"Re-examining path dependence in the digital age: The evolution of connected car business models"

Research Policy, Volume 50, Issue 9, November 2021

René Bohnsack, Hannes Kurtz, André Hanel

Abstract

Proliferating digitalization affects the evolution of business models across contexts and challenges firms’ established innovation trajectories. Prior work on organizational path dependence suggests that firms experience decreasing option spaces over time and ultimately arrive at lock-in situations that prevent them from reacting to changing environmental conditions. Contemporary business practice, however, challenges these assumptions, as firms—even industrial-age incumbents—appear to be able to escape lock-ins and restore choices. One potential explanation for this could be the flexible nature of digital technologies that are increasingly integrated into business models during digitalization. To explore how and why this process affects organizational path dependence, we conducted a longitudinal multiple case study on connected car business models. We derive four business model archetypes adopted by different companies in the automotive industry and by new entrants, and we describe their evolution over time. We find that the growing integration of digital technologies into business models increases the number of possible pathways and can help to break path-dependent behavior. Based on our findings, we challenge and extend established knowledge on organizational path dependence with regard to key tenets, such as initial conditions and lock-ins, and provide a nuanced perspective on path dependence's resource- and cognition-based foundations.

"A Systematic Review of the Literature on Digital Transformation: Insights and Implications for Strategy and Organizational Change"

Journal of Management Studies, Volume 58, Issue 5, July 2021, Pages 1159-1197

André Hanelt, René Bohnsack, David Marz, Cláudia Antunes Marante

Abstract

In this article we provide a systematic review of the extensive yet diverse and fragmented literature on digital transformation (DT), with the goal of clarifying boundary conditions to investigate the phenomenon from the perspective of organizational change. On the basis of 279 articles, we provide a multi-dimensional framework synthesizing what is known about DT and discern two important thematical patterns: DT is moving firms to malleable organizational designs that enable continuous adaptation, and this move is embedded in and driven by digital business ecosystems. From these two patterns, we derive four perspectives on the phenomenon of DT: technology impact, compartmentalized adaptation, systemic shift and holistic co-evolution. Linking our findings and interpretations to existing work, we find that the nature of DT is only partially covered by conventional frameworks on organizational change. On the basis of this analysis, we derive a research agenda and provide managerial implications for strategy and organizational change.

"Sustainable product innovation and changing consumer behavior: Sustainability affordances as triggers of adoption and usage"

Business Strategy and the Environment, April 2021

Jonatan Pinkse, René Bohnsack

Abstract

This conceptual paper argues that for sustainable product innovation to make a contribution to addressing sustainability issues, we need to understand not only why consumers adopt sustainable products but also what makes them use these in sustainable way. To explain how specific product features can change the ways in which consumers engage with sustainable products in the adoption and usage phase, we draw on affordance theory. Affordances refer to the potential for agentic action of users in relation to a technological object. We develop a conceptual framework that explains how sustainable product innovation can lead to the design of sustainability affordances that stimulate adoption and sustainable usage. The framework shows how three forms of agency—material, firm, and user agency—interact and together influence a product's sustainability affordances that drive adoption and a change in consumer behavior. The framework explains how trade-offs between a product's environmental features and consumer expectations regarding desired functionalities and user experience can be overcome.

"The role of business models in firm internationalization: An exploration of European electricity firms in the context of the energy transition"

Journal of International Business Studies, volume 52, pages 824–852 (2021)

René Bohnsack, Francesca Ciulli, Ans Kolk 

Abstract

This article ties in directly with recently intensified interest in business models in international business (IB), using the energy transition as empirical context to explore their relevance in firm internationalization. The global energy transition presents a challenge for almost all industries, but some face specific difficulties particularly important from an IB perspective. We study a set of European firms that used to operate in a highly regulated context with (partial) state ownership, until government-directed market liberalization started to allow further competition and internationalization. Existing firms were prompted to adapt their business models to these changes, with new ventures entering the market to reap opportunities with novel energy-related technologies and business models. Linking insights from strategic management to the IB literature, we conceptualize business model-related specific advantages (BMSAs), and explore the role of BMSAs in the internationalization of the firms in our sample. We also uncover barriers to BMSA recombination in (potential) host countries, consider BMSA location-boundedness, and discuss implications for firms’ international expansion by presenting a new framework. Consequences for the energy transition and the actors already involved and (in)directly confronted with it are explicated, while outlining promising areas for further research, building on the insights and limitations of our study.

