Exploring Service Dominant Logic and Business Model for IT Firms to Transition to the Cloud Era: A Focus Group Study

Increasingly, IT firms are turning to cloud services as a new way of creating and capturing value. The challenge faced by current IT firms is not limited to development of new cloud service. It is simultaneously about the deployment and usage of existing resources and capability to develop new value offerings for forms of value creation. This chapter argues that due to the paucity of research on the emergent potential dominant logic in the cloud era for IT firms, our understanding of the critical resource allocation decision process through which cloud-related product development is limited. The cloud dominant logic provides a novel and valuable theoretical perspective that necessitates a rethinking and re-evaluation of the conventional business practices in the IT industry. This study was carried out within the framework of a Smart System Services Project (SSSP), where this study aims to explore the future opportunities and the mechanisms of cultivation of talent for the Taiwanese IT industry in cloud era. The SSSP incorporates four levels including (1) strategic planning, (2) process redesign, (3) technical architecture assessment, and (4) agile system deployment, and aims to focus on the development of the optimal service model-driven system architecture to increase the service value for the Taiwanese IT industry. The findings from the analysis suggested that six cloud dominant logic categories are needed for IT firm business transformation in cloud era positing that they can help scholars and managers analyze, design, and implement breakthrough advances in resource use and allocation decisions.