Exploring the Factors Influencing Business Model Innovation Using Grounded Theory: The Case of a Chinese High-End Equipment Manufacturer
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The paper examines factors influencing BMI through a case study in a Chinese’s high-end equipment manufacturer, more precisely using grounded theory. The paper is well written in a good flow and it is interesting for the readers.
However, there are some issues that need to be addressed, before the paper is considered for publication. Please consider recommendations below for further improvement of the paper.
1. In the introduction chapter the authors claim that although a number of factors have been explored and suggested to have an influence on BMI, few studies examine the internal and external antecedents of BMI …
In the literature, there have already been studies that provided differentiation of antecedents for BMI and distinguish between internal and external drivers. Please see also the following two papers:
Hartmann, M.; Oriani, R.; Bateman, H. The Performance Effect of Business Model Innovation: An Empirical Analysis of Pension Funds. In Proceedings of the 35th DRUID Celebration Conference 2013, Barcelona, Spain, 17–19 June 2013.
Andreini, D.; Bettinelli, C. Business model innovation: From systematic literature review to future research directions. J. Manag. Gov. 2017, 21, 785–792.
In the introduction section authors would need to strengthen the identified research gap (provide it more clearly) and reason why, they address it. What is new and differs from existing research? There have been also empirical studies in this field (e.g. you cite Pucihar et. Al, 2019 - please check the citation, it is wrong in this current version) and thus it is needed to provide stronger argumentation on what is expected contribution to theory and practice from single case study, using grounded theory.
2. In the literature review there could be added some more of prior research on drivers for BMI as for example:
https://pure.tudelft.nl/portal/files/47318071/Business_Model_Innovation_and_Firm_Performance.pdf
http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.1022.9104&rep=rep1&type=pdf
https://pure.tudelft.nl/portal/files/47318123/Business_Model_Innovation_in_European_SMEs.pdf
3. Research design
Research method could be described in more details and also argued why this particular method has been used. As already mentioned, previous factors (antecedents, drivers) have been already identified. Please argue and make stronger points why you’ve chosen particular method.
More information should be provided about the selected enterprise. For example, what is the number of employees, operational markets, more about industry - services they provide.
Please provide questionnaire as an appendix. Who were interviewees, what are their positions in enterprise?
4. Factors influencing BMI
Please avoid sentences “due to space limitation ….”.
Please further explain figure 2. What is the difference between factors written in rectangle and ellipse? It is not clear from current description.
Please shortly clarify somewhere in the paper what are the strategies “Made in China 2025"and "One Belt and One Road" and how the Czech Republic is related to government policy. This will provide deeper understanding on government policy impact on BMI.
5. Discussion and Conclusion
In this chapter I miss discussion of results from your research in comparison with previous research. What is new in which context? Please provide detailed elaboration. Are there new factors? Are factors the same as identified in previous research?
This is rather strong argumentation as there have been previous studies in the field.
“This study is among the first to develop a more holistic understanding of the multiple factors influencing business model innovation.«
I recommend to separate discussion and conclusion chapter.
Author Response
Dear editor
We thank the two reviewers for their constructive feedback that have helped us to improve the paper. Our revisions in the manuscript and responses to each review’s comments are detailed below.
Point 1: In the introduction chapter the authors claim that although a number of factors have been explored and suggested to have an influence on BMI, few studies examine the internal and external antecedents of BMI …
In the literature, there have already been studies that provided differentiation of antecedents for BMI and distinguish between internal and external drivers. Please see also the following two papers:
Hartmann, M.; Oriani, R.; Bateman, H. The Performance Effect of Business Model Innovation: An Empirical Analysis of Pension Funds. In Proceedings of the 35th DRUID Celebration Conference 2013, Barcelona, Spain, 17–19 June 2013.
Andreini, D.; Bettinelli, C. Business model innovation: From systematic literature review to future research directions. J. Manag. Gov. 2017, 21, 785–792.
In the introduction section authors would need to strengthen the identified research gap (provide it more clearly) and reason why, they address it. What is new and differs from existing research? There have been also empirical studies in this field (e.g. you cite Pucihar et. Al, 2019 - please check the citation, it is wrong in this current version) and thus it is needed to provide stronger argumentation on what is expected contribution to theory and practice from single case study, using grounded theory.
