Strategic Learning by e-Service Suppliers in Service Value Networks

Abstract

This article examines strategic behavior of e-Service suppliers that offer electronic services in complex Service Value Networks (SVNs). In SVNs, consumers request a bundle of e-Services, and the SVN acts as an aggregator of single service instances, automatically configuring services from different e-Service suppliers into a complex service bundle, which is then offered to the consumers. In this context, e-Service suppliers who want to maximize their business success need to configure their services according to the (for them unknown) preferences of the consumers. Current literature, however, does not offer much guidance on how to find a fitting service offer in this situation, especially when the suppliers are faced with a changing consumer base. For this reason, we study two specific learning regimes that are able to capture and deal with the inherent complexity of the corresponding strategy space. Besides finding beneficial service offers, e-Service suppliers might also learn collusive behavior if it aligns with individual incentives. The potential occurrence of such behavior is the second aim of our work. Our results show that even with relatively simple learning regimes, e-Service suppliers are able to find beneficial offers and learn to collude tacitly (and presumably legally), which increases their profits.

Service operations: what’s next?

“…Although dyadic interactions are undeniably a fundamental driver of service operations performance, a growing body of research highlights the performance implications of actors who would normally be considered external to a service encounter, such as other service providers concurrently used by the customer, infrastructure providers, suppliers, or other customers (Gummesson, 2008;Harvey, 2016;Tax et al, 2013). Service research has seen a proliferation of new theoretical constructs that allow researchers and practitioners to account for the increasingly distributed nature of service delivery, such as service delivery networks (Tax et al, 2013), collaborative networked organizations (Romero and Molina, 2011), service value networks (Haas et al, 2013), and service ecosystems (Barile et al, 2016). We refer to the set of entities that participate directly or indirectly in the realization of a service outcome with the label of Service Supply Network (SSN) (Sampson et al, 2015).…”

Service supply chain management: a behavioural operations perspective

“…However, many studies only introduce the service element into research situations in PSSC, with limited discussions on SOSC (Wang et al, 2015). Haas et al (2013) portray the strategic behaviour of the e-service supplier in complex service value networks, arguing that e-service suppliers who want to maximise their business success need to configure their services according to the preferences of the consumers. López and Zúñiga (2014) study the strategic ability adjustment behaviour of servers in the judicial service supply chain, noting that servers within the supply chain change their processing speeds in order to maintain a backlog of cases that is acceptable and credible.…”

“…Strategic customer (Liang et al, 2018;Ghoshal et al, 2018), the impacts of strategic behaviour (Zhang, Mantin and Wu, 2019;Papanastasiou and Savva, 2016;Kremer et al, 2017). Generalised strategic behaviour refers to decision making that considers other influencing factors (Haas et al, 2013;Liu and Xie, 2013;López and Zúñiga, 2014;Zhang, Xing and Li, 2018)…”

“…In studies of generalised strategic behaviour, the understanding of "strategic" is more diverse. Given the important role of customers in the service supply chain (Maull et al, 2012;Sampson and Spring, 2012), much of the strategic behaviour literature considers customer's impactincluding customer preference, customer satisfaction and customer loyalty Nam, 2010, 2013;Song et al, 2011;Dan et al, 2012;Liu and Xie, 2013;Haas et al, 2013;Boon-itt et al, 2017;Cai et al, 2017). However, many studies only introduce the service element into research situations in PSSC, with limited discussions on SOSC (Wang et al, 2015).…”

The impact of service bundles on the mechanism through which functional value and price value affect WOM intent

“…They emphasized the word separate because this signifies that these are distinct products and/or services, for which distinct markets exist. The existing literature on bundling can be categorized into a few broad streams: the pricing and promotional implications of bundles (e.g., Basu and Vitharana, 2009); customer responses to bundle offers (e.g., Han et al, 2009); and designing and offering value through bundles (e.g., Haas et al, 2013). Much of the early research was product-focused, as well as emphasizing price optimization strategies and customer responses to such offers.…”