Building digital servitization ecosystems: An analysis of inter-firm collaboration types and social exchange mechanisms among actors

Abstract

The servitization literature has evidenced that the development and provision of Smart Product-Service Systems usually happen through collaborative ecosystems, but little is known about the different arrangements that ecosystem's actors can follow to provide digital solutions. We aim to define collaborative configurations of ecosystem actors in digital servitization based on their value creation and capture and their social base of collaboration. We propose four configurations of inter-firm collaboration, based on the level of joint value creation activities and value capture interdependence among the actors: expanded business, enhanced business, platform business and symbiotic business. We analyze how these different collaboration types operate based on a multi-case study approach using the Social Exchange Theory (SET) to examine actors' interactions. We focus on four elements of SET: trust, commitment, reciprocity, and power. We found that trust, commitment and reciprocity are related to value creation and capture dynamics, while power is mostly affected by other external factors. These four elements allow to define the operationalization of the four types of inter-firm collaboration in digital servitization ecosystem. We contribute to the theory showing how service and digital suppliers interact with the servitized product firm in the ecosystem. Managers can learn the elements involved in different business models and collaboration arrangements for the provision of servitized digital solutions aiming to better decide the servitization strategy they want to follow.