Digital transformation: harnessing digital

technologies for the next generation

Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to discuss digital transformation and its four trajectories – digital technology, digital strategy, customer
experience and data-driven business models – that could shape the next generation of services. This includes a discussion on whether both the
market and organizations are all ready for the digital change and what are the opportunities that will enable firms to create and capture value
though new business models.
Design/methodology/approach – Providing services is a proven and effective way to secure a competitive position, deliver long-term stable
revenues and open up new market opportunities. However, it is also clear that some organisations are struggling to digitally transform. Therefore,
the commentary provides a brief insight into how firms explore the possibilities of digital transformation and navigate these uncharted waters.
Findings – Today’s digital technologies affect the organisation outside and in, enabling the creation of new business models and transforming the
customer experience. The incumbents are acutely aware that they need to transform strategically – to build new networks and value chains.
Originality/value – This commentary extends earlier work exploring the digital disruption within services to highlight a number of connected areas:
the challenges and opportunities of digital transformation at a strategic level, as well as understanding and enhancing the customer experience and
seeing how new data-driven business models can underpin service transformation.
Keywords Big Data, Strategy, Customer value, Customer service, Service encounters, Business model, Digital, Service, Customer experience,
Digital economy, Digital transformation strategy, Data-driven business models, Machine learning, AI, Digital technologies
Paper type Commentary

Introduction planning and while competitors will still want to out sell their
rivals, they are aware that there is an interdependency within
Customer expectations in both the business-to-business (B2B) their respective ecosystems which in turn means they need to be
and business-to-consumer (B2C) worlds are being ramped up as open to new ways of working and learning the lessons others
market entrants endlessly innovate to enhance their services. may have taken on board through trial and error.
However, companies can also see the opportunities that are being “Test, test, test and don’t be afraid to fail” is not just
created in this new experience and platform-led economy. At the phraseology taken from a business text book, firms know that
same time, the fear of new competition emerging from they have to have eyes in the back of their heads to see what the
unexpected quarters is very real. Ultimately, firms are terrified of next wave of innovations may be in their business streams and
the Kodak and Toys R Us scenarios: eyes fixed on a game- to be adopters of these new advances somewhere down the line.
changing technology as it comes over the horizon but unable to If they do not want to be first, then knowing when to enter the
make the organisational changes that would allow them to new markets that are developing and replacing the old products
embrace it. However, the Kodak example is instructive in lots of and ways of working will be a critical decision for them.
ways. It is very difficult for large companies to achieve the kind of Workforces too will need to be responsive to change, and
shift from product to service transformation demanded of them perhaps employees too should keep an eye out for their next
in the new digital era. Equally, they cannot opt out. job, which in all likelihood will have a very different job
That change has happened because firms have looked at the description from the one they undertake at the moment. They
data they have collected over the years, and by carefully might even like to write it themselves with a foot firmly planted
analysing what it tells them, they can see how to fine tune their in the digital technology of the future.
business plans to serve their customers better and to respond to Newer companies are more agile to technological change, as
what they actually need and what they say. Collaborations they do not inherit old systems and working practices that will
between firms have also helped to create more accurate at some time need to undergo change. Compare, for example,
Alibaba a Chinese company that is just 18-years old, to
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emirates which is 32-years old and IBM which is just over 70-
Emerald Insight at: www.emeraldinsight.com/0887-6045.htm years old. So how can they seize the opportunities digitalisation
presents without falling prey to its disruptive tendencies? In this

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commentary, I will discuss four trajectories of the digital service networks and learns from it without human interference. In
transformation (digital technology, digital strategy, customer addition, just like us (only more reliably), it learns from its
experience and data-driven business Models) that could shape mistakes. In fact, many of these ideas have been around for
the next generation of services. decades but to work they needed access to the gargantuan
datasets and computational power that has only become
Digital technology trajectory available in recent years.
