Three Essays on Growth and Innovation of Digital Platforms

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Abstract

Digital platforms are complex digital technology arrangements that enable the interaction of otherwise unaffiliated organisations. This interaction often generates novel outputs and as a result digital platforms are seen as a powerful driver of digital innovation. Yet exactly how digital platforms generate innovations by facilitating interaction merits further investigation. This dissertation illustrates aspects of how platforms grow and innovate using the case of the open-geo data platform OpenStreetMap. The study draws from both quantitative as well as qualitative analysis techniques applied to highly detailed data capturing the use, design, and operation of the platform over more than ten years. A series of computationally-intensive, mixedmethods studies were conducted to utilise the full scale of available empirical material while maintaining contextual richness relevant to the case. Embedded in recent topics on digital platforms, three empirical studies are presented. Each study focuses on one aspect of growth and innovation on digital platforms. The studies specifically examine; (i) how platform operators can stimulate generativity, that is the generation of novel outputs without direct input by the operator, (ii), how the unique attributes of digital technologies enable the creation of complex ecosystems that allow for highpaced changes in a platform’s architecture even if that increases the structural complexity of a platform, and, (iii) how participants coordinate contributions to a platform’s operation when they cannot rely on stable interfaces. Collectively these studies contribute to the understanding of how platforms generate new digital innovations.

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