Transforming Energy Marketing Practices for Enhanced Solar PV Adoption

The adoption and use of solar PV systems is a complex and multifarious process influenced by personal, social, economic, technical and regulatory factors. Solar PV companies involved in the sales and interaction with the customers can play an important role in facilitating adoption. Companies’ ability to effectively market the product, disseminate information, frame value offerings and address consumers concerns can play an important role in this regard. The small size of the domestic market, an amplified competition and limited resources highlight the need to alter the way companies have been carrying out their operations. The qualitative study explores how solar PV companies can transform their marketing operations by integrating through the use of advanced digital technologies to facilitate the process.© 2022. Published by AHFE Open Access. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).fi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed

Ideologies in Energy Transition : Community Discourses on Renewables

This paper examines discourses in five Finnish municipalities' energy transition processes to identify and explain different ideological discourses among its members. The study fills a gap in research extending the idea of sense making to capture the ideologies that hide in discourses during socio-technical transitions. We identify three types of ideological discourses labelled as Clan, Solarpunk and Native. The implications of the ideologies embedded in municipal, multi-partner networks that participate in energy transition affect who will be heard in a local context. This impacts future choices directly related to sustainability outcomes. We propose that discourses in these multi-partner networks, conceptualized from the perspective of municipal energy systems, help us to uncover underlying ideologies that imperil change. And yet at the same time, these revelations offer opportunities for sustainability-oriented innovation.©2021 The Authors. Published by Talent First Network 2007–2021 and published in the Technology Innovation Management Review. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.We want to thank the following institutions and projects for financial support: University of Vaasa, School of Marketing and Communication, and VEBIC (Vaasa Energy Business Innovation Center) research platform; South Ostrobothnia Regional Fund of the Finnish Cultural Foundation; Business Finland, FLEXIMAR (Novel marketplace for energy flexibility) and SolarX (Maximizing PV integration capacity in energy and power systems) projects; European Regional Development Fund, ESSR (Energy Self-Sufficient Regions) project; and the Foundation for Economic Education, PETs (Pathways to Energy Transitions) project.fi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed

Servitization in a Security Business: Changing the Logic of Value Creation

How can a firm change its value-creation logic from providing technology to selling technology-based services? This is a question many security companies face today when trying to apply a solutions-based business model in response to recent macro- and microeconomic trends. The fact that customers increasingly demand security as a service, rather than technical equipment, challenges the basis of a security firm's value provision and alters the logic of its operation. In this article, we investigate a technology- and product-oriented security business that is now rapidly transforming into a service business. We use data from a case study to propose a 4C model (conceptualization, calculation, communication, and co-creation of value) that can help security providers to objectify their service offerings and succeed in the servitization of their security businesses

Neolocalism and Beyond - Sexing Up Rural Places

In this paper, we revise the concept of neolocalism by showing how companies that sex up rural places update and add novel nuances to neolocalist marketing. As the positive aspects drawn from tradition, stories and history are at the center of neolocalism, we aim to highlight how the usually negatively perceived images of the rural may be turned into something positive, trendy, desirable, and eventually sexy in the marketing of rural areas and businesses. The data of this study consists of nine company interviews and four consumer focus groups (n = 17). Our findings show how three features—namely, the hybridization of rural and urban, generational experience of millennials, and minimalist visualization—combined construct ideas for new image creation for rural areas. The concept of sexing up places ushers in new possibilities for rural actors and regions by reducing the distinction between rural and urban via visual imagery that is a particularly good match for the generational experience of the millennials. In this way, the study offers a novel way to tackle the challenges faced by rural areas, such as depopulation and image loss.© 2021 The Authors. Rural Sociology published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of Rural Sociological Society (RSS). This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.fi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed

Ushering in a New Dawn : Demand-Side Local Flexibility Platform Governance and Design in the Finnish Energy Markets

Energy ecosystems are under a significant transition. Local flexibility marketplaces (LFM) and platforms are argued to have significant potential in contributing to such a transition. The purpose of this study was to answer the following research question: how do market conditions and stakeholders shape emerging LFM platform governance choices? We approached this objective with an exploratory single-case study by conducting ten semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders in the Finnish energy ecosystem. The results of the content and pattern analyses revealed the key challenges to LFM implementation such as the current regulatory treatment of flexibility, high costs of gadget installations, and ensuring sufficient liquidity in the market. In addition, we also demonstrated that despite such barriers, the Finnish ecosystem is largely pragmatic about LFMs’ in its midst. All in all, we contributed to the non-technological streams of LFM literature by developing an exhaustive framework with four distinctive dimensions (i.e., ecosystem readiness, value-creation logic, platform architecture and governance, platform competitiveness) for LFM development, which helps academics, practitioners, and policy-makers to understand how novel platforms emerge and develop.© 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).fi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed

Business models for enhanced solar photovoltaic (PV) adoption : Transforming customer interaction and engagement practices