Amazon Alexa provides a good example of AI technological
Arguably, the nature of digital technologies is a fundamental development which is disrupting business-to-consumer
key difference causing the dramatic shift within organisations markets. Alexa is a virtual assistant based on voice recognition
and in the competitive landscape. Today, we are reaching an technology to enable the interaction between human and
inflection point, where the effect of these digital technologies’ computers. Human vocal communication contains
manifests with “full force” and enables “unprecedented things” sophisticated and implied information that we learn to
(Brynjolfsson and Mcfee, 2014). A convergence of multiple understand intuitively, but which must be unpicked for a
technologies, such as mobile, location-based, virtual reality, computer to interpret. For example, if we ask Alexa “how tall is
digital twins, blockchains, artificial intelligence (AI), wearable the Gherkin?” Alexa needs to interpret not only the words used,
technologies, chatbots, neuroscience and business process but also the meaning to know that we are referring to the height
automation, as well as machine-to-machine interactions of a building rather than the length of a pickled vegetable! Alexa
through the Internet of Things (IoT) are happening today. The is the service, rather than a device. It is a virtual assistant that
innovations build on and amplify one another in a fusion of can be used across a range of devices and applications.
multiple technologies across the physical, digital and social Recently, Amazon patented a new Alexa feature that knows
realms (Bolton et al., 2018). In addition, digital technologies when you are ill and offers you medicine. It analyses speech and
have mobility and ubiquitous connectivity features, which identifies other signs of illness or emotion (Cook, 2018).
provide immediate interaction and access to a wide range of Amazon has stimulated technology development for Alexa, by
data and computing power; these features are also reflected in encouraging developers (in other companies or as individuals)
today’s products and services and enable a wider reach (of to build and publish ‘skills’ using the Alexa Skills Kit. Once
people), regardless of geographical location (Schwab, 2016; published, third party skills can be made available across Alexa-
Lanzolla and Anderson, 2008; Lanzolla and Giudici, 2017). enabled devices. To date there are over 50,000 skills written by
The exponential availability of data as a result of the discussed 325,000 developers. This is an example of how Amazon
features enables companies to analyse the insights and derive the encourages innovation across ecosystems rather than relying on
right decisions in real time. Therefore, AI is a hugely powerful
closed internal R&D for innovation.
tool which is already having an impact on us all. A new report As digital technology overtakes old ways of working, more
from the McKinsey Global Institute (2018) has predicted that it firms are creating digital systems that are highly responsive and
could add $13tn to the global economic output by 2030 and that that can move goods from the factory to the consumer as soon
around 70 per cent of companies will have implemented some as orders are placed. Gone are the days when factories
form of AI by the end of the next decade. AI – and more produced goods and sales forces waited to sell them. In a B2B
specifically machine learning, and even more specifically deep setting, for example, CEMEX developed an e-commerce
learning – is becoming part of our everyday lives, used by the platform called ‘CEMEX Go’ for a seamless service delivery of
likes of Google to identify millions of images. Self-driving cars a Readymix concrete product. This is the first end-to-end
are using it to learn how to recognise obstacles and react digital platform in the cement industry. The implementation of
accordingly. In addition, these deep learning systems are the platform required more than technical development; it
achieving impressive results when you measure their overall required digital capabilities, and a digital culture. CEMEX is
accuracy across huge datasets. However, in many real-world working towards a culture in which decision makers and
applications, it may not be enough to work well “on average”. employees have a “digital mind-set”, with the willingness and
These systems need to be as sure as the data allow them to be, capability to develop solutions in practice that solve customer
particularly when there are serious downsides to getting it wrong. needs (CEMEX, 2017). These technologies do not merely
These terms are often used interchangeably, but it is helpful automate basic processes, satisfy information needs or affect
to understand where the distinctions lie. AI is the term that the business strategy, as was the role of IT in previous eras
tends to be most widely used. Although it is not wrong to use it (Ward et al., 1990); they also have the capacity to reformulate
as a catchall, it is not very precise. AI is an umbrella term for the entire service strategy as a result of their unprecedented
anything done by a machine that mimics the way humans think. capabilities: ensuring efficiency, scalability, reliability and
As a concept, it has been around since the 1950s. Some would
predictability of core operations, while simultaneously
say that it goes back to the ancient Greeks. Machine learning is
facilitating rapid development and the implementation of rapid
the sub-discipline of AI which has really taken off in recent
innovations in response to, or even anticipation of, customers’
years and caused the enormous upsurge in interest in the field. needs.
