CALL FOR CONTRIBUTIONS

Conference on “New Business Models: Exploring a changing view on organizing value creation for sustainable development”

Venue: Toulouse Business School (TBS), Toulouse (France) | Date: June 16 and 17, 2016

Conference announcement incl. full CfP and guide for submissions

 Full CfP as PDF

Important Dates

• 28 MARCH 2016 – Deadline submission of abstracts via email : j.jonker@tbs-education.fr
• 18 APRIL 2016 – Notification to authors
• 16 MAY 2016 – Deadline submission conference paper
• 6 JUNE 2016 – Deadline registration to the conference
• 16 & 17 JUNE 2016 – Conference
• 4 SEPTEMBER 2016 – Submission of full paper for peer-review

Introduction to the Conference Theme

The “tissue” of our Western society is created by a myriad of transactions realizing common and individual functions for almost all aspects of professional and private lives such as the provision of the workforce and goods or services. These transactions are realized in a variety of ways of organizing and enabling the delivery of outcomes that are perceived as valuable (and which are not only ‘profitable’ in an economic context). Delivering complex outcomes (including products and services) such as creating new business propositions while improving living conditions is, therefore, the fundament for value creation. Business models (BMs) are, in particular, constructs with conceptual and practical dimensions providing a logic and pathway for organizing including delivering value creation. In the contemporary debate regarding BMs, several issues focused on the nature of value creation are being discussed. Issues that address moving from creating single to multiple forms of values simultaneously, e.g. creating financial, ecological, and social value. What also becomes important is an (inter)organizational and constituents’ discussion on the changing nature of how value is being created – as a single-organization or as a community effort. These types of changes stimulate the shaping of new roles, such as the prosumer, and the renewed role of the commons. What is evidently then also discussed is the balance between tangible and intangible forms of value.

Considering these debates, a generation of business models is emerging that can be referred to as ‘new’ business models (NBMs). NBMs provide a logic for value creation that is based on an array of principles encompassing cooperation, dematerialization, sharing, or perceiving services as a product. Developing an NBM – or transforming an existing BM into the scheme of an NBM – is leading to outcomes based on guiding principles of which the most prominent are multiple, collective, and shared value creation. It is not purely company or individual-based but more community or inter-party-based. It also facilitates working with hybrid forms of value – in addition to money, transaction means can also include credits, energy, or time. We assume that this logic of new business models provides a cornerstone of realizing sustainable development in and through the methods that we organize value creation in society. Around the globe, researchers discuss those NBMs often in the context of green or sustainable business models.

NBMs demonstrate a considerably relevant field of investigation where the emergence of a new type of complementary economy can be observed. This is an economy based on ideas about organizing closed (circular) loops based on commodities and materials, about a way of organizing that preserves eco-system services, and about enabling participation in a social-economic life based on a more comprehensive range of transaction-means that stimulate social participation (inclusivity). Broad labels such as the ‘blue’, ‘sharing’, and ‘collaborative’ economy provide a global sense of direction for this development. Organizing towards such an economy can subsequently lead to an increasing variety of more or less fundamental changes – including transformations and transitions. In turn, this fosters sustainable development given the fact that it emerges in a societal ‘landscape’ already filled with organizations acting upon conventional BMs.

Overarching Questions

This international two-day conference regarding New Business models is being organized for the first time after two preparatory workshops that took place in 2014 and 2015 at the Toulouse Business School. Considering the emerging, yet complex, nature of NBMs, an extensive range of generic questions can be raised. Here, we only stipulate three.

(1) What are the theoretical foundations of BMs and particularly of NBMs? If the logic for value creation is the essence of a BM and of an NBM, what theoretical foundations do they have in common, and what are the differences if the two are compared? Despite the fact that value creation appears to be the ‘holy grail’ of any business activity, what do we genuinely know about the fundaments of value creation, and what role do value(s) play in the logic and process of value creation?

(2) If the nature of how value creation is being organized changes, this implies looking for new methods of organizing. As a consequence, conventional ways of organizing must be critically assessed with the intention to discover and/or design ways that are more appropriate in order to realize different forms of value. What are alternative organizational approaches to create value, and how can multiple forms of value be created conjunctively?

(3) This new economy is emerging amidst a society of already existing organizations. A number of these organizations will become obsolete, others will attempt to transform themselves from within, but some might even attempt to oppose this new economy.

More detailed guiding questions can be found in the complete call for papers.

Sessions

• Session 1: Entrepreneurial and intra-preneurial business models for sustainable development
• Session 2: Making the financial paradox work
• Session 3: Business models for a circular economy
• Session 4: Business Models for Regional Development
• Session 5: Business Models for a Functional Economy
• Session 6: Innovation roles in fostering a next generation business models
• Session 7: Theme still to be decided – suggestions welcome
• Session 8: New Cases of Sustainability-oriented Business Model Innovation
• Session 9: Financial, Ecological, and Social Value; The Changing Role of Stakeholders in Organizations
• Session 10: Ethical aspects of community-based business models
• Session 11: Where do New Business Models come from? The role of public policies, institutions, and individual actors
• Session 12:Innovation Roles in Fostering Next Generation Business Models

Conference announcement incl. full CfP and guide for submissions

Full CfP as PDF