"Organizing a virtual conference changed the way we think about academic exchange"

Nature, June 2020

Christina Bidmon, Cristyn Meath, René Bohnsack

Flying around the world to give a ten-minute presentation to an exhausted audience is a model long overdue for reform, say sustainability researchers Christina Bidmon, Cristyn Meath and René Bohnsack.

"Business model design spaces in socio-technical transitions: The case of electric driving in the Netherlands"

Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Volume 154, May 2020

Joeri H.Wesseling, Christina Bidmon, René Bohnsack

Abstract

Whereas research acknowledges the potential of business model innovation (BMI) to destabilize an existing regime, the impact of a socio-technical system in transition on BMI remains under-conceptualized. To advance work in this direction, this study expands the concept of a business model design space (BMDS), which describes the opportunities and constraints to design novel ways of creating and capturing value from niche technologies available at a given point in time in a transition. Illustrated with the case of electric vehicles in the Netherlands, we show how BMI are affected by and, in turn, affect this design space. We find that the policy and the science and technology dimensions of the socio-technical system form hard boundaries to the BMDS that niche actors cannot directly overcome via BMI. Yet, BMI can push the softer industry, market, and cultural boundaries of the BMDS by supporting niche expansion via coupling novel technologies to business models that (i) conform to the current regime, or that (ii) attempt to transform the regime. This paper offers an analytical framework that connects firm- and system-level to support the exploration of questions like how much novelty niche actors can introduce into a ST-system at specific points in a transition.

"Influencing the disruptive potential of sustainable technologies through value proposition design: The case of vehicle-to-grid technology"

Journal of Cleaner Production, Volume 254, May 2020

Sana Akbar Khan, René Bohnsack 

Abstract

Disruptive innovations often struggle to enter the mainstream market, especially those that benefit society. Innovative business models can help to make inferior technologies attractive and disrupt existing market linkages. As value propositions are an integral part of business models, they can play a key role in this process. This study explores the effect of value proposition design (VPD) on the customer value of sustainable technologies in the case of vehicle-to-grid charging. The result suggests that VPD can influence the trajectory and customer value of a technology and pave the way for disruptive innovation. It suggests to focus on utilitarian or hedonic values in VPD to target the low-end or high-end market respectively; a mixed approach reduces customer value. Hence, the study establishes a link between technology, value proposition, and market disruption. The results have important implications for research and practice as they offer an explanatory framework that can help managers in designing value propositions to accelerate the diffusion of sustainable technologies.

"Driving the electric bandwagon: The dynamics of incumbents' sustainable innovation"

Business Strategy and the Environment, Volume 29, Issue 2, p. 727-743

René Bohnsack, Ans Kolk, Jonatan Pinkse, Christina M. Bidmon

Abstract

Given that entire industries face sustainability challenges, it is important to understand the dynamics that lead “firms-in-an-industry” to engage in sustainable product innovation. To provide more insight into the question of how innovation activities spread from individual firm action to an industry-wide engagement, this paper examines the automobile industry and the development of electric vehicles (EVs). The analysis covers automobile incumbents over a crucial decade for EV development in the industry, focusing on the different strategic motives that especially the so-called “first movers” used to justify their earlier engagement. We find that EVs became a core pillar of the incumbents' technology strategies through a combination of coercive, normative, and mimetic pressures. Yet, the strategic motives to engage in EVs stayed poles apart between different companies. The insights from our study are relevant for those interested in the diffusion of sustainable product innovation and in incumbent behaviour in sustainability transitions.