This is when an algorithm is “trained” – generally using large
amounts of data – to learn how to perform a task rather than
hand-coding software routines with a specific set of
Digital strategy trajectory
instructions. Deep learning is a type of machine learning that It became clear that digital service transformation would be a
takes the technology to the next level. Modelled on neurons of strategic focus for firms in different industry sectors. Even if a
the brain, it digests vast quantities of data through deep neural business or a sector has yet to experience the full force of

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digitalisation’s disruptive consequences, it is playing out in for good reason– all about sticking to the rules. One of the
other industries. In addition, it can mean bad news for the characteristics of this new reality is that both technologies and
incumbents as new market entrants come in and move the goal customer behaviours are changing so fast, new initiatives are
posts. However, how do the big multinationals approach never finished but remain in a state of perpetual change. Firms
digitalisation when the scale and complexity of organisation- need to be able to handle this level of uncertainty and be able to
wide transformation is so challenging? adapt quickly to new circumstances. As with all cultural
After all, management consultants and practitioners have change, this is easy to say and hard to do. It means a wholesale
been thinking about service strategy and transformation for reassessment of a company’s norms and values, as well as major
decades, largely in response to advances made in information changes in organisational structures in which the conventional
technologies in the 1990s and 2000s. A 1999 paper in the Sloan model of separate functional units (production, logistics, sales,
Management Review, for example, talked about the need to finance, IT, HR, etc.), is no longer effective. With the blurring
involve the entire organisation in business transformation. Its of roles, comes the need for cross-functional teams. Some are
authors argued that senior managers must change the worldview recommending the creation of interdisciplinary teams bringing
of the organisation, address deeply held values and beliefs while together IT and business expertise, headed by an operational
building new skill sets and putting in place new management lead. Others suggest that Chief Information Officer (CIOs) –
processes to support the new reality. However, digital service particularly those whose roles have been to lead on IT-
transformation is even tougher. This is because there is a enablement – are not necessarily the right people to take charge
fundamental difference between the scope and complexity of the of digital transformation which affects all parts of the business.
previous attempts at transformation (which has been Some companies are creating new board-level positions such as
characterised as IT-enabled transformation) and today’s digital Chief Digital Officer to work alongside the CIO and Chief
transformation. Last time it was about evolution – doing more or Marketing officer to take care of the digital products and
less the same things, serving the same customers with the same services at the customer interface.
products and services, but doing it better. Its main aims were to Thus, if the organisational changes that took place as a result
improve internal integration, support the redesign of business of the advances in ICT were challenging, they are as nothing
processes and business networks and, to an extent, enable the compared to what organisations face today. If they are to
redefinition of business scope. Now it is about all of those things prosper, they may need new operational structures and a whole
and more. new culture. Thus, firms are acutely aware that they need to
If IT-enabled transformation was evolution, digital transform strategically – to build new networks and value
transformation is a revolution. The so-called Fourth Industrial chains. However, it is not all bad news. The rewards this time
Revolution, in fact. Why is it so different this time round? First, round are also that much greater. The key differences between
the technologies themselves are different. In the IT-enabled this revolution and the last is that this time it is not just about
evolution, they were primarily used to become more efficient to doing more of the same, it has the potential to transform or
optimise the business by automating basic processes and rewrite the entire business model and the customer experience.
