Designing a Primary Personal Information Market as an Industry Platform: a Service Innovation Approach

Abstract

It is well recognised that personal data have \ intrinsic value to B2C companies. However, there \ are no widely adopted means by which individuals \ can benefit financially from the personal data they \ generate. Furthermore, there is a substantial lack of \ empirical research on markets for online personal \ data. Nevertheless, prior work has shown that a \ Primary Personal Information Market (PPIM) is a \ viable solution to the problem of monetising \ personal data. This paper explores how a PPIM \ could be conceptualised and designed as an \ Industry Platform. Using an integrated Service \ Innovation Method (iSIM) we incorporate into our \ design a multi-sided personal information business \ model to facilitate commercialisation. An initial \ prototype is developed and its utility from a data \ product consumer’s perspective is evaluated using \ semi-structured interviews with industry \ practitioners. We find that a PPIM conceptualised \ as an industry platform has significant commercial \ appeal and that it resolves a number of objections \ raised in response to previous designs.