"Three's a Crowd? An Optimal Distinctiveness View on Premium Car Makers' Electrification Strategies"

Academy of Management Annual Meeting Proceedings, 2020, Volume 1

Christina Bidmon, Rene Bohnsack

Abstract

Despite an increasing scholarly effort to integrate institutional theory into strategic management, we still know little about how organizations balance conformity and differentiation when they are pressured to come up with innovation. Drawing on the recently proposed perspective of optimal distinctiveness, we use a comparative case study among German premium car manufacturers to assess how organizations within this group strategically position their electrification strategies in the midst of regulatory and competitive pressures. We identify integrative and compensatory positioning as two strategic levers by which these organizations try to achieve competitive differentiation via their innovation strategies. We also reveal patterns in the relation between these levers and which circumstances predict their use. Our study contributes to the understanding of organizational responses to conflicting demands, the innovation strategies of incumbents, and the role of optimal distinctiveness in this process."

"Optimizing Resource Usage in an Unobtrusive Way Through Smart Aggregation: The Case of Electric Vehicle Charging in Amsterdam"

In: Dorsman A., Arslan-Ayaydin Ö., Thewissen J. (eds) Regulations in the Energy Industry, pp 243-261

Kees van Montfort, Halldora Thorsdottir, René Bohnsack

Abstract

The increasing popularity of electric vehicles (EVs) is known to amplify the already present peaks in electricity demand. The possibility to remotely control and influence the charging of many EVs using the Internet of Things (IoT) via an aggregator has been proposed to optimize resource usage, to alleviate peak problems, and to exploit revenues that may be harnessed from fluctuating electricity prices. However, so far, the potential hinged on the acceptance of users, particularly the willingness to change their charging behavior. In this study, we develop an unobtrusive and easily implementable optimization method. Its effectiveness is tested on 360,000 charging sessions at public charging points in Amsterdam during the year 2015, providing a realistic assessment of the effects of optimization in terms of reduced costs, change in peak demand, and long occupancy of charging points. Based on the model, an average reduction of electricity costs between 20% and 30% can be achieved, depending on the day of the week. We also show that changing EV owner’s charging preferences such as starting earlier or later can benefit certain groups of EV drivers substantially and reduce electricity charging costs up to 35%.

"What the hack? A growth hacking taxonomy and practical applications for firms"

Business Horizons, Volume 62, Issue 6, November–December 2019, Pages 799-818

René Bohnsack, Meike Malena Liesner

Abstract

As companies become increasingly digital, growth hacking emerged as a new way of scaling businesses. While the term is fashionable in business, many executives remain confused about the concept. Even if firms have an idea of what growth hacking is, they may still be puzzled as to how to do it, creating a strategy-execution gap. Our article assists firms by bridging the growth hacking strategy-execution gap. First, we provide a growth hacking framework and deconstruct its building blocks: marketing, data analysis, coding, and the lean startup philosophy. We then present a taxonomy of 34 growth hacking patterns along the customer lifecycle of acquisition, activation, revenue, retention, and referral; categorize them on the two dimensions of resource intensity and time lag; and provide an example of how to apply the taxonomy in the case of a fitness application. Finally, we discuss seven opportunities and challenges of growth hacking that firms should keep in mind.

"Industry Business Model Patterns for Business Model Innovation – The Case of the Electricity Industry"

Academy of Management Annual Meeting Proceedings 2019

Cláudia Marante, René Bohnsack

Abstract

This paper addresses the question of how a pattern taxonomy of activities in an industry can be used to innovate business models. At the example of the electricity industry – an industry that is facing several changes due to digital technologies, liberalization, and renewable energy technologies – we present a systematic process of building a business model pattern taxonomy using a modified Delphi card sorting approach. In doing so, this paper contributes to understanding how patterns and pattern taxonomies can be used in business model innovation and provide a methodology to catalogue emerging new business models in traditional industries.

