Federal Platform Ecosystems to Counter Monopolists: A Value-Based Vision for the Logistics Industry

Abstract

Today, we observe the platformization of many industries. Although most platforms fail, a few monopolists have the potential to completely transform industries and their competitive dynamics. In contrast to this, European values, e.g., democracy and freedom, aim to protect today’s variety of companies and offers. This paper’s goal is to protect European values and companies’ competitiveness against potential monopolists. We suggest founding and governing federal platform ecosystems following the “swarm intelligence” principle where many small(er) organizations collaboratively fight off monopolists. While this is currently still a new and untested concept, we selected a use case to make it more tangible and adaptable. The government-funded project aims at a vision for the Logistics Broker (LB) – which is envisioned to become the center-piece of the German logistics industry’s federal platform ecosystem. To analyze the context, role, and stakeholders we conducted a workshop study and propose an agenda for future research.