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Crowdfunding (CF) is a digital-financial innovation that, bypassing credit crisis, bank system rigidities and constraints of the capital market, is allowing new ventures and established companies to get the needed funds to support innovations. After one decade of research, mainly focused on relations between variables and outcomes of the CF campaign, the literature shows methodological lacks about the study of its overall behavior. These reflect into a weak theoretical understanding and inconsistent managerial guidance, leading to a 27% success ratio of campaigns. To bridge this gap, this paper embraces a “complex system” perspective of the CF campaign, able to explore the system's behavior of a campaign over time, in light of its causal loop structure.

By adopting and following the document model building (DMB) methodology, a set of 26 variables and mutual causal relations modeled the system “Crowdfunding campaign” and a data set based on them and crafted to model the “Crowdfunding campaign” with a causal loop diagram. Finally, system archetypes have been used to link the causal loop structure with qualitative trends of CF's behavior (i.e. the raised capital over time).

The research brought to 26 variables making the system a “Crowdfunding campaign.” The variables influence each other, thus showing a set of feedback loops, whose structure determines the behavior of the CF campaign. The causal loop structure is traced back to three system archetypes, presiding the behavior in three stages of the campaign.

The value of this paper is both methodological and theoretical. First, the DMB methodology has been expanded and reinforced concerning previous applications; second, we carried out a causation analysis, unlike the common correlation analysis; further, we created a theoretical model of a “Crowdfunding Campaign” unlike the common empirical models built on CF platform's data.

The concept of positional innovation – as one of the four innovation types of the Francis and Bessant’s “4P’s” model – is an effective product innovation strategy for producers of mature and credence goods as food products are. Despite the acknowledgement as one of the major industries worldwide, positional innovations about the food products are underexplored in the managerial literature. To fill this gap, this paper first develops a theoretical analysis of the concepts. Then, by adopting a case-study research methodology, it discloses the way a bakery small enterprise manages positional innovation. Theoretical and practical implications are finally introduced and discussed.

After a literature review about the role and the characteristics of the positional innovation, the paper presents a case study of definition and implementation of managerial actions and initiatives driven by positional innovation. The aim is not to report on an inductive study, but to use this example as a picture to clarify theory and show how the various conceptual issues may be operatively applied and provide more contextual insights.

It emerges how a small food enterprise manages positional innovation to survive and compete in the national and international markets; the positional innovation sources are tapped into culture, social responsibility, tradition and other territorial assets of tangible and intangible nature, effectively combined to innovate the product perception and/or the utility in a use context.

“Non-technological”, simple products, like food, are underexplored and rarely seen as relevant context to investigate along the strategic and innovation management literature. Nonetheless, positional innovation is a perspective that values and credits the innovation efforts of small food products, revealing interesting managerial concepts and inspiring entrepreneurs and managers for activating and sustaining new strategies of innovation for their businesses.

Large scale research infrastructures (LSRIs) are rising in the competitive and globalized research environment, since they offer to external researchers-users, inputs and services for cutting-edge, large scale researches. Such researches would not be possible with usual infrastructures and budgets of single universities and research institutions. However, despite the strategic relevance acknowledged to LSRI by the nascent literature and by national policymakers, there is a lack of understanding of configurations and key performances of a LSRI. This paper aims to bridge this gap by identifying key morphologies of LSRIs and analysing their performances.

The research is carried out adopting a mixed research methodology, merging a literature review with a survey conducted on a sample of 11 LSRIs; they provided the data set for the parametrization of a morphological matrix.

The research led to the identification of seven LSRIs morphologies, with different performance linked to their structure.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this paper originally proposes the data set needed to develop a morphological analysis of LSRIs.

The innovation of business model (BM) is a strategic process for many firms, from which depends competitiveness and sustainability. Despite its theoretical relevance in management sciences, research on business model innovation is in its infancy and lacks of research consistency and theoretical connections to the theme of “performance”. With the aim to contribute in bridging this gap, this paper aims to identify and analyse drivers of business model innovation performance.

This research is based on an integrative literature review methodology.

BMI performance drivers are conditions related to various dimensions (i.e. processes, resources, market, BM structure, etc). that, when fulfilled, allow the BMI to have higher performance. BMI performance drivers are antecedents of BMI performance, and their identification is of both theoretical and practical value. The authors find and report a set of 35 BMI performance drivers.

The value of this research is both theoretical and practical. From a theoretical point of view, the identified “Business Model Innovation performance drivers” define and identify a variable of BMI performance, from a practical perspective, and they provide a comprehensive set of key conditions whose attainment should be planned, pursued and monitored by managers.

This paper proposes an in-depth and complete literature review of the revenue management (RM) issue in the passenger transportation industry. The purpose of this paper is to investigate structural elements and characteristics that help to make sense of the current body of RM literature under a managerial perspective.

The RM literature landscape is analysed according to a systematic literature review approach to point out the main topics around which the scientific literature has grown in the past 30 years. Topics are further categorized in themes by means of an agglomerative hierarchical clustering procedure.

First, the scientific literature of the past 30 years has been categorized into ten topics and four themes. Second, topics and themes are put in contrast with stages of the RM business process to highlight research areas still unaddressed by the literature. Third, the paper suggests research lines for future-related works that could positively contribute to the elevation of RM from a system of techniques to a “strategic management” theory.

Available literature reviews of RM in passenger transportation are focused on quantitative aspects and poorly structured in the systemic view of the RM. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this research is the first of its kind, as it aims to assess the whole body of literature, rather than specific themes, and to do it under a management/business perspective.

