research

Research overview

This project explores the application of digital servitization business models in the context of UK Manufacturing Small to Medium Sized Enterprises (SMEs), by empirically depicting its antecedents and firm-level implications. Following the completion of a large empirical study, the key contextual and organisational factors that determine successful implementation of business models have been identified. The study’s key findings suggest that SMEs can achieve high performance through adoption of digital servitization business models, depending on how well each model aligns with the organisation’s context and design.

To assist the UK Manufacturing community, in addition to the main report, the project’s deliverables are accessible to stakeholders through its dedicated microsite, SME toolkit, video training manual and practitioner webinar.

Please complete the captcha to download the file.

Download “Report - Business model innovation and digital servitization in UK manufacturing small and medium sized enterprises” Business-Model-Innovation-and-Digital-Servitization.pdf – Downloaded 4957 times – 1.46 MB

Project microsite

The microsite provides SMEs with a valuable resource that practitioners can engage with, to better understand digital servitization and its corresponding business models. Developed in an illustrative manner, the microsite provides a visual overview of the study’s data and key findings and constitutes the project’s primary means of impact on business practice.

Access the project microsite

SME toolkit

A key project output, the self-assessment toolkit aspires to assist SME principal decision-makers in diagnosing the contextual and organisational conditions of their business and determine the suitability of digital servitization business models. Toolkit users are invited to complete an anonymised questionnaire and in turn, they receive a recommendation of which business model might represent the best match to their current conditions.

Video training manual

The video training manual represents a step-by-step guide to the toolkit and provides users with the key terms of interest and the process of answering the toolkit questions.

Online webinar

As a primary dissemination activity, the project’s first ex-post webinar has been delivered in early August 2023 to raise awareness about the project, communicate the study’s findings and promote the publication of the main report and its accompanying intellectual outputs.

watch the webinar recording

This research was conducted by Dr. Dimitrios Dousios and Dr. Antonios Karatzas (University of East Anglia). This work was supported by the UKRI Made Smarter Innovation Challenge and the Economic and Social Research Council via InterAct [Grant Reference ES/W007231/1].

For further discussions or potential applications/collaborations, please contact Antonios Karatzas.

InterAct is pleased to announce the recipients of our second round of Systematic Review funding. These two projects are led by Dr. Dalila Ribaudo of Aston University and Dr. Nikolai Kazantsev of the Institute for Manufacturing, University of Cambridge. The projects will focus on topics relating to ‘Manufacturing in the metaverse’ and ‘Perceptions of manufacturing’.

Manufacturing in the metaverse: Conceptual model and future research directions

U2M Brand / Adobe Stock

Principal Investigator:

Professor Chander Velu – Institute for Manufacturing, University of Cambridge.

Lead researcher:

Dr. Nikolai Kazantsev – Institute for Manufacturing, University of Cambridge.

Project Outline:

The industrial metaverse uses ‘virtual and augmented reality to blend the physical and digital worlds to transform how businesses design, manufacture and interact with objects’.

The project aims to provide a coherent interdisciplinary summary of established knowledge from academia and practice on the application and potential benefits of a metaverse in manufacturing, mainly focusing on bridging technical and social insights.

The specific objectives are:

To clarify the terminology, technologies, and roles the metaverse can play in manufacturing.
To derive the barriers, drivers and benefits of adopting the metaverse for individuals, firms, the manufacturing ecosystem and the economy.
To summarise a conceptual model and outline future research directions of an industrial metaverse in manufacturing.

The industrial metaverse is often explored solely from a technological perspective despite being a fast-growing field of study in various domains. As a result, complex terms and concepts are misinterpreted by the industry, resulting in an overlapping stack of technologies and, therefore, unclear evidence of the application of the concept in manufacturing.

By investigating overlooked social and economic factors behind metaverse applications, the project aims unlock the virtual space for goods manufacturing and transaction, and discover how the interactions between firms and customers happen.

The team is open for collaborations on this research. Please contact nk622@cam.ac.uk if you are interested.

The purpose of a potential collaboration would be to better inform research on the positioning of the metaverse as a technological tool in manufacturing.

The team are keen to hear from:

Industrial partners who have already applied some elements of virtual reality or who want to do so soon, but are unclear on how to progress due to the perceived risks or unclear benefits of the technology.
This could be technology providers, such as Vuforia, Hololens (MST), Meta or creators of alternative augmented reality glasses.

How to make manufacturing charming again? It is everything, everywhere, all at once.

Kawee / Adobe Stock

Principal Investigator:

Dr. Dalila Ribaudo – Aston University

Co-investigators:

Dr. Guendalina Anzolin – University of Cambridge

Dr. Jennifer Castañeda-Navarrete – University of Cambridge

Project Outline:

The aim of this project is to conduct a comprehensive literature review of the perceptions of manufacturing, with a particular emphasis on international industrial strategies.

The team plans to analyse how perceptions of manufacturing have been changing across countries and how governments are taking actions to bring manufacturing back into the policy agenda. One of the main areas where this is happening is the adoption of digital technologies, a field where the changing features of manufacturing are evident.

For example, policy makers need to design industrial strategies that address both the increasingly higher requirement for skilled labour, and firms’ adoption of digital technologies, while also developing strategic sectors, such as semiconductors.

This study will reveal how countries prioritize manufacturing in the context of national and regional industrial strategies (i.e., for example with the levelling up agenda in the UK and the Innovation and Competition Act in the US.

There are four main topics the team will examine that can be linked to negative perceptions on manufacturing:

It is believed to be a declining industry, replaced by services, especially in advanced economies.
Manufacturing is a low-skilled and low-paying employment environment.
Manufacturing is a dirty and polluting industry that harms the environment.
Ideological as well as practical barriers for policymakers to provide sufficient attention to manufacturing.