Response 1: we have revised the introduction section as suggested. We have added additional studies as suggested to indicate that existing studies have provided differentiation of antecedents for business model innovation and distinguish between internal and external drivers. Additionally, we have strengthened the identified research gap by highlighting that research on the internal and external antecedents of business model innovation has not yet been sufficiently investigated, in a more holistically way, and in a Chinese context. Thus, a stronger argumentation on the expected contribution is provided as follow:
First, based on a deeper understanding of a single case, this study adds to the existing knowledge base by developing a more holistic understanding of the complex nature of how business model innovation is affected by multiple internal and external factors in a Chinese context. Second, this study provides additional empirical evidence in support of the findings of existing research on business model innovation by extending their generalizability to the Chinese high-end equipment manufacturing context. Third, the present study’s findings could help Chinese manufacturers to better understand and manage their business model innovation thereby improving their competitiveness and performance.
As suggested, we have revised the wrong citation. The right reference is: Pucihar, A; Lenart, G; Borstnar, MK; Vidmar, D; Marolt, M. Drivers and outcomes of business model innovation—micro, small and medium-sized enterprises perspective. Sustainability. 2019, 11, 344-360.
Point 2: In the literature review there could be added some more of prior research on drivers for BMI as for example:
https://pure.tudelft.nl/portal/files/47318071/Business_Model_Innovation_and_Firm_Performance.pdf
http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.1022.9104&rep=rep1&type=pdf
https://pure.tudelft.nl/portal/files/47318123/Business_Model_Innovation_in_European_SMEs.pdf
Response 2: As suggested, we have added more prior studies on the factors affecting business model innovation.
Point 3: Research design.
Research method could be described in more details and also argued why this particular method has been used. As already mentioned, previous factors (antecedents, drivers) have been already identified. Please argue and make stronger points why you’ve chosen particular method.
More information should be provided about the selected enterprise. For example, what is the number of employees, operational markets, more about industry - services they provide.
Please provide questionnaire as an appendix. Who were interviewees, what are their positions in enterprise?
Response 3:
As suggested, we have made stronger points why we have chosen grounded theory to conduct this research based on some given reasons in the manuscript, as follow:
The analysis of grounded theory is mainly carried out through three types of coding, namely open coding, axial coding and selective coding. Coding is to decompose and label the observation records and transcribed interview materials word by word, sentence by sentence, and paragraph by paragraph. It gives a conceptual definition to individual events or phenomena, and gradually conceptualizes and categorizes, so as to develop the relationship between categories and categories until theoretical saturation is reached, and finally the theory is constructed.
Grounded theory has been commonly used in qualitative research. There are four main reasons for choosing grounded theory in this study: (1) There are many factors influencing the business model innovation of high-end equipment manufacturing enterprises, which is difficult to study through traditional hypothesis testing; (2) Grounded theory can be used to extract and summarize the empirical data in real life from the bottom up, and then construct and perfect the theory; (3) the influencing factors of business model innovation are yet to be sufficiently examined; and (4) business model innovation is complex, involving multiple interrelated factors. Therefore, grounded theory is suitable for the present study to systematically collect and analyze empirical data to generate conceptual categories, that is, the factors that influence business model innovation in the context of high-end equipment manufacturing in China.
We also supplements company-related information. As follow:
Shaanxi Blowers was founded in 1968 and put into production in 1975. In 1996, it was reorganized from Shaanxi Blower Factory to Shaanxi Blower (Group) Co., Ltd., and currently has 2761 employees.
Through internationalization development practice and integration of global resources, Shaanxi Blowers has comprehensively developed its core businesses and competitiveness in the areas of, for example, equipment, Engineering Procurement Construction, service, operation and finance and distributed energy.
The respondents of this study are Chairman, Deputy General Manager, Assistant General Manager, Minister of Culture and some other middle and high-level managers of Shaanxi Blowers. Research questions have been added as an appendix.
Point 4: Factors influencing BMI
Please avoid sentences “due to space limitation ….”.
Please further explain figure 2. What is the difference between factors written in rectangle and ellipse? It is not clear from current description.
Please shortly clarify somewhere in the paper what are the strategies “Made in China 2025" and "One Belt and One Road" and how the Czech Republic is related to government policy. This will provide deeper understanding on government policy impact on BMI.
Response 4:
We have revised the sentence “due to space limitation ….”.
Factors written in ellipse are the main category, factors written in rectangle are the initial category, and factors written in ellipse include corresponding factors written in rectangle. Classified display has been carried out in Table 2. For example, Organizational Capabilities includes Dynamic capability and Innovation capability. We have revised the corresponding part in the manuscript.