Digital platforms for the provision of food information-based services (FISs) represent a consolidated business with increasing revenue streams for entrepreneurs. Such platforms have transformed and clarified the nature of uncertainty and ambiguity inherent in the traditional food sector entrepreneurial processes. Anyway, a clear understanding of the value of digital platforms for FISs is not yet consolidated in the literature. With this paper, the authors try to fill this gap through a critical literature review of scientific research that combines knowledge on food consumer's behavior and user's knowledge behavior.

The authors carried out a critical literature review of scientific research combining knowledge of food consumer's and food information user's behavior. This allowed the identification of the main value components of FISs.

The authors propose a multidimensional framework for modelling the value proposition of digital platforms for FISs. Three main value dimensions have been identified: relevance, credibility, and accessibility. These dimensions concur with the consumer's perceived value of consumers in terms of benefits increase and cost reduction.

The research was intended to shed light on aspects characterizing consumers' perception of food information value. The authors put in evidence that the informational perspective of food communication is under-investigated. This study attempts to provide a holistic overview of the dimensions impacting on consumers' perception of the value of information for food consumers, opening new research perspectives.

The framework represents a tool for positioning food information offerings on the market, with the objective to analyze the value proposition of FISs according to a consumer perspective and to understand gaps of current offering of FISs. Moreover, it may support the design of a new generation of digital platform for food information provision, which would respond to consumers' expectations and information needs, highlighting emerging business opportunities for digital entrepreneurs.

Few research works provide a characterization of value proposition of digital platforms providing food information to consumers. In particular, to date, literature lacks of a holistic overview of the dimensions influencing consumer's perception of the information value of food communications.

Studies on academic entrepreneurship (AE) agree on the significant impact that Universities can have on entrepreneurial development. AE deploys through fundamental activities, like the start-up of new companies and the connection of the University with Enterprises. The purpose of this paper is to analyse the role of digital learning platforms (DLP) to connect Universities and Enterprises effectively. Although the literature has extensively investigated DLP, there is a lack of understanding of the role of DLP in supporting digital AE. This paper focuses, in particular, on the functional requirements that have to distinguish the development of DLPs supporting education-based activities of knowledge transfer between academia and enterprise.

The research is carried out, adopting a case study methodology. A single and holistic case regarding a DLP developed for the strategic and exclusive deployment of AE activities is proposed to describe and discuss the functional requirements of such Platform.

The DLP is a virtual learning space in which Enterprises and Universities can interact. The definition of design requirements is crucial for the efficacy of DLPs and needs to be carefully supported. Various criteria are proposed, respect to the various stakeholders engaged in DAE learning platform (Universities, Enterprises, students, employees), and according to the short- and long-term objectives of Universities and Entrepreneurship connection.

The paper explores an original case of DLP established in AE, to connect Universities and Enterprises. The research also sheds light on the under focussed typology of AE activities regarding education-based knowledge exchange. They are currently unaddressed by the literature on AE.

System dynamics (SD) is emerging as a powerful approach to understand, analyse, simulate and predict complex and dynamic business processes. In particular, it is true in the process of business model innovation (BMI) and not only as a computational approach. Due to the visual and diagrammatic tools employed by SD, innovation managers overcome humans' mental limitations and improve knowledge management in the BMI. This paper discloses the value of SD's visual tools, i.e. causal loop diagrams and stock and flow diagrams, to contribute to the “Knowldege Visualization” research line, and promote the application of SD as a powerful approach to support decisions in BMI.

Given the explorative nature and the “how” question driving the research, the methodology involved is a single, holistic case study. In particular, the case is about a business model (BM) diversification, in which an information and communication technology service provider has added to its existing business model a new BM based on a digital multi-sided platform, for passengers transportation.

The diagrammatic tools of SD, that is causal loop diagrams and stock and flow diagrams, allowed entrepreneurs to overcome the complexity of the business parameters concurring in the design of the BM.

The value of this research is in the exploratory approach and in the originality of the perspective by which SD is analysed: the visual knowledge perspective.

Digitalization had a relevant impact on the cultural tourism sector, both demand and supply. If, on the one hand, advances in digital technologies provided tourists with new mobile services able to amplify the cultural experience, on the other hand, they catalyzed the development of new business models by digital enterprises. This paper has a twofold purpose: to detect business models and key characteristics of mobile apps for cultural tourism and to analyze the offering of app-based services in this sector.

The authors defined a methodology to identify, characterize and analyze a particular category of digital products for cultural tourism: app-based services. They are studied in terms of value creation, proposition and capture with the aim to identify the distinctive features of business models. As a result, the authors identified a classification framework on three main dimensions, namely “how to exploit mobile app features to create value for cultural tourists” (value creation), “which valuable services are delivered to cultural tourists” (value proposition) and “how companies are rewarded for the value they offered” (value capture). The authors apply the framework to perform a situation analysis of app-based services in the cultural tourism market.

The analysis highlights that digital enterprises offering app-based services do not fully exploit advances in technologies about users' value requirements. Hence, the results of our work suggest some directions that digital enterprises may follow to better exploit mobile app technology.

To date, little research has been devoted to investigating cultural tourism business models involving the exploitation of mobile app-based services. This research provides a useful framework to analyze fundamental aspects of business models in this sector. Such a framework represents a practical tool that provides fruitful insights for the design of a new generation of app-based services within the so-called “Internet of things” domain.