Servitization and Industry 4.0 convergence in the digital transformation of product firms: A business model innovation perspective

By A. Frank, G. H. Mendes, N. F. Ayala, Antonio Ghezzi. Technological forecasting & social change, 2019

921 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Abstract Servitization and Industry 4.0 are considered two of the most recent trends transforming industrial companies. Servitization is mainly focused on adding value to the customer (demand-pull) while Industry 4.0 is frequently related to adding value to manufacturing process (technology-push). Although some scholars address them as complementary concepts, the literature lacks evidences about what are the interfaces and connection between the two trends. Thus, we aim to develop a conceptual framework that connects Servitization and Industry 4.0 concepts from a business model innovation (BMI) perspective. Our framework is based on three Servitization levels (i.e. smoothing, adapting and substituting) and three levels of digitization (i.e. low, moderate and high levels). We show that matching these levels results in nine possible configurations classified in manual, digital and industry 4.0-related services, which can focus on smoothing, adapting or substituting services. We use reported cases from the literature to support and illustrate these configurations. We also discuss different levels of complexity for the implementation of these configurations. The study hence provides a foundation for the growing research on the interface between Servitization and Industry 4.0.

Subfields: Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering, Marketing

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/eb522780e67011409df432c3326187ac688e231a

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Citations in the corpus

Organizational learning paths based upon industry 4.0 adoption: An empirical study with Brazilian manufacturers (2020, methodology): “In opposition, Frank et al. (2019b) carried out a survey-based study in Brazilian manufacturers and empirically validated a theoretical framework consisted of four main I4.”
Industry 4.0: A Bibliometric Review of Its Managerial Intellectual Structure and Potential Evolution in the Service Industries (2019, background): “With the exception of a very few exploratory studies (Frank et al., 2019; Nagy et al., 2018), much remains to be done in terms of conceptual and, especially, empirical studies (for instance, using large-scale samples of firms within and across different service industries and countries).”
Digital servitization business models in ecosystems: A theory of the firm (2019, background): “Thus, the concept of digital servitization reshapes the conventional idea of products as standalone concepts, instead emphasizing the connectivity between products (IoT) and between companies (manufacturers, operators, and customers) (Frank, Mendes, Ayala, & Ghezzi, 2019).”
Influences of the Industry 4.0 Revolution on the Human Capital Development and Consumer Behavior: A Systematic Review (2020, background): “0, servitization also contributes to the transformation of companies, focusing mainly on adding value for the customer [73].”
The applications of Industry 4.0 technologies in manufacturing context: a systematic literature review (2020, background): “…Weking et al.2020 ) Big data and analytics Customer proﬁling & service innovation (Anshari et al. 2018; Ardito et al. 2019; Bressanelli et al. 2018a; Frank et al. 2019; Zaki et al. 2019; Zheng et al. 2018) Cloud technology Cloud service platform; (Ardito et al. 2019; Dalenogare et al. 2018; Frank…”
Digital transformation in business and management research: An overview of the current status quo (2022, background): “Frank, Mendes, Ayala, and Ghezzi (2019) proposed a conceptual framework connecting servitization and Industry 4.0 while taking a business model innovation perspective.”