As suggested, we add three notes followed table 1 to clarify “Made in China 2025" and "One Belt and One Road" and how the Czech Republic is related to government policy.
Notes:
① "Made in China 2025" is a strategic plan of China issued by Chinese Premier Li Keqiang and his cabinet in May 2015. China is moving away from being the World's factory floor (cheap goods and low quality) to move to higher value products and services. In essence a blueprint to upgrade the manufacturing capabilities of Chinese industries.
②The Belt and Road Initiative, also known as the One Belt One Road (OBOR), is a development strategy adopted by the Chinese government involving infrastructure development and investments in countries in Europe, Asia and Africa.
③The Czech Republic is one country along the “The Belt and Road Initiative” countries, and Shaanxi Blowers bought the company of EKOL，a leading medium steam turbine manufacturer based in Czech, which benefitted from China’s “The Belt and Road Initiative” corresponding policy.
Point 5: Discussion and Conclusion
In this chapter I miss discussion of results from your research in comparison with previous research. What is new in which context? Please provide detailed elaboration. Are there new factors? Are factors the same as identified in previous research?
This is rather strong argumentation as there have been previous studies in the field.
“This study is among the first to develop a more holistic understanding of the multiple factors influencing business model innovation.
I recommend to separate discussion and conclusion chapter.
Response 5: As suggested, we have discussed the newness of the factors identified in this study in relation to that of prior studies in Section 5.4. We have removed the strong argumentation: “This study is among the first to develop a more holistic understanding of the multiple factors influencing business model innovation.”
A separate conclusion is now provided.
Reviewer 2 Report
A brief summary
The aim of the paper is to add knowledge to the body-of-knowledge of business model innovation. More specific, the paper comes up to a research gap formulated by Foss and Saebi (2017) which is the study of antecedents of business model innovation. To ‘fill’ this research gap, the authors fomulated a research question ‘what are the key factors that influence business model innovation in the context of high-end equipment manufacturing in China?’. By using as a research method grounded theory and different research techniques for data acquisition, like ‘the enterprise files, relevant documents, field observations, interview records, observation of participation, material evidence, etc.’, research was conducted on one case study. In the end, seven factors that can probably influence business model innovation in the context of high-end equipment manufacturing in China are presented.
Broad comments
Originality/Novelty: Is the question original and well defined? Do the results provide an advance in current knowledge?
The research question is original and well defined: ‘what are the key factors that influence business model innovation in the context of high-end equipment manufacturing in China?’ It is a ‘what’ question, and according to the rest of the question, qualitative research is suitable. As it is an explorative study, the results can provide an advance in current knowledge. The Achilles heel of the research is the fact that the researchers only used one case study. Though they point to this in the ‘limitations and future research’ sector, they derive too strong conclusions based on their research earlier in the paper, as ‘The present study’s findings could also help manufacturers to better understand and manage their business model innovation thereby to improve their competitiveness and performance’. This is an example of ‘overreaching’. They must give more arguments why they choose for a single holistic case study (at least I suppose it is a single holistic case study, as I have to derive this from the text) and what effect this has on the conclusions and generalisation of the results.
Significance: Are the results interpreted appropriately? Are they significant? Are all conclusions justified and supported by the results? Are hypotheses and speculations carefully identified as such?
This is part of the other reviewed topics.
Quality of Presentation: Is the article written in an appropriate way? Are the data and analyses presented appropriately? Are the highest standards for presentation of the results used?
The article is written in an appropriate way. What I miss are appendices. For example in line 207: ‘We designed an interview outline including 11 open questions, and then conducted semi-structured interviews with selected personnel. Please add an appendix with the 11 open questions, which are now partly mentioned in the text. Another example: the authors are talking in line 203 about ‘field observations’ and in line 204 about ‘observation of participation’. What aspects did they observe, and how was this conducted? If the authors used an observation protocol, please add this in an appendix.
Scientific Soundness: is the study correctly designed and technically sound? Are the analyses performed with the highest technical standards? Are the data robust enough to draw the conclusions? Are the methods, tools, software, and reagents described with sufficient details to allow another researcher to reproduce the results?
The Scientific soundness is mediocre. The study is sufficiently designed and technically sound. The research method has been elaborated sufficiently, and concerning the data acquisition it becomes clear what techniques the authors have been using. But as pointed before, I miss the appendices concerning the research questionnaire and the observation protocols (what has been observed, and why?). Concerning the coding, I think the authors did a sufficient job.
