Designing Digital Platforms: A Synthetization of Relevant Design Topics for Business Models from a Literature Review

Abstract

Digital platforms (DPs) represent a challenging research object. In this context, scientific literature has produced a large number of publications studying DPs. Given the importance of designing DPs in both academia and practice, the purpose of this study is to synthesize the current research findings on DPs and provide a framework with possible design topics under consideration from a business model perspective. A systematic literature review (SLR) was conducted to identify and synthesize the relevant findings. We analyzed 22 publications published before May 2021. The analysis shows that, in terms of "Value Propositions", most design topics were identified. In contrast, only one design topic was identified for "Customer Relationships", "Customer Segments", and "Cost Structure". In sum, our results present a framework with design topics for DPs and support the alignment of further research. Practitioners receive an overview of design topics for DPs that encourage today`s digital transformation projects.