Dissertation. - Universitaet Hamburg, 2011. - 207 pages
Single companies often do not possess the resources and capacities to deliver customer solutions. Integrated solutions for business customers or consumers are increasingly designed, developed, and delivered by value-added networks. The principle of building networks between organizations focuses on gathering benefits in an organizations’ value creation. Cooperation enables businesses to operate on an extended resource base. This effect is highly relevant for small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) as they need to cooperate to compete in a complex and dynamic competitive environment in consideration of their restricted resources and limited capacities for innovation. In order to improve the efficiency of value-added chains, tight coordination is necessary to integrate the solution components from the various partners in a value-added network. Information is potentially the biggest driver of performance in value-added networks because it directly affects other drivers. From an information-processing view, organizations, and especially providers of service-driven solutions, need functional information flows and strive to create efficient information flows to be effective. Due to technical and service innovations, the bundles of products and services become more and more complex. These more complex combinations of elements may increase information asymmetry as each of the organization is often an autonomous unit. Information asymmetry and, hence, information gaps in the value-added network may lead to uncovered and unused knowledge. This dissertation presents the conceptualization, development, and implementation of IT-based artifacts in order to overcome information-processing gaps in value-added networks by leveraging collective intelligence. A special focus is set on the evaluation of the approach in the German machine and plant construction industry.