I also miss the argumentation why the outcomes of a single (holistic?) case study can be generalised (or not).
In section 4.3. the authors talk about external factors and internal factors that promote business model innovation. But they also present ‘guarantee factors’, which are ‘culture and strategy, human resources and organizational capability’ in the text. Unclear is what the authors mean with ‘guarantee factors’, i.e. what do they actually ‘guarantee’?
Interest to the Readers: Are the conclusions interesting for the readership of the Journal? Will the paper attract a wide readership, or be of interest only to a limited number of people? (please see the Aims and Scope of the journal)
No, this article is not suited to be published in ‘Sustainability’. I can not find any argumentation or even reference n the article concerning ‘sustainability’. So, what is the link between this topic and sustainability?
Overall Merit: Is there an overall benefit to publishing this work? Does the work provide an advance towards the current knowledge? Do the authors have addressed an important long-standing question with smart experiments?
Yes, I think there is an overall benefit to publish the work, as it comes up to a research gap formulated by Foss and Saebi (2017) ‘they identified a number of research gaps in the business model innovation research, and one of them is the study of antecedents of business model innovation’(line 135). The study has also been conducted in a Chinese firm.
English Level: Is the English language appropriate and understandable?
I would recommend proofreading by a native speaker.
Specific comments
Line 22: What are 'guarantee factors'? What do they 'guarantee'?
Line 41: ‘Early stages’ of what?
Line 44: Why these four dots?
Line 47: Year of publication (Drucker)?
Line 116: What is meant with ‘Magrett a[28] pointed’?
Lines 123 and 124: ‘Despite being regarded as a crucial organizational competence, there is no commonly accepted definition of what business model innovation is.’ Okay, that is true, but what definition do the authors embrace in this article?
Line 183:’Figure 1. The flow chart of the grounded theory’ Source of this figure?
Line 298. So you interviewed 18 interviewees, and used in the first place 15 of these interviews? If not, please explain where these 'remaining three interviews' come from.
Line 373: Again, why these dots?
Author Response
Dear editor
We thank the two reviewers for their constructive feedback that have helped us to improve the paper. Our revisions in the manuscript and responses to each review’s comments are detailed below.
Point 1: The research question is original and well defined: ‘what are the key factors that influence business model innovation in the context of high-end equipment manufacturing in China?’ It is a ‘what’ question, and according to the rest of the question, qualitative research is suitable. As it is an explorative study, the results can provide an advance in current knowledge. The Achilles heel of the research is the fact that the researchers only used one case study. Though they point to this in the ‘limitations and future research’ sector, they derive too strong conclusions based on their research earlier in the paper, as ‘The present study’s findings could also help manufacturers to better understand and manage their business model innovation thereby to improve their competitiveness and performance’. This is an example of ‘overreaching’. They must give more arguments why they choose for a single holistic case study (at least I suppose it is a single holistic case study, as I have to derive this from the text) and what effect this has on the conclusions and generalisation of the results.
Response 1: As suggested, we have now revised the overreaching conclusion to: “which indicates a possibility for Chinese high-end equipment manufacturers improving their competitiveness and performance through better managing their business model innovation”.
We have also further explained the reason why a single holistic case study is chosen in Section 3.2. Based on Yin (2009), this study has used a single case to be the representative of many other Chinese high-end equipment manufacturers. This is a single holistic case in the sense that the global nature of business model innovation will be investigated.
With respect to why the outcomes of a single case study can be generalized, as suggested by Yin (2014) and Simon (2015), this study was not intended to generalize to a larger universe; rather, the study’s findings are generalizable in the sense that the context and particularity of the case described in this study would allow other Chinese high-end equipment manufacturers to generalize the findings to their own similar contexts.
Yin, R. K. (2009). Case study research: Design and methods (4th Ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Simons, H. (2015). Interpret in context: Generalizing from the single case in evaluation. Evaluation, 21(2), 173-188.
Point 2: The article is written in an appropriate way. What I miss are appendices. For example in line 207: ‘We designed an interview outline including 11 open questions, and then conducted semi-structured interviews with selected personnel. Please add an appendix with the 11 open questions, which are now partly mentioned in the text. Another example: the authors are talking in line 203 about ‘field observations’ and in line 204 about ‘observation of participation’. What aspects did they observe, and how was this conducted? If the authors used an observation protocol, please add this in an appendix.
Response 2: As suggested, We have add an appendix with the 11 open questions.
