Towards comparable business model concepts: resource description framework (RDF) schemas for semantic business model representations

Abstract

Scholars have demonstrated that business model (BM) choices have a significant impact on the success of products, innovations and organizations. However, knowledge about key elements of BMs is disseminated across a large body of literature and builds on different conceptualizations. We take a step back and provide a new approach to formalize BM concepts and related BM knowledge, based on concepts from the semantic web. We introduce and evaluate the Resource Description Framework (RDF) as a data model for comparable and extensible BM descriptions. Moreover, we use this new perspective to analyze commonalities and differences between BM concepts, to reflect critically on the process of translating concepts to RDF and evaluate its relevance for BM design practice