"Re-examining path dependence in the digital age: The evolution of connected car business models"

Research Policy, Volume 50, Issue 9, November 2021

René Bohnsack, Hannes Kurtz, André Hanelt

Abstract

Proliferating digitalization affects the evolution of business models across contexts and challenges firms’ established innovation trajectories. Prior work on organizational path dependence suggests that firms experience decreasing option spaces over time and ultimately arrive at lock-in situations that prevent them from reacting to changing environmental conditions. Contemporary business practice, however, challenges these assumptions, as firms—even industrial-age incumbents—appear to be able to escape lock-ins and restore choices. One potential explanation for this could be the flexible nature of digital technologies that are increasingly integrated into business models during digitalization. To explore how and why this process affects organizational path dependence, we conducted a longitudinal multiple case study on connected car business models. We derive four business model archetypes adopted by different companies in the automotive industry and by new entrants, and we describe their evolution over time. We find that the growing integration of digital technologies into business models increases the number of possible pathways and can help to break path-dependent behavior. Based on our findings, we challenge and extend established knowledge on organizational path dependence with regard to key tenets, such as initial conditions and lock-ins, and provide a nuanced perspective on path dependence's resource- and cognition-based foundations.

"Local niches and firm responses in sustainability transitions: The case of low-emission vehicles in China"

Technovation, Volumes 70–71, February–March 2018, Pages 20-32

René Bohnsack

Abstract

The Chinese government has implemented a comprehensive strategy to push low-emission vehicles (LEVs). Local municipalities have played an important role in this transition. Programs such as the “Ten Cities Thousand Vehicles” (TCTV) program created protection mechanisms in local niches for the development of LEVs in which public and private actors have been able to experiment without market pressures. However, often the setup of local niches has favoured local companies which led to incompatibility across provinces and barriers to diffusion. This article aims to explore the dynamics in the local niche and how the niche has been shaped by local protection and firm responses. Heeding the call for a better conceptualization of the spatial dimension in sustainability transitions, we draw on the recent second generation, multi-scalar multi-level perspective (MLP) and conceptualize the local niche. Based on our empirical results we find four ideal type local niches – the open niche, the technology shielding niche, the market shielding niche and the closed niche – and distill respective firm responses. This has important implications for policy-makers and managers in China and for industries in sustainability transition in general.

"Entrepreneurial orientation and its effect on sustainability decision tradeoffs: The case of sustainable fashion firms"

Journal of Business Venturing, Volume 32, Issue 5, September 2017, Pages 569-587

Lori DiVitoa, René Bohnsack

Abstract

We examined the entrepreneurial orientation and sustainability orientation, a persistent and conflicting duality, of sustainable entrepreneurs and their evaluation of competing priorities in sustainability decision making. We conducted an exploratory, mixed-method study of 24 sustainable fashion firms and collected data through structured surveys and rich in-depth interviews. Through our inductive and deductive analysis, we derive three sustainability decision making profiles (singular, flexible and holistic) with distinct prioritization logic (nested, ordered and aligned, respectively). We find different configurations of entrepreneurial orientation correspond to the sustainability decision making profiles. We extend the literature by showing how the reflexivity of entrepreneurial orientation interacts with sustainability orientation.

"Value Propositions for Disruptive Technologies: Reconfiguration Tactics in the Case of Electric Vehicles"

California Management Review, Vol 59, Issue 4, 2017

René Bohnsack, Jonatan Pinkse

Abstract

Disruptive technologies tend to underperform on attributes that are considered as key attributes of incumbent technologies and require new value propositions to increase mainstream customer appeal. Yet, how do firms reconfigure their value proposition as a way to overcome the technological inferiority of disruptive technologies? This article conceptualizes and empirically investigates the process of value proposition reconfiguration. Based on evidence on the commercialization of electric vehicles, it explores the tactics firms use to reconfigure value propositions to increase market acceptance from mainstream customers. The article develops a framework showing three reconfiguration tactics: compensating, enhancing, and coupling tactics. 

