The Two Sides of Open Business Models

Abstract

Traditional closed business models have recently shown their limitations. In this paper we explore the role of key resources, and how they can be aggregated into open business models. We first examine how the nature of key resources influences the development of these models. We pay particular attention to whether the resources are rivalrous or non-rivalrous, and whether they are excludable or not. We outlined to the two faces of open business models, considering the buy side and the sell side of how resources are accessed and leveraged respectively in such models. We examined one organization in more detail, the El Bulli restaurant, to provide an indepth illustration of both sides of that firm’s business model, and show its adaptability.