The key to scaling in the digital era: Simultaneous automation, individualization and interdisciplinarity
提出一个理论框架，解释数字技术如何帮助小企业通过同时实现成本降低和价值提升来获得竞争优势并快速规模化，并通过案例研究验证了该框架。
In this paper, we develop a theoretical framework that explains how digital technologies can help small businesses generate competitive advantages for scaling. To gain and sustain competitive advantages, small businesses traditionally had to choose between cost leadership and differentiation strategies. Digital technologies enable small businesses to reduce their costs and at the same time enhance the value of their market offerings through differentiation. The aim of this paper is to explain the role of digital technologies in such hybrid strategies for small businesses. We first identify automation, individualization and interdisciplinarity as the three dimensions of digital technologies that together enable technology-driven firms to gain and sustain competitive advantages and to scale rapidly. Second, we integrate these three dimensions into a theoretical framework. Third, we test and confirm the theoretical framework in an explanatory case study and discuss the results.