Johann Kranz

The Impact of Endogenous Motivations on Adoption of IT-Enabled Services The Case of Transformative Services in the Energy Sector

Transformative services represent a crucial topic in future service research. Particularly in the energy sector, consumer adoption of transformative—often IT-enabled—services is essential to increased environmental sustainability. As adopting these services increases both individual and collective well-being, research has to delve more deeply into the origins of consumers’ motivations. For this reason, this study aims at augmenting the understanding of how different types of motivation determine consumers’ intention to adopt transformative services. The proposed model integrates the theory of planned behavior and the self-determination theory and is tested with survey data gathered from 462 users and 537 nonusers of home energy management services. Results indicate that consumers’ motivations are major direct determinants of intentions to adopt. While this finding notably holds when consumers perceive the adoption as self-determined and internalize associated values such as environmentalism, motivations based on external rewards and feelings of compulsion matter to a lesser extent. A comparison of users and nonusers reveals important differences in motivation, in particular that extrinsic motivations tend to be more relevant for nonusers than for users.

Smart energy: where do we stand and where should we go?

Although public concern about environmental issues has been growing, the global efforts towards greater environmental sustainability have not been able to stabilize—let alone decrease—the level of GHGs in the atmosphere (IPCC 2013). Still worse, in 2013 the level of carbon dioxide (the main GHG produced by burning fossil fuels such as coal and oil) in the atmosphere surged at its fastest rate in 30 years (IPCC 2013). Annually, about 50 billion tons of additional carbon dioxide are emitted (The Economist 2014). There is a consensus among academics that, by 2100, in order to avoid “dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system” (UNFCCC 1992), the global mean temperature must not increase more than two degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. To stabilize carbon dioxide concentration at this level, emissions must be reduced by around 40 to 70 % (compared to 2010) by 2050 and close to zero by 2100 (IPCC 2014a). Currently, however, it appears extremely unlikely that the global community will succeed in effectively curbing GHG emissions fast enough to achieve the two degrees Celsius goal. Our economies are still heavily dependent on fossil fuels, and as long as increasing economic prosperity goes along with increasing levels of GHG emissions (von Weizsacker, Hargroves, Smith, Desha, and Stasinopoulos 2009, pp. 17), these emissions will almost certainly not decline as much as needed. To break this vicious cycle, we have to identify ways to increase carbon productivity (using energy more efficiently while sustaining economic growth), consume less energy (eco-effectivity and eco-sufficiency), and decrease our dependency on fossil fuels by using renewable energy sources (Hoffert et al. 2002; McKinsey Global Institute 2008; von Weizsacker et al. 2009). Correspondingly, Sarkis, Koo, and Watson (2013) emphasize the need to find a synergistic win–win relationship between economic growth and green growth. The largest proportion (49 %) of GHG emissions are caused by the energy supply sector (IPCC 2014b). Due to a higher energy demand and a larger share of coal in the global fuel mix, GHG emissions associated with the energy supply sector increased more rapidly between 2000 and 2010 than in the three previous decades (IPCC 2014a). Seventy percent of the energy supply sector’s GHG emissions are caused by electricity and heat generation, the largest polluter of which is in the electricity sector. Therefore, many countries have been striving to make their electricity systems more renewablesbased and “intelligent.” Intelligent (or smart) systems often involve the deployment of information and communication technologies (ICTs) to allow for electricity systems to be used as efficiently as possible. J. Kranz (*) Chair of Management Information Systems and Methods, University of Gottingen, Platz der Gottinger Sieben 5, 37073 Gottingen, Germany e-mail: jkranz@uni-goettingen.de

Internet business strategies

In business and beyond, the Internet has been a – if not the – most influential technological change within the last two decades. It has greatly affected traditional industries at the macro and micro levels. It has also created new markets such as online auctions, online gaming, search engines, social networks, online advertising, and digital marketplaces. In both new and old markets the Internet has changed traditional ways to gain competitive advantage. Many established companies are challenged with the question of how to use the Internet as a complement to or even full transformation of their offline business and capture appropriate value from their Internet activities. ‘Platformization’ is a new phenomenon especially widespread on the Internet. The Internet also enables hybrid competitive strategies beyond cost and differentiation strategies. In this chapter, we particularly focus on the question of how established firms and dot-coms can leverage Internet technologies and do business on the Internet to gain competitive advantage.

Challenges for Business Development in the Field of Smart Grids

Smart Grids—communication networks connecting electricity system components—are a promising solution to balance the fluctuating production of renewable energy sources with consumption in low voltage grids. In this respect, electricity storage and smart metering are important technologies. However, due to a lack of working business models, diffusion is low. We analyze the effect of positive externalities on this low diffusion using expert interviews. We identify related stakeholders and their potential costs and benefits from smart grid investments. Our findings provide numerous avenues for business development and strategy definition in the field of smart grids and show that smart meters and decentralized electricity storages are widely seen as beneficial to society. Private benefits are numerous but widely distributed among distinct players. Thus, we argue that investments desired by society are omitted due to positive externalities. In addition, we identify and discuss measures to foster diffusion of the two studied smart grid key components. In this analysis, we find that even experts from industries directly benefiting from direct interventions argue against subsidies as being not suitable for accelerating the implementation of smart grids. Instead, they prefer clearly defined and well-designed regulatory and legal frameworks, which are free of contradictions.

Toward Competitive and Innovative Energy Service Markets: How to Establish a Level Playing Field for New Entrants and Established Players?

By integrating a communications system with the traditional energy system, smart grids provide end-to-end connectivity. This enables all entities and components integrated in the energy supply system to exchange information bi-directionally. New transformative and sustainable services that will improve and optimize the use of electricity depend on the availability of a smart grid communication network. In an end-to-end smart grid, the current communications gap between consumers’ premises and the remaining energy network is bridged by an Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI). Given the current liberalized electricity markets’ structure, local incumbents will control the AMI and the meter data. This gives rise to concerns about anti-competitiveness. We argue that leveraging the AMI in a social welfare maximizing way requires non-discriminatory access to the (1) AMI and the (2) meter data through (3) interoperable standards. We discuss regulatory remedies to ensure a level playing field for innovative services in smart grids and consider implications for research and regulation.

The neverending story of the smart metering technology — What needs to be done for a happy end?

The Smart Metering Technology (SMT) forms an essential building block of smart grids. However, to date the diffusion of the SMT is low. We therefore analyze measures to foster their implementation as well as propose new regulatory requirements regarding advanced metering infrastructures (AMI). For this purpose we conducted expert interviews. The majority of interviewees consider SMT as beneficial to society. However, owing to the wide distribution of potential benefits from a large-scale SMT-rollout among various market players positive externalities occur. This situation leads to the omission of a socially desirable investment. We analyze and discuss diverse measures to overcome this gridlock. In particular, we identify three potential bottlenecks that need to be considered by regulatory agencies.