Using Service Dominant Logic to Assess the Value Co-creation of Smart Services

Abstract

The digital transformation of industrial firms is providing opportunities to improve efficiency, design new value propositions and re-engineer their business models. With the adoption of digital technologies in combination with the use of data, firms can develop new smart services for their internal or external customers, enabling new value co-creation opportunities and, possibly, leading to a competitive advantage. Nevertheless, assessment of the impact of smart services in financial and organizational terms, and the way to reach such a competitive advantage, is problematic for firms. The challenge firms are facing is that the value created through smart services consists of many small improvements which add up rather than a single point of value. This paper introduces the background literature research, then presents and discusses the results from a use-case where the application of enabled smart services was developed. The outcomes show that digitization can support both internal value creation and the development of new customer value propositions based on servitization and allow non-manufacturing firms to develop new value propositions through smart services.