Abstract:
IoT (Internet of Things) represents a class of emerging disruptive technologies that are among the most popular in organizations and society. For organizations of all kinds, this type of technology opens many new forms of value. However, the realization of value, whatever its form, is far from immediate, simple and linear. And many organizations still have insufficient understanding of the causal process leading to it. The aim of this article is therefore to examine how organizations go about realizing IoT business value. To this end, the article develops a theoretical framework presenting a causal process for realizing IoT business value. It draws on the contributions of Makadok (2001) and Wang et al. (2012) concerning causal mechanisms of value creation, and on the literature related to ICT business value. The article then implements a case study approach to document the practices of eight organizations in realizing the benefits of IoT. The results show that they are implementing a process that synergizes the development of capacity through large-scale IoT deployment and the structuring of complementary resources via different approaches. The paper makes several contributions. It elaborates and documents a causal process for realizing the business value of IoT. It also proposes a more complete conceptualization of IoT business value.
Keywords: IoT, Business value, Causal process, Causal mechanisms, Capability building, Resource structuring
