are presented.
Research limitations/implications
With the small sample size from different industries and one in-depth case study, generalizing the findings was not possible.
Practical implications
The mapping exercise is powerful when top management from different functional departments can participate together to share their expertise and achieve consensus. It logs the “states” that the manufacturer undergoes over time.
Originality/value
The Digital Servitization Cube serves as a conceptual framework for manufacturers to systematically map and categorize their current and future PSSw strategies. It bridges the cross-disciplinary theoretical discussion in DS.
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Saad Zighan, David Bamford, Iain Reid and Ahmed EL-Qasem
This study examines the criteria for evaluating the quality of servitization and the factors influencing the project–service system's success.
Abstract
Purpose
This study examines the criteria for evaluating the quality of servitization and the factors influencing the project–service system's success.
Design/methodology/approach
Evidence was collected through three rounds of Delphi consensus with 42 project managers.
Findings
The results indicate that the quality of servitization in project-oriented organizations is conceptualized as a cumulative construct driven by the product-service system's overall ability to offer more customer value. This value is defined by three interconnected dimensions: the service, the project and the integration system. The study also proposes a novel customer-oriented quality process with two connected levels comprising eight key factors influencing the quality of the project–service systems and nine key quality criteria that assist in evaluating the project–service systems.
Practical implications
Offering extra services is crucial for successful project-oriented organizations to deliver more customer value. The value of servitization is the combined value of products and services. The failure of one of these components to satisfy customers leads to the collapse of the whole system, which entails the need for a balanced-focus quality system toward projects and services.
Originality/value
This study contributes to the quality of servitization in project-oriented organizations, arguing that a balance between service orientation and project orientation is preferred to increase customer value and reduce the clash and ambiguity between project operations and service provision.
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Haihua Zhu, James Gao and Qixiang Cai
Product-service system (PSS) has been attracting attentions of global manufacturing to providing high-value added services in addition to their traditional product development and…
Abstract
Purpose
Product-service system (PSS) has been attracting attentions of global manufacturing to providing high-value added services in addition to their traditional product development and manufacturing business. For this reason, it is of great importance to research PSS. The purpose of this paper is to establish a systematic strategy and a system tool for PSS design.
Design/methodology/approach
A requirement-driven product-service system (RdPPS) is developed using requirements analysis and knowledge management technologies. A framework is proposed to support RdPPS by providing tools and methods for requirement analysis and processing, formalization of PSS by ontology-based knowledge representation, reasoning method for PSS solution finding, and solution optimizing and assessing. Finally, the design support strategies for RdPPS are investigated to demonstrate the usability and functioning of the developed system.
Findings
Many conventional design methods did not consider the influence of customer requirements (CRs) during the planning phase of PSS design. Moreover, a broader range of knowledge is required to PSS design, since both products and services are considered.
Research limitations/implications
This research provides a solid foundation for PSS, and promotes an effective means for PSS design.
Originality/value
A RdPSS is presented. CRs are considered during the design phase of PSS as well as both product and service knowledge.
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Vidyasagar Gembali, Aalok Kumar and PRS Sarma
The present study discusses the benefits and importance of sociotechnical thinking for the integration of industry 4.0 (I4.0), and their subsequent usefulness in analyzing the…
Abstract
The present study discusses the benefits and importance of sociotechnical thinking for the integration of industry 4.0 (I4.0), and their subsequent usefulness in analyzing the value-added activities and related quality issues, and their implications in the quality 4.0 (Q4.0), product-service systems (PSS) in the organization level/complex systems in the era of I4.0. I4.0 pushed the traditional manufacturing models toward product-service systems; for this transition, social and economic factors influence more, and technological advancements are going more rapidly than the social developments needed for the transition. The integration of social-technical system perspective with I4.0 technologies adoption would improve the value cocreation of PSS. The balance among the sociotechnical systems theory (STST) and I4.0 technologies are necessary for production and logistics organizations. This can be attained by sociotechnical systems thinking because it gives a comprehensive overview for integrating I4.0 and related quality issues in the production and logistics service systems.
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Alex Garrett, Karla Straker and Cara Wrigley
Collaborative consumption firms leverage networked peers, communicating, collaborating and even delivering services to one another through a central marketplace channel. This…
Abstract
Purpose
Collaborative consumption firms leverage networked peers, communicating, collaborating and even delivering services to one another through a central marketplace channel. This raises questions as to the nature of this new form of digital channel strategy and deployment from a firm’s perspective. As a first step, this research seeks to help bridge the gap in knowledge by establishing an understanding of the digital channel usage of collaborative consumption firms.
Design/methodology/approach
A qualitative content analysis of 30 collaborative consumption firms was conducted using multiple data sources and coded into typologies against a predetermined coding scheme. These results were then compared against existing literature on digital channel usage in regards to a wider company usage.
Findings
This study identifies the digital channel usage and digital channel typology of each of the 30 firms associated within the collaborative consumption domain. The study shows a distinct increase in the use of social and community digital channels between traditional firms and collaborative consumption firms. As a result of this study, a concise definition of a collaborative consumption firm is provided, the digital channel usage of collaborative consumption firms is detailed and insights are provided for each sub-type of collaborative consumption.
Research limitations/implications
This study contributes to the understanding of the collaborative consumption phenomena, the business model of collaborative consumption firms and digital channels. This study assists in describing the shift from traditional firms to peer-to-peer systems. Finally, a theoretical model is provided that demonstrates the nuance of collaborative consumption channel choice within each subcategory for future researchers to test and reflect upon.
Practical implications
This study demonstrates how collaborative consumption firms are allowing customers to drive interaction rather than traditional business-to-customer messages. A theoretical model is provided which shows contemporary marketers how to best dictate a digital channel strategy for a collaborative consumption style initiative.
Originality/value
Contributions include: a definition of what a collaborative consumption firm and its channels pertain to and how to design a collaborative consumption digital channel strategy. This study presents a digital channel comparison between collaborative consumption firms and traditional organisations.
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