"Business models for sustainable technologies: Exploring business model evolution in the case of electric vehicles"

Research Policy, Volume 43, Issue 2, March 2014, Pages 284-300

René Bohnsack, Jonatan Pinkse, Ans Kolka

Abstract

Sustainable technologies challenge prevailing business practices, especially in industries that depend heavily on the use of fossil fuels. Firms are therefore in need of business models that transform the specific characteristics of sustainable technologies into new ways to create economic value and overcome the barriers that stand in the way of their market penetration. A key issue is the respective impact of incumbent and entrepreneurial firms’ path-dependent behaviour on the development of such new business models. Embedded in the literature on business models, this paper explores how incumbent and entrepreneurial firms’ path dependencies have affected the evolution of business models for electric vehicles. Based on a qualitative analysis of electric vehicle projects of key industry players over a five-year period (2006–2010), the paper identifies four business model archetypes and traces their evolution over time. Findings suggest that incumbent and entrepreneurial firms approach business model innovation in distinctive ways. Business model evolution shows a series of incremental changes that introduce service-based components, which were initially developed by entrepreneurial firms, to the product. Over time there seems to be some convergence in the business models of incumbents and entrepreneurs in the direction of delivering economy multi-purpose vehicles.

"Timing-based business models for flexibility creation in the electric power sector"

Energy Policy, Volume 92, May 2016, Pages 348-358

Thorsten Helms, Moritz Loock, René Bohnsack

Abstract

Energy policies in many countries push for an increase in the generation of wind and solar power. Along these developments, the balance between supply and demand becomes more challenging as the generation of wind and solar power is volatile, and flexibility of supply and demand becomes valuable. As a consequence, companies in the electric power sector develop new business models that create flexibility through activities of timing supply and demand. Based on an extensive qualitative analysis of interviews and industry research in the energy industry, the paper at hand explores the role of timing-based business models in the power sector and sheds light on the mechanisms of flexibility creation through timing. In particular we distill four ideal-type business models of flexibility creation with timing and reveal how they can be classified along two dimensions, namely costs of multiplicity and intervention costs. We put forward that these business models offer ‘coupled services’, combining resource-centered and service-centered perspectives. This complementary character has important implications for energy policy.

"The institutional evolution process of the global solar industry: The role of public and private actors in creating institutional shifts"

Environmental Innovation and Societal Transitions, Volume 20, September 2016, Pages 16-32

René Bohnsack, Jonatan Pinkse, Anneloes Waelpoel

Abstract

This study takes an institutional perspective on industry creation, which argues that an industry’s maturation relies on a process of building legitimacy and establishing rules for competition. It addresses the institutional evolution process that an industry experiences, in which existing rules for competition are disrupted and replaced by new regulatory frameworks, technological standards, and business models. These interruptions are referred to as institutional shifts. The study seeks to understand the role of specific actors in creating institutional shifts that drive an industry’s institutional evolution process. Based on a study of the global solar industry over the period of 1982–2012, the findings suggest that the industry’s institutional evolution was driven by an interplay of different public and private actors that influenced one another over time and across national borders. To create institutional shifts, companies employed a mechanism based on knowledge diffusion, while governments used a stimuli-based mechanism instead.

"Catching recurring waves: Low-emission vehicles, international policy developments and firm innovation strategies"

Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Volume 98, September 2015, Pages 71-87

René Bohnsack, Ans Kolk, Jonatan Pinkse

Abstract

Low-emission vehicle (LEV) technologies have grown in the 1990s, but have since experienced fluctuating interest. Initially, electric vehicles (EVs) were the most promising technology. Most large car firms developed EVs and started bringing them to the market, in limited numbers. Yet, car firms halted their EV engagement around 2001 and focused on hybrid vehicles (HVs) and fuel-cell vehicles (FCVs) instead. Hybrids found their way into the product portfolios of most car manufacturers while FCVs failed to gain traction. In 2006, car firms again committed to EVs, and on a larger scale. To better understand recurring waves of firms' low-emission-vehicle investments in the international context, this paper explores the influence of geographically-bound government policies on car firms' innovation strategies. An analysis of archival data from 1997 to 2010 details LEV-specific developments per region/firm, and shows the complex interplay between policies on local, national and international levels and firms' strategies. Three mechanisms seem to shape the international LEV trajectory: (1) international policy diffusion (vertically and horizontally), (2) firms' international operations, and (3) fit between policy requirements and firm capabilities. Heeding the call for a better geographical conceptualization of technological trajectories, this paper also proposes a framework that explains co-evolution between government policies and car manufacturers.

