Matching Between Innovative Business Model Patterns and IT Impact Areas

Under the pressure of digital transformation, companies are forced to constantly revise or even reinvent their business models. As many examples show, remaining in the so-called “red ocean” may have consequences that threaten the company’s existence. However, business model innovations encounter various obstacles in corporate management. These obstacles can be overcome, for example, with the help of a structured approach of the St. Gallen Business Model Navigator, which provides a construction methodology for the redesign of a business model based on 55 business model patterns that have been proven in practice. Empirical investigations of the patterns found in corporate reality led to the identification of a business model DNA consisting of 12 pattern combinations. The paper examines the relationship between this business model DNA and various IT impact areas such as different IT technologies (e.g. cloud or in-memory computing) and applications (such as process mining or blockchain), data sources tapped through digitalization (such as IoT or social media data), and types of digital customer access, for example via multi-sided platforms or smart services. Using concrete examples, the study relates these four areas of impact of IT for digital transformation to the clustered pattern combinations of the business model DNA. In the process, it becomes apparent that these pattern combinations have different requirements for different IT areas. This paper is intended to provide an overview of the interdependencies between business models and IT areas and technologies. On the one hand, it provides answers to the question, which business model DNA requires special efforts in which area of impact. It also gives indications for which pattern combination a company has to focus on which IT areas. On the other hand, it examines which possibilities technologies offer to make the implementation of patterns or pattern combinations more effective or more efficient. This provides assistance to companies in selecting suitable strategies for digital transformation, as well as in selecting and developing a suitable IT foundation.