Smart product-service systems design process for socially conscious digitalization

While digitalization has become a key driver for promoting value creation for customers and stakeholders, much attention is being paid to smart product-service systems (PSS) to meet their diversified needs. When designing smart PSS, there is a strong need to consider growing concerns about the social and ethical impacts of digital technologies. Numerous ethical guidelines for digital technologies, such as artificial intelligence, have been developed. However, a more practical methodology for designing smart PSS by taking into account both positive and negative impacts (including social and ethical impacts) of using digital technologies is anticipated. This paper aims to address this issue by integrating value sensitive design into the smart PSS design process. This design process combines participatory and systematic design approaches and integrates methods to extract values and develop the specifications of complex smart PSS in an iterative manner. To demonstrate its efficacy, this paper presents a case study of a monitoring service for seniors using a communication robot. The results demonstrate that the proposed design process can support design consideration for social and ethical values and lead designers and design participants to clarify design requirements and generate a socially conscious design solution.

Automated summary

Digitalization has become a crucial driver for creating value for customers and stakeholders, and it is important to consider the social and ethical impacts of digital technologies when designing smart product-service systems (PSS). This paper proposes integrating value sensitive design into the PSS design process to address this issue. The design process combines participatory and systematic approaches and enables the consideration of social and ethical values in an iterative manner.