"The Role of Public and Private Protection in Disruptive Innovation: The Automotive Industry and the Emergence of Low-Emission Vehicles"

Journal of Product Innovation Management, Volume 31, Issue 1, January 2014, Pages 43-60

Jonatan Pinkse, René Bohnsack, Ans Kolk

Abstract

In the automotive industry, the need to move toward more sustainable trajectories of innovation has received much attention. Car manufacturers have started to develop lower emission alternatives for the internal combustion engine, particularly electric, hybrid, and fuel-cell vehicles. They face the challenge, however, of how to make a potentially disruptive, systemic, and societally embedded technology such as a low-emission vehicle attractive to mainstream customers. While literature has suggested that companies can empower the initial stages of disruptive innovation by creating protected spaces themselves and/or by taking advantage of such spaces created by public actors, the specific role of these different types of protection levers—private and/or public—has remained unclear. This article therefore investigates to what extent and how private and public protection levers affect firm-level strategies to increase the attractiveness of disruptive and systemic innovations to mainstream customers. This is explored empirically through a multiple case study of the emergence of low-emission vehicles within three car manufacturers—Daimler, General Motors, and Toyota—in the context of European, Japanese, and U.S. policies. The empirical analysis is conducted on a data set consisting of more than 9000 articles from two trade magazines, a car magazine and a financial newspaper for the period of 1997–2010. As main findings, the article identifies regulation, tax incentives, and public–private partnerships as the public protection levers that impose or stimulate “new” performance metrics such as fuel economy and vehicle emissions. It also finds that resource allocation, niche occupation, and collaboration-integration act as the main private protection levers. In addition, two protection levers emerge from the data that are rather prominent in this context: the use of regulation imposing large-scale commercialization of low-emission vehicles and dumping of products in the market below cost price. The article concludes with two different protection trajectories—a public protection trajectory and a private protection trajectory—which explain how car manufacturers leverage the various protection levers to deal with disruptive technology. The main implication of the two trajectories is that while the public protection trajectory stalled due to the systemic, socially embedded technological impediments of electric vehicles and fuel-cell vehicles, the private protection trajectory picked up the remains of the public protection trajectory and has gained momentum, continuing until today.

"Electricity decarbonisation pathways for 2050 in Portugal: A TIMES (The Integrated MARKAL-EFOM System) based approach in closed versus open systems modelling"

Energy, Volume 69, May 2014, Pages 104-112

Filipa Amorim, André Pina, Hana Gerbelová, Patrícia Pereira da Silva, Jorge Vasconcelos, Victor Martins

Abstract

The goal of this research is to analyse the cost-effective opportunities in continental Portugal to achieve full decarbonisation of the electricity generation sector by 2050. Since interconnection with neighbouring Spain may be one of the key drivers to achieve a cost-effective low carbon pathway, combined with new generating technologies, we evaluate its importance by modelling the Portuguese system either as an isolated or as part of an integrated Iberian system.

To design the low carbon roadmap for 2050 in Portugal, TIMES – The Integrated MARKAL-EFOM (MARKet ALlocation-Energy Flow Optimisation Model) System was used. It is an optimization partial equilibrium bottom-up model generator that finds the minimal cost solution for an energy system over a certain time period. Our approach accounts for the short term dynamics of supply and demand to enable a better match and optimize resources complementarities.

The results show that modelling Portugal as an isolated system can lead to underinvestment and underuse of the country's endowment of renewable energy sources in the longer term, which reduces the efficiency of investment. The modelling of Portugal as an interconnected energy system can therefore have a significant impact on the design of a sustainable electricity system and lead to improved investment efficiency with lower costs risk.

