Sustainability in Servitization: A Review of Assessment Methodologies for the Steel Sector

Abstract

Due to increasingly stringent environmental regulations, many sectors, including the steel industry, have to think about new strategies to improve their sustainability performance. In other sectors, the adoption of servitized business models has proven to be an effective practice in this respect. For this reason, the steel sector is increasingly looking at this paradigm. However, as there is a lack of clear methodologies for assessing the sustainability of servitized business models, this article aims to identify the most suitable ones through a literature review. In order to provide guidelines within the steel sector then, the work is completed by matching the identified methodologies with a set of criteria useful for assessing servitized business models in this specific sector. The results show how the adoption of Multi Criteria Decision-Making methodologies is more suitable for qualitative criteria, while methodologies such as Life Cycle Cost or Life Cycle Assessment are more suitable for quantitative criteria, although attention must be paid to the identification of the functional unit, or the determination of the system boundaries. Finally, the article also shows which criteria are most relevant to assess the sustainability of servitized business models within the steel sector.