On the right track - Service network orchestration in the railway industry

Abstract: Nowadays, service is increasingly created by cross-functional collaboration within service networks. A service network can be orchestrated by one central company, which is named coordinating hub in the present study. This study examines the contemporary and unexplored phenomenon of service network orchestration in the passenger railway markets in Sweden and Germany. It is the first to offer a definition of service network orchestration and presents a novel service network orchestration model by synthesizing business network orchestration and service marketing literature. The model’s applicability in practice is examined by qualitative empirical data derived from a multiple case study. The findings of this study confirm the proposed model’s practical applicability. Nevertheless, the findings suggest that service networks found in practice include a greater variety of partnerships than the current literature indicates. 1) The partner firm’s proximity to the coordinating hub (i.e. internal vs. external) and 2) the coordinating hub’s involvement in the partnerships (i.e. high vs. low) are found to create contexts that require distinct orchestration activities. Based on these findings, a set of takeaways is formulated, which contributes to a holistic understanding of service network orchestration that is relevant in both theory and practice.