Service Variety Management by Flexible Assembly of Service Components

Abstract

In this paper, I discuss a way of variety management achieved by flexible assembly of service components. The contribution of service industry on GDP basis is increasing rapidly, and service innovation and productivity improvement become more important issues in many countries. In response to the issues, a new discipline called "service science" has been established. In the context of service systems science, service is defined as value co-creation emerged by interactions among providers and customers. This value co-creation process can be regarded as an input and output system and defined as "service component". According to the definition, we can analyze corporate activity and industry structure as a combination of service components. Information system is one of platforms which enable to assemble service component flexibly. If a company offers a service which is tailored to customer needs based on the platforms, then it becomes competitive advantage for the company. Finally, we discuss the doujinshi publishing business as an example of a platform which enables hyper-variety market. From an interview with a publishing company, we insist that suggesting appropriate service for customers is important as well as providing various services based on service component flexibility.