English

Information Technology Platforms: Definition and Research Directions

Computers and Society 2016-06-07 v1

Abstract

The concept of an information technology (IT) related platform is broad and covers phenomena ranging from the operating system Linux to the Internet. Such platforms are of increasing importance to innovation and value creation across many facets of industry and daily life. There is, however, a lack of common understanding in both research and industry about what is mean by the term platform when related to IT. This lack of consensus is detrimental to research and knowledge development. Thus, the aims of this study are to: (i) provide a sound definition of the IT-platform concept by identifying its distinguishing dimensions; and (ii) identify important current research directions for the IT-platform concept. To achieve these aims a systematic literature review was undertaken with 133 relevant articles taken from major information systems journals, conferences, and business publications. The study contributes by providing a sound base for future research into IT-platforms.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1606.01445,
  title  = {Information Technology Platforms: Definition and Research Directions},
  author = {Ruonan Sun and Shirley Gregor and Byron Keating},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1606.01445},
  year   = {2016}
}

Comments

Research-in-progress ISBN# 978-0-646-95337-3 Presented at the Australasian Conference on Information Systems 2015 (arXiv:1605.01032)

R2 v1 2026-06-22T14:17:55.408Z