"Potential of CO2 (carbon dioxide) taxes as a policy measure towards low-carbon Portuguese electricity sector by 2050"

Energy, Volume 69, 1 May 2014, Pages 113-119

Hana Gerbelová, Filipa Amorim, André Pina, Mário Melo, Christos Ioakimidis, PauloFerrão

Abstract

The European Union proposed the introduction of taxes on emitted CO2 as an effective policy measure for the reduction of CO2 emissions in its electricity sector. Applying the TIMES (The Integrated MARKAL-EFOM System) modeling tool, this paper examines the cost effectiveness of different evolutions of CO2 taxes under the Emissions Trading System in Europe by 2050 in order to analyze the possible roles and limits of different mitigation technologies within the Portuguese electricity supply system. The results were analyzed based on the final year CO2 emissions of the electricity system when compared to 1990 levels. The results show that when CO2 prices stay below 50 €/tonne by 2050 there is no reduction in emitted CO2 emissions when compared to the levels of 1990. For CO2 prices reaching between 50 and 100 €/tonne there is a clear reduction in CO2 with the increase in the price, from 7% with 50 €/tonne to 79% with 100 €/tonne. For prices above 100 €/tonne the increased taxation has only a slight impact on the reduction of CO2 emissions, as even with a 300 €/tonne price the CO2 reductions achieved are only of 87%.

Conference Paper: "When Incumbents Change Their Mind: Framing Strategic Reorientation in Emerging Fields"

Academy of Management Annual Meeting Proceedings, Vol. 2019, No. 1

Christina Bidmon, René Bohnsack

Abstract

How actors evaluate the prospects of novel, sustainable technologies is unlikely to remain stable over time. In this paper, we employ a framing lens to study how the five largest German car manufacturers publicly reframed their strategic position on the emerging field around electric vehicles (EVs) in the 25-year period from 1993 to 2018. Based on 125 letters to shareholders and 336 public interviews with CEOs, we find that the car manufacturers maintained ambiguity about their own terms of engagement in this field by framing EVs both as an opportunity and a threat. We discuss temporal maneuvering as a distinct way of temporal framing that enables the maintenance of opposing frames over a sustained period of time. How actors such as incumbents communicate about the prospects of an emerging field and their own role in this field is important because it guides meaning-making and action by other actors. Insights into the question how incumbents handle the phase-out of old technologies and the phase-in of new technologies can support a better understanding of incumbent behavior in sustainability transitions.

Conference Paper: "Deriving vehicle-to-grid business models from consumer preferences"

Conference: Electric Vehicle Symposium, At: Seoul, South Korea, Volume: 27

René Bohnsack, Robert van den Hoed

Abstract

Combining electric cars with utility services seems to be a natural fit and holds the promise to tackle various mobility as well as electricity challenges at the same time. So far no viable business model for vehicle-to-grid technology has emerged, raising the question which characteristics a vehicle-to-grid business model should have. Drawing on an exploratory study amongst 189 Dutch consumers this study seeks to understand consumer preferences in vehicle-to-grid business models using conjoint analysis, factor analysis and cluster analysis. The results suggest that consumers prefer private ownership of an EV and a bidirectional charger instead of community ownership of bidirectional charger, they prefer utility companies instead of car companies as the aggregator and they require home and public charging. The most salient attributes in a V2G business model seem to be functional rather than financial or social. The customer segment with the highest willingness to adopt V2G prefers functional attributes. Based on the findings, the study proposes a business model that incorporates the derived preferences.

Conference Paper: "Assessment of legacy generation contracts' costs in the future Portuguese electricity system"

2012 9th International Conference on the European Energy Market

Filipa Amorim, Jorge Vasconcelos, Isabel Abreu, Patricia Silva, Victor Martins

Abstract

Although the Portuguese electricity system liberalization process started almost 20 years ago, 83% of electricity generated in 2010 still benefited from a State guaranteed price, independent of market behavior. This applies not only to producers using renewable energy sources and cogeneration under feed-in tariffs, but also to all conventional power plants that undersigned a power purchase agreement in the 1990s. Because no comprehensive public information about State guaranteed prices is available, research was first carried out to unveil generation legacy contracts' volumes and then costs and their impact on consumers. A producers' database was created by the authors which enables an accurate assessment of the volumes of electricity with and without State guaranteed prices. In a previous paper the authors have validated the data set and the volume computation methodology for the period 2000-2010 and provided an estimate of those volumes in the period 2011-2030. This paper estimates average prices per producer type and assesses generation legacy contract costs in the period 2011-2030. Moreover, the paper computes the impact of generation legacy costs upon end-user average electricity prices and generation costs for several scenarios of market prices and demand.