Firm Strategies in Open Internet of Things Business Ecosystems: Framework and Case Study

We present a typology of strategies employed by firms using the Internet of Things (IoT). The IoT is a distributed network of connected physical objects. As these devices exchange data with each other instead of through an intermediary, the IoT increases complexity of business ecosystems, and opens up new business opportunities. When the platform owner does not own the data and technology is mostly open source, other actors can use and build on them. In addition to platform owner’s strategy, we propose a framework with three additional strategies, based on whether the firms’ offering integrates into the specific industrial value chain or contributes to the IoT ecosystem, and whether the firm offering is by nature stand-alone or systemic. With a multiple case study design, we explore this framework in the setting of 23 firms in a large research project context. The descriptions of the identified IoT strategies support our framework