Simulation Applied in Product-Service System (PSS): System Dynamics Potentials of Supporting Sustainable PSS Development

The rapid evolution of market demand towards more sustainable solutions has brought manufacturing companies to extend their traditional product-centric offerings with new service-oriented proposals, based on a mix of tangible products and intangible services. Such a combination, known as Product-Service Systems (PSS), represents for manufacturing companies an opportunity to generate new revenues, increase customer loyalty, optimize resource consumption in a sustainable fashion, and differentiate from competitors. This offer's focus on the needs of the consumer is crucial, but for it to be financially sustainable for the business, it must also be feasible at the economic level. Equally significant are the other dimensions of the Triple Bottom Line, the environmental and social ones, that have the potential to be improved with a PSS solution but they could not exceed the economic sustainability. Therefore, it is crucial to enable the identification of the trade-off between a PSS's effectiveness and efficiency and to provide decision-makers with guidance. Therefore, this research is focused on investigating how simulation-based modelling can be exploited as a tool for the decision-making process at the strategic level to support the development of sustainable PSS offerings. Specifically, the System Dynamics (SD) simulation approach has been explored, identifying the knowledge available on its application to PSS. The research has driven the development of a SD model for supporting manufacturing managers in the adoption of different PSS solutions. Specifically, the economic and environmental impacts of the different PSS have been utilized for the development of the conceptual model, which would be the object of a detailed description.