Abstract
Incumbent B2B manufacturing companies join forces and form collaborative networks, called consortia, aiming to increase the circularity of their products. Our research interest lies in the understanding of how the business models (BM) of the companies and the industry are affected by such collaborations in the collaborative networks of the circular economy (CE). Given the exploratory nature of our empirical research, we applied a mixed research strategy of an inductively deductive nature. We carried out case studies in a manufacturing industry field and combined them with quantitative content analyses of the companies’ financial and non-financial reports. Drawing on the assumptions of the Attention-Based View Theory and Legitimacy Theory, we defined and found verbally communicated identifiers of BM elements, CE strategies, and collaborative networks, quantified their occurrences, and transformed them into variables. Using correlation analyses, we determined the tightness and the changes in relationships between the BMs’ elements and CE strategies. We examined the dynamic changes in the structure of BMs and their elements occurring within the implementation of selected CE strategies. Our findings suggest that collaborative networks for CE support an adaptation of the industry’s BMs. The higher-level CE strategies impact the BM more than the lower-level ones. The contribution of our research is in the suggested method of quantification and concretization of an abstract concept of BMs’ elements and their interrelations. This enables an assessment and a direct comparison of BMs, as well as of implemented CE strategies across companies and across industries. Our results also shed more light on the way the companies and industries adapt their BMs towards reaching circularity, as well as on how collaborative networks support such a transition.
Highlights
Current societal challenges related to products, processes, businesses, and entire sectors include a requirement to increase the sustainability of entrepreneurship and to contribute to addressing the issues related to both environmental and social aspects of entrepreneurship
In our research presented here, we have agreed with the definition of the BMD according to [43] p. 39): “The dynamics of the business model means any change in the content, significance, and relations of individual elements of the business model, caused by internal or external influences, which leads to the expansion or revision of the existing business models (BM)
The companies operating in the DIS sector saw the establishment of, and in 2020 became members of, the global consortium entitled CEDIS (Circular Economy for Decorative and Information Systems)
Summary
Current societal challenges related to products, processes, businesses, and entire sectors include a requirement to increase the sustainability of entrepreneurship and to contribute to addressing the issues related to both environmental and social aspects of entrepreneurship. The reduction in or elimination of negative influences and events associated with traditional production and consumption methods has become a new paradigm. Following the 2015 UN Conference in Paris [1] and the conclusion of the Paris Agreement—a global agreement on climate change—there has been increasing pressure to achieve greater environmental friendliness within business to ensure sustainable development. The European Green Deal, presented by the European Commission in 2020 [2], is another significant milestone on the road to ensuring society-wide sustainability. Especially non-renewable sources of raw materials, reducing waste generation, and reuse, are becoming a new social paradigm. A CE is perceived as one of the supporting tools
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