Digitization and Phase Transitions in Platform Organizing Logics: Evidence from the Process Automation Industry
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This paper draws on complex adaptive systems (CAS) theory to explore the transformation of an analog automation product platform as it was infused with extensive and deepening digital capacities over a 40-year period. Our case demonstrates how the deepening digitization of components and functions drives complexity by connecting the platform to multiple social and technical settings and producing new interactions and information exchanges. The increased connectivity and dynamism invited unexpected and significant architectural and organizational shifts that moved the platform toward an ecosystem-centered organizing logic. CAS theory and its notion of constrained generating procedures (CGPs) are used to analyze how new connections and interactions produced a multilevel and nonlinear change in the platform organization. We offer two main contributions. First, we provide a novel empirical analysis of how product platform digitization leads to phase transitions and show the mediating role of three mechanisms in this process treated as CGPs: interaction rules, design control, and stimuli-response variety. Second, we demonstrate the multilevel and recursive nature of digitally driven growth in physical product platforms.
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There is empirical evidence that internal or supply-chain platforms digitize and eventually become DPEs.
“There is, however, empirical evidence that internal or supply-chain platforms digitize and eventually become DPEs (Sandberg et al., 2020;Stonig et al., 2022).”
From Digital platform ecosystems in flux: From proprietary digital platforms to wide-spanning ecosystems (2023) · cites this paper as Sandberg et al., 2020
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Digital platform ecosystems in flux: From proprietary digital platforms to wide-spanning ecosystems
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- Authors
- Sandberg, J., Holmström, J., & Lyytinen, K.
- Affiliations
- Umeå University (SE)
- Case Western Reserve University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Sandberg, Johan
- Venue
- MIS Quarterly
- Publisher
- MIS Quarterly
- Published
- 2020-03-01
- Volume
- 44
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 129-154
- ISSN
- 0276-7783 (ISSN-L)
- 2162-9730
- OpenAlex
- W3009843608
- Cited by
- 236
- References
- 57
- Citations by year
- 2026: 32 · 2025: 47 · 2024: 41 · 2023: 50 · 2022: 35 · 2021: 24 · 2020: 7
- FWCI
- 30.95
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- urn.kb.se
- Licence
- other-oa
- Locations
- MIS Quarterly (publishedVersion)
- DiVA at Umeå University (Umeå University) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- Journal of the Association for Information Systems (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- Case Western Reserve University
- Marcus och Amalia Wallenbergs minnesfond
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Business, Management and Accounting › Strategy and Management › Digital Platforms and Economics
- Social Sciences › Business, Management and Accounting › Management of Technology and Innovation › Product Development and Customization
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Information Systems Theories and Implementation
- Keywords
- phase transitions, complex adaptive systems, interaction rules, design control
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