Users' knowledge as a specific asset: the case of the valued added services

Bertrand Quélin (1) , Eric Brousseau

1 HEC Paris - Recherche - Hors Laboratoire

This article examines the value-added services (VAS) market. The production of these services requires the cooperation of assets and competencies owned by different categories of firms. The first part of the paper points out the nature of the services and identifies a number of firms which are involved in the VAS production. The second part of the paper is based on a statistical analysis of an original sample. Three classes of services are discriminated: enhanced communication services, dedicated services, and information services. Then, we focus our attention on the dedicated services. A detailed analysis of this category enables us to identify three sub-groups of services: specialized communication services, community services and on line transaction services. Moreover the production of these dedicated services is driven by users. It is concluded that users have gained control over a wide segment of the VAS market because they own some specific competencies and knowledge

Keywords: Information technology; Telecommunication; Market penetration; Service; Type; Inquiry; Methodology; Analysis; Statistical method; Firm; Firm strategy; Added value; Marketing approach; Management science

Domains: Humanities and Social Sciences; Business administration; Strategy and business policy

Bertrand Quélin, Eric Brousseau. Users' knowledge as a specific asset: the case of the valued added services. Journal of Information Technology, 1992, Vol. 7, n° 4, pp. 233-243. ⟨10.1057/jit.1992.30⟩. ⟨hal-00460015⟩