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Introduction
Information and Communications Technology (ICT) is revolutionizing the development of products and services. From assembly lines to multi-stakeholder complex systems that combine hardware, sensors, data storage, microprocessors, software, connectivity and offer a new wave of smart technologies that reengineer best practice and propel service providers to optimize their performance dynamically (Guttentag and Smith, 2017). Smart, connected products accelerated by processing power and ubiquitous network connectivity restructure markets, disrupt value chains and reengineer business processes and economies (Porter and Heppelmann, 2014). This has implications in life, work and travel as it introduces dynamic formations for every aspect. This revolution is taking different forms and shapes. Increasingly economies are formed as distributed networks of owners/suppliers/intermediaries/stakeholders who interact dynamically with customers/demand over distributed platforms. In the pre-sharing economy era, when transport was offered only by authorized professionals, there was little choice other than owning your vehicle or to pay professionals and organizations to transport passengers (trains, authorized busses or taxis). In the sharing economy era, personally owned Uber cars or dockless scooters, such as Lime and Bird in the USA, have eliminated the stranglehold of transportation companies and introduce flexibly adapted shared resources, disrupting market structures and dynamics. All these require reconfiguration to become and remain competitive in smart networked environments at the micro level reflecting structural influences of changes in marketplace practices at the macro level.
Service management inevitably has been influenced by recent technological revolutions and smartness. The availability and accessibility of services grew exponentially as customers from around the world could instantly plug and play from the emerging platforms harnessed by service providers. More importantly, the sharing economy means that customers are in a position to offer services on emerging platforms and network with others who can easily identify and use them (Guttentag and Smith, 2017). Deliveroo or Uber Eats are examples of organizations that grew rapidly to facilitate service providers to meet service requirements. A range of new business models emerged to enable the market to expand and operate. The proliferation of internet connectivity, big data and the Internet of Everything reengineer economies at both micro and macro levels, revolutionizing production and consumption.
Tourism and hospitality firms by definition offer services to consumers in hostile environments, away from the safety and familiarity of...