Business model innovations in times of long-term discontinuous technological change - An empirical examination of the automotive industry in transition to electric mobility

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Business model innovations, as adjustments of business models to changes in the environment, are currently being studied mainly from the process point of view. So far, an examination of the content of decisions to innovate business models and their components (i.e., resource allocation, competitive advantages, value architecture, customer value proposition and profit model) has been largely neglected. Nevertheless, they are very important particularly in the event of long-term discontinuous technological changes where the transition to the new technology takes so long that widely differing business models are possible simultaneously. To investigate such differing business model innovations, hypotheses on the adaptation of business models are formed on the basis of a variety of explanatory approaches, particularly the competence-based view, and studied in scenario-based experiments at 52 German automotive companies in the transition to electric mobility. With these experiments decisions on business models, especially alternative paths for innovating business model components can be identified (technology embracing, technology balancing and technology postponing). © 2015 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd.