Innovation Tactics

Develop innovation ideas you can be proud of

Platform business model: the most revolutionary innovation idea right now

The platform business model must be considered the most important and revolutionary business model of the last decade or two. Google, Facebook, Alibaba, Uber, Airbnb, Paypal and many other of the most successful startups are built on this business model.

The great misconception is that this is only an opportunity for high-flying IT companies. In reality anyone can come up with these ideas. Why should not an incumbent from the hospitality industry come up with the idea of TripAdvisor or Airbnb? Gain the knowledge you need to understand how this business model works and develop your own ideas.

Here are links to our most popular articles.

(1) real-life examples covered in-depth:

Understanding Uber

Fully Understand Airbnb

Business models compared: TripAdvisor, Booking.com, Expedia

(2) the fundamentals first:

Complete Guide to the Revolutionary Platform Business Model

(3) or just drop your email address to the sidebar and get a full pack of valuable resources on this business model:


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Amazon business model [part 3]: the Kindle system and its 10 business models

The Kindle is generally described as an Amazon gadget that mainly generates revenues through its own sales and the sales of ebooks. But what if I told you that there are at least 10 business models enabled by the Kindle system. How many would you be able to list?

The Kindle is a much bigger endeavour than just a product. It is not only disrupting brick-and-mortar bookstores but also the publishing industry. And there is yet more. Amazon Kindle, Fire TV, Tablet, Echo and Alexa are gateways to something much more complex behind the screen. And they have a number of characteristics in common:

Sharing Platform Business Model Value Chain [Updated]

Airbnb and Uber are the two most prominent examples of how to apply the platform business model to the sharing economy. But there are countless other sharing economy platform businesses as you have seen last time in the explanation of types and examples.

The sharing economy is one of the most significant socio-economic trends of the last decade. For innovators, it is still early days with countless ideas and opportunities to be discovered.

But how do we innovate within a large trend? One of the most important aspects is to understand which business models are suitable to bring the strength of the trend to light.

And that’s exactly what we are going to look at today: I am explaining the sharing platform business model using the value chain strategy tool!

The single biggest risks to Airbnb, Uber and your sharing platform idea

The biggest risks to Uber, Airbnb and sharing economy platform business models doesn’t come from technical or commercial dimensions but from their social impacts, yet these are being largely ignored.

The large for-profit sharing economy platforms, such as Uber and Airbnb, come with social risks and opportunities and I will give a balanced overview over both. The critics see them as leading to a “dystopia, with increasingly powerful platforms facing disempowered workers” [“that deliver a latte in a rainstorm to the more fortunate ones”]. Optimistic observers spot utopian possibilities of a crowd- and trust-based economic system and the emergence of a “networked society of micro‐entrepreneurs”

With a number of recent blows to both Uber and Airbnb in the US social and regulatory risks become crucial … understand what’s going on and how it may affect your ideas!

Can Uber, Airbnb and sharing platforms self-regulate?

The sharing economy is a fast-growing innovation opportunity. PricewaterhouseCoopers projects a 20-fold increase between 2016 and 2025 – reaching €570 billion ($674 billion). Its best know representatives are Uber and Airbnb. But there are many other wonderful examples and types of sharing economy platform business models.

It is common understanding that the role of the innovator is to introduce new methods, ideas, products/services or business models. But does it end there?

The answer is a resounding “no”. After having built one of the highest valued start-ups (by market capitalisation), Uber CEO and co-founder Travis Kalanick had to step down as top executive. The reason were not a lack of growth or bad financial results. It was due to the poor management of negative impacts of the platform. At the same time, Airbnb is awaiting dozens of regulatory decisions all over the world that can wipe off a considerable amount of their housing stock in the affected cities.

Innovators have to understand and manage the implications of their ideas to participants and non-participants before a negative public opinion forms which would  put pressure on regulators to introduce heavy-handed, innovation-stifling measures in place.

Today we will look how innovators can help manage the foot print of their companies, the public discourse and regulations in a positive way using innovative ideas.

The death of the (original) Sharing Economy and the birth of the amazing Sharing Economy v2.0

Sharing, gift cultures and reciprocity are as old as human civilisations and possibly as old as human species – even without a smartphone! But since we have the latter, things have started changing dramatically. We have not become much more generous all of a sudden. But the number of opportunities to share has dramatically increased – thanks to the work of clever innovators.

The sharing economy is an important trend following the invention of the world wide web.

Like web 1.0, the early sharing economy ideas have not unleashed the full potential of the idea. As was web 2.0, the sharing economy (call it 2.0) is an exciting rebirth of this socio-economic trend that plays an increasing role in people’s life and present so many innovation ideas.

Join me for a journey through the exiting examples of the sharing economy 2.0.

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