For the data collection, we revised the description of the first sentence in section 3.3, enterprise files, relevant documents, field observations, interview records, observation of participation, material evidence are the general ways to collect data using grounded theory. In this research, we use visit and interviews to collect primary data. Secondary data came from other 4 ways written in the manuscript.
Point 3: The Scientific soundness is mediocre. The study is sufficiently designed and technically sound. The research method has been elaborated sufficiently, and concerning the data acquisition it becomes clear what techniques the authors have been using. But as pointed before, I miss the appendices concerning the research questionnaire and the observation protocols (what has been observed, and why?). Concerning the coding, I think the authors did a sufficient job.
I also miss the argumentation why the outcomes of a single (holistic?) case study can be generalised (or not).
In section 4.3. the authors talk about external factors and internal factors that promote business model innovation. But they also present ‘guarantee factors’, which are ‘culture and strategy, human resources and organizational capability’ in the text. Unclear is what the authors mean with ‘guarantee factors’, i.e. what do they actually ‘guarantee’?
Response 3:
With regard to why the outcomes of a single case can be generalized, please see our Response 1.
Guarantee factors are the conditions to support and enable BMI. Section 5.3 explains how these factors support and enable BMI .
Point 4: No, this article is not suited to be published in ‘Sustainability’. I can not find any argumentation or even reference n the article concerning ‘sustainability’. So, what is the link between this topic and sustainability?
Response 4: The purpose of this article is to find the impact factors of BMI, which will help the company to build new competitive advantages to support the company’s sustainable development. In essence, this article talked about a kind of company-level sustainability questions. “Sustainability” is an international, cross-disciplinary journal of environment, culture, economic, and social sustainability of human beings. Meanwhile, many articles about business model have been published in this journal, 89 articles are listed using the keyword “business model” to query the journal.
Point 5: I would recommend proofreading by a native speaker.
Specific comments
Line 22: What are 'guarantee factors'? What do they 'guarantee'?
Line 41: ‘Early stages’ of what?
Line 44: Why these four dots?
Line 47: Year of publication (Drucker)?
Line 116: What is meant with ‘Magrett a[28] pointed’?
Lines 123 and 124: ‘Despite being regarded as a crucial organizational competence, there is no commonly accepted definition of what business model innovation is.’ Okay, that is true, but what definition do the authors embrace in this article?
Line 183:’Figure 1. The flow chart of the grounded theory’ Source of this figure?
Line 298. So you interviewed 18 interviewees, and used in the first place 15 of these interviews? If not, please explain where these 'remaining three interviews' come from.
Line 373: Again, why these dots?
Response 5:
We have used the service of English editing form MDPI and revised the manuscript according to their suggested changes.
Specific comments:(the now line number is different from the past)
Line 22: Please see response 3.
Line 41: Early stages of R&D.
Line 44: We have deleted the four dots.
Line 47: 2004, We have added the year of publication.
Line 116: It is Magretta, the author name. There is a space in the middle of the word which has been modified.
Lines 123 and 124: We add one sentence: We argue that business model innovation is an important way gaining sustainable competitiveness through value creation and delivery to the customer.
Line 183:Figure 1 is Adapted from Pandit(1996).The Creation of Theory: A Recent Application of the Grounded Theory Method, The Qualitative Report.Vol.2.No.4. We have add it to the manuscript.
Line 298.It should be encoded the remaining three primary materials (not interviewees) and five secondary data to test whether the theory is saturated. We have modified it in section 4.4.
Line 373: We have deleted the unnecessary three dots.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
Dear Authors,
thank you very much for providing the updated version of your paper. It looks like all the issues have been addressed and the paper is now significantly improved. Congratulations.
Minor issue: please check the source citation at Figure 1.
Author Response
Dear editor，
Thank you for your second feedback that have helped us to improve the paper. Our response to your comment is detailed below.
Point 1: Minor issue: please check the source citation at Figure 1.
Response 1: We have revised the citation: added the page number, and moved the source citation to the references according to the published articles of Sustainability.
Reviewer 2 Report
The authors have used my feedback to improve the paper in a sufficient manner.
Author Response
Dear editor，
Thank you for your kindly feedback that have helped us to improve the paper. The first reviewer's secondround feedback and our response are detailed below.
Point 1: Minor issue: please check the source citation at Figure 1.
Response 1: We have revised the citation: added the page number, and moved the source citation to the references according to the published articles of Sustainability.
