New business model proposal in the digital age: sustainability-focused servitization

Purpose With the pressure of global markets and demanding customers, most production companies are moving from pure production to the integration of products and services. This new formation is known as servitization and can give companies a strong competitive advantage. The recent studies in the literature propose that servitization has a positive impact on sustainability by improved energy consumption. However, they also underscored the need for better implementation of sustainability and the barriers avoiding sustainable servitization behavior. This research aims to investigate sustainability-oriented servitization barriers, which have not taken any attention by previous research, and their relationships for successful implementations. Design/methodology/approach We extracted fifteen servitization barriers from the literature and a focus group study. Then we presented their relationship with sustainable dimensions such as human, business, economic and market, and environment. Using the selected experts’ assessments, we implemented Fuzzy-TISM to analyze the causal relationship among the barriers. We also implemented Fuzzy-MICMAC analysis to categorize the barriers. Findings The findings presented that lack of understanding of customer, cultural problems, high market risk, financial constraints, lack of environmental awareness, and lack of environmental regulations are independent variables and play a very critical role in the success of sustainable-servitization implementations. Finally, we proposed several managerial insights and a structured hierarchical model that can be used as a guide by practitioners to develop a better strategy for their implementations. Originality/value To the best of our knowledge, a detailed examination of the barriers and challenges in the triple bottom line approach is already missing at the desired level. From this point of view, this study is the first research that determines barriers of servitization based on the triple-bottom-line model with a sustainability perspective.