Methodology implications in automotive product–service systems: a systematic literature review

Abstract

The worldwide automotive industry sector has been experiencing a period of noticeable growth and success, especially since overcoming the financial crisis in 2008; however, this success is accompanied by remarkable erosion in the sales profit margin, causing automakers to invest in the after-sales and product–service system (PSS) sectors. The purpose of this review is twofold. First, it establishes an understanding of the automotive PSS concept by summarising and discussing the objectives, methodologies and findings of these studies. Second, it develops a framework to classify 102 articles analysed in depth and dating from 1999 to 2015 according to their adopted methodologies with an extended analysis of the most-used data collection instruments and analysis tools. It is evident that there is a tendency to utilise quantitative methods despite the expediency of implementing mixed methods in recent studies. This paper provides meaningful insights into the research methodologies, and for an audience consisting of general researchers and practitioners with an interest in conducting research in the automotive PSS and production disciplines, it represents a guideline to choose the appropriate research methodology, taking into consideration the advantages and disadvantages of each one.

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