A simulation study: The business value of E-business for a maintenance provider

The exploitation of IT using the Internet platform to integrate inter-firm processes, often termed "ebusiness", has gained research attention due to its potential to enhance the competitive position of businesses. However, the business value of new ebusiness technologies has remained unexamined given the complexity of the processes through which value is created. In this study we investigate the value of an emerging e-business technology, founded on mobile cloud computing technology. We focus on evaluating the prospective impacts of a collaborative manufacturing network, currently developed by an EC research project, in an automation maintenance company. Three simulation models were constructed, one for the traditional coffective maintenance operation mode as well as two alternative maintenance scenarios enabled by the collaborative platform that allows dynamic allocation of technicians, based on fault status. The results show that by using the collaborative platform, efficiency and service quality can be improved along with reduced cost and improved sustainability. Moreover, communication infrastructure quality negatively affected system contribution. Results also show that the collaborative capabilities, allowing effective handling of different demand volumes, have also improved system flexibly along the demand dimension. Managerial implications of the results are discussed. Proceedings 28th European Conference on Modelling and Simulation