speeding up the exchange of information. The combination of While the organisational pain needed to achieve that may be
today’s digital technologies such as social, mobile, analytics, acute, it promises to transform the fortunes of those that can
cloud and the Internet of Things has the potential to deliver make it happen. For example, Emirates Airline aims to re-
much more far-reaching change, not least from the blending of invent its processes using digital technology to enable a
personal and corporate IT environments. Innovation is also delightful travel experience. They are examining new
happening at an unprecedented rate, as these technologies technologies such as AI and real-time analytics and ideas to
converge and build on one another. Another fundamental identify the opportunities they represent for both incremental
difference is that some of these new technologies can be improvement and disruptive change in their business model.
embedded within products. As a result, of the vast For example, they developed a digital application which aims to
improvements in processing power, miniaturisation and the reduce aircraft turnaround at Dubai International airport.
availability of wireless connectivity, new generations of smart, Currently, it takes around 90 min to turnaround aircraft like
connected products which can provide services as well as better B777. The standard turnaround process consists of interiors
products – and by doing so, pave the way for the development cleaning, water and toilet servicing, loading meals, refuelling,
of completely new value propositions. From a value chain maintenance checks, loading passenger luggage and cargo and
perspective, smart connectivity lends itself to a new way of servicing the aircraft’s Auxiliary Power Unit. Different data
working with firms collaborating with their customers and sources are accessed and integrated to track activities on a real
other organisations (sometimes their competitors) to co-create time basis and to raise alarms when there are delays. This
value. It also transforms organisations’ understanding of – and enables Emirate to identify root causes and reduce potential
relationships with – their customers. They can see how delays (Caswell, 2018). However, the critical questions are as
customers are using their products, they can predict and pre- follows: How do you create new value propositions for your
empt problems and they can use all of this functionality to customers that will deliver a return on investment? How do you
transform the customer experience. change from a rules-based culture to one that supports
Today’s technologically driven change affects the innovation and takes risks? and How do you do all that while
organisation outside and in. As companies seek to harness these running your existing business and keeping today’s customers
new technologies, they need risk-taking to become a cultural happy? These questions are not going away any time soon, and
norm. For engineering-based, product-focused multinationals, academia and industry will firmly focus on digital service
in particular, this goes against everything they know which is – transformation theme to address these challenges.

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Customer experience trajectory ask them. Which is where customer experience analytics come
in. They are able to develop a much deeper understanding of
Being able to see your firm through the eyes of your customer is
customer decisions along the whole customer journey, not just
fundamental to successful service delivery. We are already
at the point of transaction. To do this, creating a framework for
seeing many examples of firms competing on customer
interrogating the data based on a deep understanding is
experience, whether it is Lenovo’s quick response time policy or
necessary. For example, machine learning can be used to
Disney personalising its customer interactions or omnichannel
monitor dimensions such as touchpoints, value creation
retail. Recently, the Coca-Cola Company has launched a new elements (resources, activities, context, interactions and
vending machine in China where consumers can purchase customer role), cognitive responses and discrete emotions
beverages, as well as return and recycle used bottles and cans. (McColl-Kennedy et al., 2019), alongside the more functional
The vending machine uses AI technology such as facial measures of how well a particular product or service performs.
recognition and sound interaction to provide an interactive Once these dimensions have been defined, they can then be
experience to the consumers. Consumers who buy a beverage used to interrogate the data using machine learning to score
bottle may receive a reminder along the lines of “you owe me a customers on only those aspects of the transaction that matter
bottle, don’t forget to pay back,” via their mobile devices, to them. This enables firms to properly identify critical pain
consumers can also earn credits by recycling more. These points, unmask underlying sources of friction at the
credits can be used to send e-vouchers to friends for drinks or to touchpoints along the customer journey and provide insights
purchase items made from recycled plastic (Haigh, 2018). into how and where firms need to implement change to
However, is this something that needs to concern B2B improve their responsiveness. Understanding, managing and
companies? The answer is – emphatically – yes. McKinsey measuring customer experience is vital for service providers.
