Decoding the Digital Platform Business Landscape: A Morphological Review

In this article, the authors examine pertinent literature on digital platforms and serve multiple objectives. First, they present the notion of Digital Platform Business (DPB), which synthesizes diverse perspectives of platform researchers across disciplines. They then define DPB to precisely identify and conceptually distinguish digitally incarnated platform businesses from other businesses discussed in the extensive literature. Furthermore, the authors construct a morphological framework of the literature pertaining to DPBs, capturing its scope and variety in terms of dimensions and options. The framework identified 10 dimensions with corresponding options that succinctly capture the main themes studied. By organizing studies based on structural and thematic elements, the authors identified gaps, unexplored intersections, and potential areas for innovation. For researchers, the framework aids in thoroughly comprehending the notion of DPB as examined in the literature and promotes future study. For practitioners, it provides them with a thorough guide on designing and scaling DPBs.