Paper Number
1462
Paper Type
Complete
Description
Digital infrastructures provide a space where possibilities for innovation continuously emerge. They are not stable entities but are evolving. Their boundaries are subject to constant negotiation among multiple organizational actors as well as changing connections of digital technologies, operations, and users. In this paper, we explore the evolution of an Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) infrastructure in a leading manufacturing company. We find that the IIoT infrastructure provided actionable spaces upon which organizational actors discovered opportunities for improving process performance which, in turn, led to investment decisions. We explain this process through the lens of digital options theory and highlight how IIoT infrastructure provides the material foundation for the identification of digital options, how the realization of digital options leads to the emergence of more digital options, and how these “cascading” digital options are implicated in the evolution of IIoT infrastructure. We discuss theoretical and practical implications.
Recommended Citation
Drechsler, Katharina; Grisold, Thomas; and Seidel, Stefan, "Cascading Digital Options and the Evolution of Digital Infrastructures: The Case of IIoT" (2022). ICIS 2022 Proceedings. 5.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/icis2022/entren/entren/5
Cascading Digital Options and the Evolution of Digital Infrastructures: The Case of IIoT
Digital infrastructures provide a space where possibilities for innovation continuously emerge. They are not stable entities but are evolving. Their boundaries are subject to constant negotiation among multiple organizational actors as well as changing connections of digital technologies, operations, and users. In this paper, we explore the evolution of an Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) infrastructure in a leading manufacturing company. We find that the IIoT infrastructure provided actionable spaces upon which organizational actors discovered opportunities for improving process performance which, in turn, led to investment decisions. We explain this process through the lens of digital options theory and highlight how IIoT infrastructure provides the material foundation for the identification of digital options, how the realization of digital options leads to the emergence of more digital options, and how these “cascading” digital options are implicated in the evolution of IIoT infrastructure. We discuss theoretical and practical implications.
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Comments
14-DigitalInnovation