Report (2016) pointed out that B2B customer-experience These new analytical approaches will enable firms to develop
index ratings significantly lag behind those of retail customers. more bespoke and more responsive services and, by doing so,
Yet B2B customer expectations are rising fast. As we now run help to “lock in” their loyal customers.
our personal lives through smart, real-time services and
customer-friendly apps, we will become increasingly Data-driven Business Models trajectory
unimpressed by a lack of service innovation in the workplace. In
addition, for B2B, where the value of each customer tends to be Capitalizing on the data explosion from different systems and
high, customer loyalty is paramount. At the same time, service encounters is increasingly becoming a necessity for
however, the notion of a B2B customer is complicated. Where businesses who wish to remain competitive. As a consequence,
in B2C a customer is usually one person, in B2B purchasing many firms are looking to develop new business models –
decisions are usually made by multiple stakeholders. In this effectively data-driven business models (Hartmann et al.,
scenario, understanding the customer experience is even more 2016). The challenges are threefold:
critical and needs sophisticated analytical tools. 1 how to extract data;
This sounds like common sense. Why, then, are so many 2 how to refine it; and
firms unaware of what their customers think of them and 3 how to ensure it is used most effectively.
dangerously complacent as a result? The reason is that lots of Businesses and other organisations that fail to align themselves
them do not monitor the customer experience in real time and with data-driven practices risk losing a critical competitive
rely on simplified, single-metric ways of measuring customer advantage and, ultimately, market share and the accompanying
satisfaction using techniques such as Net Promoter Scores and revenue. For today’s businesses, effective data utilisation is
customer satisfaction surveys. This is understandable. They are concerned with not only competitiveness but also arguably
relatively easy to administer and give you a set of numbers you survival itself. However, such innovation is notoriously
can present to the board. These techniques fail to provide a true difficult – particularly for large existing firms who have to
insight into the customer experience they are often actively contend with ingrained company structure, culture and
misleading, lulling firms into a false sense of security until they traditional revenue streams. It is the competitive advantage
notice – too late – they have haemorrhaged customers. This is associated with effective big data utilisation that is driving
because there are many dimensions to customer experience existing mainstream businesses to become data-driven.
which cannot be measured by a single data point. Advances in In some industries, such as publishing, big data has spawned
machine learning mean we can now delve more fully – and entirely new business models. The shift towards a digitally
more usefully – into the customer experience. By analysing the oriented distribution model produced dwindling advertising
more detailed and nuanced feedback contained in the free-text revenues, but as a response, certain publisher began to
comments section of surveys, social media, reviews and CRM, accumulate data relating to their online users – users whose
managers can develop a much richer view of a customer and demographic was particularly attractive to advertisers. This
their interactions with a firm throughout the customer journey data was then sold, enabling targeted and more effective
(Ordenes et al., 2014; Zaki and Neely, 2018). advertising and thus increasing revenue. A second general
Another common misapprehension about customer industry example is in the financial services sector where
analytics is that “Big Data” by itself is the answer. Thanks to an trading algorithms are applied to analyse huge quantities and
increasingly digitalised value chain, firms may have huge varieties of data enabling the capture of value in milliseconds. It
volumes of data at their disposal. However, sheer volume does is unsurprising that 71 per cent of banking firms directly report
not – in and of itself – deliver new insights into customer that the use of big data provides them with a competitive
behaviour. We need to know what questions to ask and how to advantage (Turner et al., 2013) – each often finding a slightly

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different angle for data application. Welovroi- A start-up Web several ways to segment customers. However, the most generic
application that uses big data in a way that allows marketers to classification was used, dividing target customers into
directly measure the effectiveness of digital marketing businesses (B2B), individual consumers (B2C) (Morris et al.,
campaigns and offers its services to customers in exchange for 2005) and consumer-to-consumer, which is defined as
a subscription fee. Business start-ups may be inclined to use a facilitating the use of customers to acquire further customers.
