How Big Old Companies Navigate Digital Transformation
Open accessAbstract
New digital technologies present both game-changing opportunities for—and existential threats to—companies whose success was built in the pre-digital economy. This article describes our findings from a study of 25 companies that were embarking on digital transformation journeys. We identified two digital strategies—customer engagement and digitized solutions—that provide direction for a digital transformation. Two technology-enabled assets are essential for executing those strategies: an operational backbone and a digital services platform. We describe how a big old company can combine these elements to navigate its digital transformation.
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
Digital transformation is intrinsically linked to strategic changes in business models.
“Due to the implementation of digital technologies, digital transformation is intrinsically linked to strategic changes in business models (Sebastian et al., 2020).”
From Exploring Human Resource Management Digital Transformation in the Digital Age (2024) · cites this paper as Sebastian et al., 2020
Self-check
Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.
The self-check needs the paper’s full text.
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Understanding digital transformation: A review and a research agenda
Vial, G. (2019) · The Journal of Strategic Information Systems · doi:10.1016/j.jsis.2019.01.003 · Cited by 7,337 · see citing works
Hanelt, A., Bohnsack, R., Marz, D., & Antunes Marante, C. (2021) · Journal of Management Studies · doi:10.1111/joms.12639 · Cited by 2,550 · see citing works
Hein, A., Schreieck, M., Riasanow, T., Setzke, D. S., Wiesche, M., Böhm, M., & Krcmar, H. (2020) · Electronic Markets · doi:10.1007/s12525-019-00377-4 · Cited by 945 · see citing works
Digital transformation challenges: strategies emerging from a multi-stakeholder approach
Brunetti, F., Matt, D. T., Bonfanti, A., De Longhi, A., Pedrini, G., & Orzes, G. (2020) · The TQM Journal · doi:10.1108/tqm-12-2019-0309 · Cited by 544 · see citing works
Exploring Human Resource Management Digital Transformation in the Digital Age
Zhang, J., & Chen, Z. (2024) · Journal of the Knowledge Economy · doi:10.1007/s13132-023-01214-y · Cited by 414 · see citing works
“Due to the implementation of digital technologies, digital transformation is intrinsically linked to strategic changes in business models (Sebastian et al., 2020).”
BackgroundPast, present, and future barriers to digital transformation in manufacturing: A review
Jones, M. D., Hutcheson, S., & Camba, J. D. (2021) · Journal of Manufacturing Systems · doi:10.1016/j.jmsy.2021.03.006 · Cited by 377 · see citing works
Gong, Y., Yang, J., & Shi, X. (2020) · Government Information Quarterly · doi:10.1016/j.giq.2020.101487 · Cited by 301 · see citing works
Growing with smart products: Why customization capabilities matter for manufacturing firms
Schulz, C., Kortmann, S., Piller, F. T., & Pollok, P. (2023) · Journal of Product Innovation Management · doi:10.1111/jpim.12680 · Cited by 49 · see citing works
Identifying the primary dimensions of DevSecOps: A multi-vocal literature review
Zhao, X., Clear, T., & Lal, R. (2024) · Journal of Systems and Software · doi:10.1016/j.jss.2024.112063 · Cited by 40 · see citing works
Digital leadership: transitioning into the digital age
Prince, K. A. (2018) · James Cook University · doi:10.25903/5d2bdd672c0e5 · Cited by 34 · see citing works
- Authors
- Sebastian, I. M., Ross, J. W., Beath, C., Mocker, M., Moloney, K. G., & Fonstad, N. O.
- Affiliations
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology (US)
- The University of Texas at Austin (US)
- Reutlingen University (DE)
- Venue
- Strategic Information Management
- Publisher
- Routledge
- Published
- 2020-04-08
- Pages
- 133-150
- OpenAlex
- W2756653637
- Cited by
- 1,043
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 37 · 2025: 129 · 2024: 177 · 2023: 234 · 2022: 149 · 2021: 137 · 2020: 111 · 2019: 50 · 2018: 17 · 2017: 1
- FWCI
- 450.68
- Type
- book chapter
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Locations
- Routledge eBooks (publishedVersion)
- Reutlingen University Academic Bibliography (Reutlingen University) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- Journal of the Association for Information Systems (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Business, Management and Accounting › Management of Technology and Innovation › Digital Innovation in Industries
- Social Sciences › Business, Management and Accounting › Management Information Systems › Information Technology Governance and Strategy
- Social Sciences › Business, Management and Accounting › Organizational Behavior and Human Resource Management › Corporate Management and Leadership
- Keywords
- digital transformation, large corporations, digital strategy, customer engagement, digital economy
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
