THE LITERATURE ON CO-CREATION: BIBLIOMETRIC ANALYSIS AND REVIEW

摘要

The very reason for this paper is that the diffusion of co-creation is growing both theoretically and empirically and it seems to challenge some of the most important pillars in the capitalist economies in which the value exchanged in a market context is usually given before the exchange (Prahalad and Ramaswamy 2000; 2004a; 2004b; Yargo and Lusch; 2004). It appears as the output of a manufacturing or a service company that delivers the value by means of a product or a service, whose price has to be paid by the customer, with some minor role for negotiation, discount, etc. Secondly, the market exchange is rooted into the dialectic relation between supply and demand that are usually seen as two opposite parties in a zero sum game: the economic and management literature presents developments about cooperation in vertical relationships in various contexts (b-to-b, b-to-c, marketing, R&D, etc.), but co-creation seems to bring a dramatic change in the roles supply and demand are asked to play in this new scenario. Suppliers and customers are no longer on opposite sides, but they interact with each other in the development of new business opportunities. The way in which value is created, distributed, paid for, and exploited is radically different than the traditional demand vs. supply model.