usage fee or a subscription in their revenue model as it is a In many cases, companies could target businesses and
consistent payment and an effective way for a start-up to individual consumers. On the other hand, business start-ups
maintain liquid capital. Next Big Sound- A start-up organisation that do not have the luxury of traditional revenue streams tend
who use large quantities of free available data and acquired data to create an entirely new offering. For example, the start-up
in the form of sales, social media interactions and purchasing Farmlogs offers a service to farmers that streamline crop and
data to improve the effectiveness in which a music artist is fertiliser input with satellite monitoring and weather and
developed, produced, branded and marketed to the public. produces pricing patterns, increasing efficiencies throughout
These short case examples illustrate the range of big data the farming process, thus enabling farmers to reduce
applications, but raise an interesting issue, namely, what are the unnecessary costs and improve practices and ultimately
underlying questions that enable firms to capitalise on data and increasing revenues. Data is obviously fundamental to new
create data-driven business models. There are six key questions generations of business models. Deciding which data is likely to
that organisations creating data-driven business models need to be most beneficial, and the nature of that data’s acquisition, is
grapple with. First, is the question of the target outcome – What pivotally important to the success of business models.
are we trying to achieve with big data? and How can this create Established businesses with a substantial number of customers,
value for customers? Take Zara, for example. They are using and therefore potential customer interaction points, are well
big data to monitor fashion trends so they can create a highly positioned to effectively use customer-provided data within
responsive supply chain that is in synch with the latest fashions their business models, although this data is often combined
and trends. Second, one has to ask – What is our desired with data from other sources. This high utilisation of all
offering? In essence, Zara uses big data to enable their desired available data sources by established organisations is indicative
offering – getting the right clothing to their customers at the that these organisations understand the value of data and orient
time they want it. Having considered both the outcome and the themselves towards becoming data-driven. In particular,
desired offering, the third question to ask is what data sources telecommunications and retail placing particular emphasis on
do we need to access? For Zara, data sources include internal self-generated data – probably due to their industry-specific
data- supply chain and inventory records, as well as externally customer interactions. Customer-provided data is used and
created data harvested from social media. The next stage regarded as important across all of the analysed sectors, which
involves asking how will we use these data? and how will we is suggestive of established business organisations viewing data
monetise them? Considering what analysis is required and how as a source of leverage. For example, the fashion retailer
this analysis delivers insight that will create value. Finally, firms Topshop combines customer-provided data, free available data
have to ask what are the inhibitors – the barriers that will from fashion blogs and social media and existing data within its
prevent us from achieving our goal? own databases when running predictive and descriptive
In order for a business to effectively use big data, it is vital analytics protocols to determine emerging trends within
that its aims are clear and realistically attainable. Often an the highly competitive retail clothing industry. Without these
organisation understands the potential value and benefit processes in place to manage and capitalise upon the valuable
associated with data but fails to determine a specific aim before source of potential customer insight, the available data, fashion
undertaking a time-consuming and costly data acquisition and retailers would lose out on significant revenue opportunities.
analysis process. By identifying a pre-determined target, the Although start-up companies have the advantage of a ‘clean
business can retain its focus on a desired and realistic goal and sheet’ when constructing data-driven business models, but also
reduce unnecessary monetary and human resource wastage the disadvantage that they rarely have the luxury of a high
during the process. Furthermore, a business must decide in number of recordable customer interaction points that can be
what way the business model will benefit the company’s current used to generate revenue streams.
