University of Twente Student Theses
How digital platform companies employ envelopment and what makes it a success : A comparative study on Adobe Systems and Smith Micro Software
Damhuis, Luuk (2019) How digital platform companies employ envelopment and what makes it a success : A comparative study on Adobe Systems and Smith Micro Software.
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| Abstract: | Through the emergence of communication technologies digital companies such as Adobe have grown swifter than companies in other markets. The need of userbases and the overlap of different userbases push digital platform companies to innovate by enveloping. Eisenmann et al. (2010) developed three types of envelopment through which digital platform companies can evolve, however, few scholars have examined which strategy leads to platform dominance. This paper theorizes how digital platform companies innovate through envelopment. Through new value propositions offered by Adobe and Smith Micro, which were derived from blog posts and press releases from 2006 to 2011, the envelopmental strategies were analyzed. Two different strategies were shown to be utilized by these companies. It was found that the best way to innovate is a balanced one, namely to strengthen ones core by enveloping focused before sporadically using dispersed envelopment. An updated envelopmental matrix was proposed based on the matrix derived by Müller, Kijl & Visjnic (2018). Here lies the proposition that there is one optimal route for envelopment, as is shown in the matrix. The main contribution of this paper lies in the direction it can give to digital platform companies to grow sustainable and the theoretical ground it provides. |
| Item Type: | Essay (Bachelor) |
| Faculty: | BMS: Behavioural, Management and Social Sciences |
| Subject: | 83 economics, 85 business administration, organizational science |
| Programme: | International Business Administration BSc (50952) |
| Link to this item: | https://purl.utwente.nl/essays/77403 |
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