Moving beyond the Build-or-Join Decision: A Multiple Case Study on Multi-Platform Strategies of Incumbent Firms

Abstract

Companies that operate digital platforms are growing rapidly. Theoretical and empirical research has largely explored digital platforms in the context of digital-native companies. Only a small set of research explores how incumbent firms transition into the platform economy. However, this stream of research has studied incumbents under the assumption that they can either build a platform or join an existing platform. In contrast, the results of our multiple case study demonstrate that incumbents pursue multiple platform strategies simultaneously and that their strategic options range from building and joining a platform over investing in and acquiring a platform to using white-label platforms. The white-label strategy uses the platform technology of a white-label platform owner to match the users of the incumbent with the complementors of the whitelabel platform. Based on the results, which further illustrate the motivations to pursue each strategy, we discuss strategic differences between asset-heavy and asset-light incumbents.

Physical interaction platforms: A taxonomy of spaces for interactive value creation

“…A key difference lies in the platform role the PIP fulfils-market, operation or co-creation (Hermes et al, 2020;Konietzko et al, 2019).…”

Qualitative vergleichende Analyse der Fallbeispiele

“…Matt et al (2015) schlagen vor, dass bei kleineren Änderungen von Produkten oder Prozessen die Integration in bestehende Unternehmensstrukturen vorteilhaft sein kann. Für substanzielle Veränderungen sollten jedoch separate Tochtergesellschaften wie neue Geschäftseinheiten oder Spin-offs gewählt werden (Hermes et al 2021). Neue Organisationseinheiten werden häufig als so genannte Digital Innovation Labs (DILs) umgesetzt.…”

“…Eine Strategie, die für ein Unternehmen erfolgreich war, lässt nicht ohne weiteres auf ein anderes übertragen. Die Forschung zu digitalen Transformationsstrategien hat jedoch bisher hauptsächlich untersucht, wie diese Strategien entworfen und durchgeführt werden, nicht aber ihren Erfolgsgrad (Berghaus und Back 2017;Matt et al 2015;Hermes et al 2021;Floetgen et al 2022).…”

Detecting and Characterizing Patterns of Failure in Complex Engineered Systems: An Ontology Development and Clustering Approach

“…For instance, Weking et al (2020) document archetypal blockchain business models using literature review and cluster analysis. Similarly, Hermes et al (2020) used qualitative cluster analysis to understand platform envelopment. In the design literature, guidelines have been extracted and classified for disassembly knowledge (Favi et al, 2016).…”