Requirements for Servitization in Manufacturing Service Ecosystems

As tangible products can be easily copied and customers ask for individual solutions, the European manufacturing industry increasingly bundles their products with associated services to so called “Extended Products” (EP). Missing competencies for this servitization have to be acquired by involving partners from the companies’ environment, the “Manufacturing Service Ecosystem” (MSE). However, traditional manufacturers lack the appropriate models, methods and tools for collaborative innovation, development and provision of EP. This paper presents the results of a requirements analysis of four manufacturing use cases that indicates the need for support in the area of servitization and collaboration in MSE.