Reflections on societal and business model transformation arising from digitization and big data analytics: A research agenda

In the era of accelerating digitization and advanced big data analytics, harnessing quality data for designing and delivering state-of-the-art services will enable innovative business models and management approaches (Boyd and Crawford, 2012; Brynjolfsson and McAfee, 2014) and yield an array of consequences. Among other consequences, digitization and big data analytics reshape business models and impact employment amongst knowledge workers - just as automation did for manufacturing workers. This Viewpoint paper considers the mechanisms underlying how digitization and big data analytics drive the transformation of business and society and outlines the potential effects of digitization and big data analytics on employment - especially in the context of cognitive tasks. Its aim is to outline a critical research agenda to explore and conceptualize evident changes in business models and society arising from these technological advances.