2844 In this services economy, products are increasingly taken for granted and services often serve as the differentiator for businesses. Invariably, product focused businesses package services around their products and service focused businesses package products around their services. As a result, in any business offering, there is a product component as well as a significant service component. In such a scenario, the architecture of product-service systems gains significant importance. This is further prompted by the change in employment patterns, job opportunities, contribution to GDP, ownership of intellectual property and reduction in sales. Such product-service systems have benefitted immensely due to the massive pace of digitization wherein businesses are adopting digital to connect to their customers in order to bring in a difference in their offerings. As a result, the convergence of digital technologies has become the platform for businesses wherein new product-service systems are created by fusing digital and physical worlds. In this setting, it has been found that the presence of many digital technologies contributes to innovation, competitiveness and growth of a business. Gartner is of the view that the nexus of forces (Cloud, Mobile, Social, and Information) are the driving factors for businesses. TCS is of the view that the digital five forces (Cloud, Big Data, Social, Mobility, and Robotics & Artificial intelligence) are the driving factors for business. HBR is of the view that smart, connected, miniaturized devices (Internet of Things) alter the structure, competition and value offered by a business. In essence, “digital” has established itself to be a force to be reckoned with by businesses and they increasingly strive for achieving domination on “Digital product-service systems”. While there exists numerous architecture frameworks, processes and reference models for architecture of enterprises, systems, products, software and services, it is often the case that most of these artefacts are not suited for “Digital product-service systems”. This paper presents a value based approach for architecting “Digital product-service systems”. As part of this approach, six different interdependent perspectives are considered as useful for architecting the system-of-interest. These perspectives are: • Context Perspective: The context perspective aids in understanding the situation and identifying the operative context based on the cause and effect relationships that exist in the situation. This perspective aids in the problem situation formulation and its appropriate expression. • Value Perspective: This perspective aids in developing a set of value propositions that would lead to customer delight, customer satisfaction and enhanced customer experience. This perspective aids in the formulation of value proposition of the Digital product-service system. • Quality Perspective: This perspective aids in understanding the ways/means by which the benefits can be delivered. This perspective aids in the development of the concept of operations, which describes the characteristics of the offering from the viewpoint of an individual who will consume it. • Purpose Perspective: This perspective aids in defining the statement of purpose of the offering. This perspective aids in the identification of the purpose and development of the function model. • Structure Perspective: This perspective aids in defining how the different components and their interfaces are organized and composed in order to provide the necessary resources for achieving the purpose. • Process Perspective: This perspective aids in defining how the different components are utilized to enable the purpose. The process perspective ensures that the supporting capabilities are available when and where necessary. In this paper, the use of these perspectives to architect “Digital product-service systems” and its application in businesses is illustrated with a case study. Keywords – Products, Services, Digital Technologies, Product-Service Systems, Digital Product-Service Systems, Context, Value, Quality, Purpose, Structure, Process
Chairs
Systems Achitecture and Engineering
Anand Kumar has more than 20 years of Industrial experience in Systems architecture and engineering. He has been a researcher in Architecture and Business systems for more than a decade. His interests are in Business Systems, Architecture and Digital Product-Service Systems. He has...
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Monday July 25, 2016 4:00pm - 4:30pm MDT
ECCR 1B51
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Day 4,
Systems Theory-Management-and-Practice,
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Day 4,
Systems Theory-Management-and-Practice,
Plenary VII,
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