offering or, alternatively, create an entirely new one. Methods of processing reveal the true value contained
Established businesses have a tendency to use data to improve within data. Knowing which key activities will be used to
or enhance their current customer offering, which is often process data enables the business to plan accordingly,
called a “value proposition” (Chesbrough and Rosenbloom, ensuring that the necessary hardware, software and employee
2002; Osterwalder, 2004; Johnson and Christensen, 2008). It skill sets are in place. To develop a complete picture of the
therefore follows that the value proposition is the value created key activities, the different activities were structured along the
for customers through the offering. A company can offer raw steps of the “virtual value chain” (Rayport and Sviokla,
data that is primarily “a set of facts” without an attached 1995). To gather data, a company can either generate the
meaning. When data has been interpreted, it becomes data itself internally or obtain the data from any external
information or knowledge. Typically, the output of any source (data acquisition). The generation can be done in
analytics activity attaches some insight or application. various ways, either manually by internal staff, automatically
Organisations are not restricted to a single offering. through the use of sensors and tracking tools (e.g. Web-
Established organisations, in particular, tend to have multiple tracking scripts) or by using crowd-sourcing tools. Insight is
customer offerings. However, organisations have to identify generated through analytics, which can be subdivided into
with those whom these offerings should target. There are descriptive analytics, analytics activities that explain the past;

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predictive analytics, which predict/forecast future outcome; consumer behaviour, changing the way companies are
and prescriptive analytics, which predict future outcome and organised and changing the role of “humans” in the
suggest decisions (Sivarajah et al., 2017) marketplace. The degree of complexity in digital
Without the target of a quantifiable benefit to a business, it is transformations exceeds that of other previous
difficult to justify the business model construction and transformations, such as IT-enabled transformation. Thus,
implementation. Incorporating a revenue model into a data- companies are experimenting with digital technologies and
driven business model is integral to its operational success. they build a digital service strategy to enhance their
Seven revenue streams are identified by Hartmann et al. competitive positioning which does not solely depend on the
(2016): asset sale, giving away the ownership rights of goods or technologies they adopt, but more importantly builds on the
service in exchange for money; lending/renting/leasing, strategy they deploy. Companies have to design the right
temporarily granting someone the exclusive right to use an asset experience for their customers and also deal with digital
for a defined period of time; licensing, granting permission to transformation challenges and obstacles (e.g. leadership,
use a protected intellectual property like a patent or copyright culture, institutional, etc.) that might stand in the way of a
in exchange for a licensing fee; a usage fee is charged for the use successful implementation. Finally, companies are looking
of a particular service; a subscription fee is charged for the use to rewrite their business models to be more of a data-driven
of the service; a brokerage fee is charged for an intermediate business model.
service; or advertising. Revenue models associated with a data-
driven business model differ considerably from a standard
subscription fee such as The New York Times for advertising. References
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Mohamed Zaki Volume 33 · Number 4 · 2019 · 429–435

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About the author
using text mining: a linguistics-based approach”, Journal of
Service Research, Vol. 17 No. 3, pp. 278-295. Mohamed Zaki, PhD, is the Deputy Director of the
Osterwalder, A. (2004), “The business model ontology – a Cambridge Service Alliance, Department of Engineering,
proposition in a design science approach”, PhD paper. University of Cambridge. Mohamed’s research focuses on
Rayport, J. and Sviokla, J. (1995), “Exploiting the virtual value developing novel machine learning methods to manage and
chain”, Harvard Business Review, pp. 75-85. measure customer experience and predict customer loyalty.
Schwab, K. (2016), The Fourth Industrial Revolution, World Other research interests include digital transformation and
Economic Forum. data-driven business models. He has a number of publications
Sivarajah, U., Kamal, M.M., Irani, Z. and Weerakkody, V. in highly ranked journals, including Journal of Service Research,
(2017), “Critical analysis of big data challenges and International Journal of Operations and Production Management,
analytical methods”, Journal of Business Research, Vol. 70, Journal of Service Management, PloS ONE, Journal of
pp. 263-286. Production Planning & Control and Journal of Services
Turner, D., Schroeck, M. and Shockley, R. (2013), “Analytics: Marketing, as well as an edited book, book chapters and many
the real-world use of big data in financial services”, IBM conference articles. He is a recipient of Marketing Science
Global Business Services, pp. 1-12. Institute grant (2016 and 2017) on customer experience.
Ward, J., Griffiths, P. and Whitmore, P. (1990), Strategic Mohamed is also a Principle Investigator and a co-investigator
Planning for Information Systems, Wiley, Chichester. on ten UK research councils (EPSRC/ESRC) and many
Zaki, M. and Neely, A. (2018), “Customer experience industrial research projects. Mohamed Zaki can be contacted
analytics: dynamic customer-centric model”, in Maglio P., at: mehyz2@cam.ac.uk

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