Socio-technical transitions in the logistics sector: how companies manage their innovation in the era of digitalisation

There is a growing theoretical interest in the role of firms in socio-technical transitions studies. In doing so, transitions scholars start to explore business model innovation in the context of sustainability transitions. However, due to a lack of a firm-level perspective in transitions theory, it is still unclear how business model innovation unfolds in a socio-technical system context over time. This thesis adopts an S-D logic, service ecosystems view on the role of firms to extend the transitions theory. Besides, logistics innovations have not been widely explored in the transitions literature. As one of the first studies to explore logistics innovations from a socio-technical transitions perspective, this thesis also contributes to understanding the system reconfiguration of production and consumption systems from a logistics perspective. This thesis employs a multiple-case studies design to investigate firms’ innovation activities and their impact at the micro-, meso-, and macro-levels of service ecosystems. Qualitative research methods have been used to investigate firms’ innovation projects. The thesis then examines the interrelation between innovation activities, logistics strategies, and logistics trends to explain not only why firms have to balance their innovation efforts at the micro-level of the service ecosystem, but also how logistics innovations unfold at the meso- and meso-levels by the enactment of these value propositions. In light of the investigation, this thesis adopts a balanced view of the relationship between firms and socio-technical systems, which helps overcome the ‘niche-actor’ and ‘regime-actor’ dichotomy in transitions studies. Also, this thesis provides a conceptual framework that bridges production and consumption by using logistics innovations as an empirical lens. Finally, due to the exploratory nature of this thesis, these findings may provide valuable insights for future research that integrate these two research streams for a better understanding of the firm-level innovation activities in socio-technical transitions