PCP (Provider – Customer – Product) Triangle: How Can Manufacturing Intelligence be Maintained?

Limited insight is available regarding the benefits of an Integrated Product Service Offering (IPSO) as a possibility to encapsulate a technology. This paper applies a framework termed the PCP (Provider – Customer – Product) Triangle to two cases. The PCP Triangle aims to identify benefits (including technology encapsulation) and risks of IPSOs in a systematic manner. In one case, a technology is the core of the offering and IPSO is an alternative as a business model. The other case concerns biogas production, where know-how to control the production is one of the key assets of the provider to add value. By doing so, it validates the PCP Triangle further with cases and explains how it can be used. The results show that the PCP Triangle is a simple but effective tool to describe and visualize the flow of information around the product by discussing strategies for keeping the firm's intelligence in manufacturing. The paper also discusses the IPSO's contribution to environmental performance.