Solar energy can play an important role in meeting global energy needs in a sustainable and environmentally friendly manner. However, despite solar energy’s accelerated growth in recent years, its level of diffusion is highly uneven when looked at on a global scale. The solar photovoltaic (PV) companies involved in the sales of PV systems are central to fostering diffusion. A company’s ability to devise and deliver value offerings that match customers’ needs is vital in encouraging the adoption of solar PV technology. The extent to which a company can address market needs and deliver value often depends on the business model it has adopted. The extant research has explored business models based on ownership structures, financing options, the effect of regulatory regimes and policies, industry practices, alliances, and business models for distributed generation and large-scale utility companies. However, the research to date, has mostly neglected the business models of solar companies involved in the sales and installation of solar PV. This qualitative study based on twenty semi-structured interviews contributes to the existing knowledge by exploring how sales and installation companies can enhance solar photovoltaic adoption by transforming customer interactions and engagement practices, which is a key element of a company’s business model. Companies’ ability to communicate value offerings and address consumer concerns is important in enhancing diffusion. The study highlights that transforming customer interaction and engagement practices can help companies broaden customer reach, improve the dissemination of information, reduce transaction costs and efficiently utilise market insights and trends.© 2024 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd on behalf of International Solar Energy Society. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).fi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed

Socio-technical modelling of customer roles in developing low voltage distribution networks

The transition of low voltage (LV) distribution networks towards more intelligent and smart microgrids is dependent on both technical and behavioral factors, thus forming a socio-technical systems change. Sociotechnical aspects need to be taken into account when developing concepts and models to establish and manage successful niche experiments. This paper presents a new framework to model actor (customer) evolution and engagement in the process of developing smart LV Microgrid distribution networks as socio-technical systems. The framework is based on combining the Multi-level perspective (MLP) and the Strategic niche management (SNM) approach with the Unified Modeling Language (UML) tool. Customer engagement is an essential element in SNM, wherefore understanding their and other actors’ different development paths is invaluable to uncover the dynamics of the Microgrid transition in the societal and the technical contexts. The proposed framework could be applied to other key actors such as DSOs and energy retailers. The benefit of the models created by the developed framework is the articulation of expectations and visions as well as building up the networks in the SNM.fi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed

Teachers’ perceptions on addressing global issues in upper secondary vocational education and training in Finland

Kestävyys ja vastuullisuus koskettavat jokaista työntekijää 2020-luvulla. Tutkimuksessa tarkastellaan ammatillisten perustutkintojen opettajien näkemyksiä globaalien aiheiden käsittelystä toisen asteen ammatillisessa koulutuksessa Suomessa. Aineisto koostuu opettajien vastauksista (N=187) keväällä 2022 toteutettuun verkkokyselyyn. Analyysissä käytettiin kuvailevia tilastollisia menetelmiä sekä temaattista analyysia peilaten kyselyvastauksia teoriataustaan, aiempaan globaalin kansalaiskasvatuksen sekä ammatillisen koulutuksen tutkimukseen. Tulokset viittaavat siihen, että globaali kansalaiskasvatus on implisiittisesti läsnä toisen asteen ammatillisessa koulutuksessa Suomessa. Tutkinnon perusteet eivät tue suunnitelmallista syventymistä globaaleihin aiheisiin ammatillisessa koulutuksessa. Silti aiheet nousevat esiin oppilaitosten arjessa ja niitä käsitellään pääosin spontaaneilla keskusteluilla opetuksen ja ohjaamisen yhteydessä. Opettajat näkevät globaalit aiheet tärkeiksi moninäkökulmaisuuden ja yhteenkietoutuneisuuden ymmärtämisen, tulevaisuuden työelämän sekä vastuullisena kansalaisena toimimisen näkökulmasta. Opettajien mukaan globaalit aiheet koskettavat kaikkia ammattialoja ja niiden merkitys kasvaa tulevaisuudessa. Koulutuksellisen yhdenvertaisuuden kannalta on keskeistä, että myös ammattiin opiskelevilla on mahdollisuus harjoitella yhteiskunnallisen osallistumisen taitoja sekä perehtyä globaaleihin aiheisiin koulutuksensa aikana. Globaali kansalaiskasvatus voi tarjota tähän sekä teoreettista että käytännöllistä tukea.Sustainability and responsibility affect every worker in the 2020s. This study examines the perceptions of teachers in initial vocational qualifications on addressing global issues in upper secondary vocational education and training (VET) in Finland. The data consist of teachers’ responses (N=187) to an online survey in the spring of 2022. In the analysis, descriptive statistics as well as thematic analysis were used and the results were reflected against the theoretical framework, earlier research on global citizenship education and VET. The results indicate that global citizenship education is implicitly present in upper secondary VET in Finland. The current qualification requirements do not support structured, in-depth exploration of global issues in VET. Yet, global issues emerge in the everyday life of educational institutions, and they are mainly addressed through spontaneous discussions in connection to teaching and guidance work. Teachers perceive the importance of global issues above all in terms of understanding multiple perspectives, diversity and interdependence, relevance for the world of work in the future and acting as a responsible citizen. According to teachers, global issues affect all professions, and their importance will increase in the future. Educational equity would require that also vocational students have the possibility to learn competences necessary for societal participation and get acquainted with global issues during their education. Global citizenship education can provide both theoretical and practical tools for this

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