Product-Service Systems design with functions and activities: Methodological framework and case studies

Product-Service Systems (PSS) have recently been of central attention for effective provision of diverse values. In this paper, a methodological framework for PSS design is proposed based on functions and activities. The proposed PSS design framework includes the following six steps: requirement identification and value targeting, stakeholder activity design, PSS function modeling, function-activity mapping and PSS concept generation, PSS concept detailing and PSS concept prototyping. In the proposed PSS design framework, requirements and values of various stakeholders are identified via life-cycle step analysis, and the various activities of stakeholders are defined and their relationships are analyzed via service blueprint approach. In PSS function modeling, overall function of PSS fulfilling target values is defined with the specification of service providers and receivers. The decomposition approach is then applied to obtain sub-functions and sub-providers/receivers. Then, PSS concepts are generated via the mapping between activities and functions, and they are compared with the introduction of a modified service blueprint. Sample case studies are conducted to validate the proposed PSS design framework.