Digital servitization in BtoB manufacturing systems

In the current markets characterized by higher complexities digital servitization could sustain industrial organizations to actualize innovation opportunities, thereby enhancing their competitiveness. However digital servitization engenders a structural, behavioral, and cultural transformation of industrial organizations, bringing customer centricity and digitalization in services' design and delivery.
By proposing a strategic conceptualization of value co-creation, the work lies the theoretical foundations for a system approach as a key to understand how digital servitization can enable and foster industrial organizations to create new value and innovation in BtoB markets. Then, the work aims at offering a reinterpretation of digital servitization, based on a better understanding of those most critical managerial issues that the extant research underestimated. At this end, combining the most recent advancements of S-D logic and Viable System Approach a holistic framework is advanced to detect the strategic management of the technology-enabled shift from a product-centric to a service-centric logic, also identifying the socio-technical dynamics and the underlying viable mechanisms leading to a digitized value creation. From a practical standpoint, an empirical investigation aimed to activate the digital servitization framework is proposed.
At managerial level, the study offers insights on relevant factors able to support the decision-making process for successfully shape a viable digital ecosystem within industrial markets by enhancing the value generated through the emergence of different kinds of innovations.

Maria Vincenza Ciasullo is an Associate Professor in Business Management at the University of Salerno, Italy, since 2005. She received the PhD degree in management from the University of Naples, Italy, in 2004. She is licensed as Full Professor in Business Management since 2018. She is also an Affiliated Professor in Management at University of Isfahan, Iran, and an Adjunct Professor at the University of Technology, Sarawak, Malaysia. Her current research focus on Digital Transformation and Business Models, Sustainability management, Service innovation and value co-creation. On these topics, she has published in National and International journal such as Sinergie, International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, Business Strategy and Environment, The TQM Journal, Studies of Higher Education, Current Issue in Tourism, Futures, Land UsePolicy, Journal of Business and Industrial Marketing. She has been awarded by Emerald (Highly Commended Paper Award, 2018; 2019).

Raffaella Montera is Adjunct Professor of Economics and Business Management at University of Salerno (Italy) - Department of Management & Innovation Systems and Adjunct Professor of Management and Marketing of Cultural Heritage at University of Salerno (Italy) - School of Specialization in Archaeological Heritage. She is engaged in training activities in the master's degrees and advanced training courses. She is also a Teaching Fellow in Business Strategies at University of Salerno (Italy) - Department of Management & Innovation Systems. She holds a PhD in Marketing and Business Communication at University of Salerno (Italy) - Department of Business Studies. Her researches are focused on Strategic Management, Marketing Management, Sustainability, Internationalization, Tourism and Hospitality. She is author of a monograph, contributions in Conference proceedings and in national and international journals.