Industrial internet platform provider and end-user perceptions of platform openness impacts

ABSTRACT

This paper aims to analyse and understand the perceived impacts of platform openness from the perspective of the Industrial Internet (II) platform providers and end-users. A qualitative case study approach was used to analyse the impact of II platform openness on platform end-users’ businesses. Four major II platforms and two II platform end-users were interviewed as part of the case studies. From the end-user perspective, the perceived impacts of II platform openness were different from the II platform providers. This research will allow managers of end-user companies to make informed decisions while selecting platforms based on the level of openness. The novelty, as well as the aim of this paper, is to analyse and understand the perceptions of II platform providers and end-users when it comes to II-platform openness and related impacts. Long-term impacts, in particular, are difficult to envision before using II platforms or experimenting with various other platforms.

KEYWORDS:

• Industrial Internet
• industry 4.0
• platform
• perceived platform openness
• openness

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

¹ https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/platform.

² https://www.kaaproject.org/.

³ https://www.ptc.com/en/products/iot/technology-platform-thingworx.

⁴ https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/iot-suite/iot-suite-what-is-azure-iot.

⁵ https://www.ibm.com/internet-of-things/platform/idc-reports/.