Smart services for sustainability – circular servitization

By Jürg Meierhofer, ZHAW

In a distinguished group of highly experienced people, we discussed how value is created in business ecosystems and differentiated between the individual and the organizational perspective. It was very inspiring to have diverse industry representatives in the same room and to create a common understanding. Departing from economic value creation, we extended our scope to the ecological dimension. An intense discussion arose how ecological value can be created without negatively impacting the economic value. There were statements that economic value creation is still the predominant requirement, and that in many cases, also a slight reduction of economic value for the sake of ecological value would not be accepted. However, the increasing relevance of sustainability and upcoming regulations might change this balance in the near future.