E-services: problems, opportunities, and digital platforms

Services that are delivered over the Internet-e-services-pose unique problems yet offer unprecedented opportunities. In this paper, we classify e-services along the dimensions of their level of digitization and the nature of their target markets (business-to-business, business-to-consumer, consumer-to-consumer). Using the case of application services, we analyze how they differ from traditional software procurement and development. Next, we extend the concept of modular platforms to this domain and identify how knowledge management can be used to rapidly assemble new application services. We also discuss how such traceability-based knowledge management can facilitate e-service evolution and version-based market segmentation.