Ali Bigdeli

Associate Professor (Reader) in Industrial Service Innovation Aston University

  • Birmingham

Dr Bigdeli is an expert in servitization and advanced services in manufacturing.

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Aston University experts to co-chair The Spring Servitization Conference 2022

The Conference is dedicated to understanding how organisations can develop and adapt their business models through servitization and advances services The theme is Achieving Net-Zero through Servitization and it will be held in Florence, Italy on 9 and 10 May Professor Tim Baines and Dr Ali Z. Bigdeli, from the Advanced Services Group at Aston University, will be co-chairs. Two Aston University experts are set to co-chair a major conference around servitization in Italy in May. Professor Tim Baines and Dr Ali Z. Bigdeli, from the Advanced Services Group (ASG) at Aston University, will be co-chairs alongside Professor Mario Rapaccini (University of Florence), Professor Nicola Saccani and Dr Federico Adrodegari (both University of Brescia) while Jill Forrest (also ASG) will be conference administrator. The Spring Servitization Conference (SSC) was first launched more than 10 years ago at Aston University in Birmingham. It was created to build and formalise a research community around the topic of servitization, and to understand how organisations can develop and adapt their business models through servitization and advances services. Servitization is a term used to describe the process through which a business transitions from selling products alone to selling a combination of product and service, and ultimately outcomes. The theme of the 2022 edition of the conference will be Achieving Net-Zero through Servitization and will be held at Istituto degli Innocenti in Florence on Monday 9 and Tuesday 10 May. The event will bring together the world’s leading researchers, practitioners and doctoral students to debate and engage with the theory and practice of servitization. Professor Tim Baines, executive director of The Advanced Services Group at Aston University and co-chair The Spring Servitization Conference 2022, said: “Servitization has already helped to transform the fortunes of many UK manufacturing businesses and I am looking forward to showcasing what it can do for businesses abroad too. “SSC2022 will follow the now established format of a single stream where all contributors have an opportunity to present to the whole conference audience and engage in both structured and semi-structured panel sessions to discuss their work. “The programme is designed to encourage extensive debate and bridge research theory and industrial practice. “We have some fantastic keynote speeches from senior executives at leading manufacturing businesses including Tim Foreman, European R&D manager, OMRON Europe and Paolo Mauri, Electrolux Professional.” You can find out more about The Spring Servitization Conference 2022 here.

Ali BigdeliTim Baines

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Biography

Dr Ziaee Bigdeli is a Reader (Associate Professor) in Industrial Service Innovation at the Advanced Services Group, the centre of excellence in research and practice on servitization and advanced services within Aston Business School, Aston University. His interests lie in the organisational change and business model innovation brought about when companies move towards providing outcome-based offerings rather than just selling products on a transactional basis, or servitization.

He has been successful in securing ~£5.5m funding from UKRI, EU, and industry, including: Principal Investigator (PI) of the ESRC-funded project ‘Pathways towards Servitization: A trans-national study of Organisational Transformation’ (ES/P010148/1), and Co-I on two Innovate UK projects: ‘Next generation rice processing’ (ES/P010148/1) and ‘Digital Servitization Demonstrator’ (TS/T011165/1) under the Manufacturing Made Smarter theme.

In the past seven years, he has been extensively engaged with both multinational and small/medium sized manufacturing firms in order to understand servitization in practice, and also help the acceleration of the adoption and implementation of advanced services. As part of his industry engagement activities, he has been the key member in founding a partnership of multinational manufacturing organisations, including Goodyear, Thales, BAXI, Nederman, Mazak, Legrand, Crown, Waters, Domino Printing, Omron and Ishida, and developed and facilitated more than 30 hands-on seminars for their senior executives to explore and accelerate the adoption of servitization.

Areas of Expertise

Manufacturing Strategy
Business Model Innovation
Servitization
Service Innovation
Organisational Change

Education

Brunel University

PhD

Management and Information Systems

2012

University of Manchester

MSc

Management Information Systems

2009

University of Science & Technology, Iran

MBA

2007

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Affiliations

  • Higher Education Academy : Fellow
  • The Institution of Engineering and Technology (MIET)
  • Academy of Management (AoM)
  • British Academy of Management (BAM)
  • European Operations Management Association (EurOMA)

Media Appearances

Manufacturing: how to work smarter, not harder

NatWest  online

2020-12-04

Technology has been a pivotal force in manufacturing ever since the first pot makers in Sumeria built a kiln to fire their products. Since then, every new breakthrough has been hailed as the game changer, equipping makers with the tools to do things faster, cleaner, safer and cheaper.

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Manufacturing and the shift to servitisation

NatWest  online

2020-12-01

For centuries the driving force of the UK economy was manufacturing, but in modern times that leadership role has been replaced by services.

It makes sense then that UK manufacturers are now increasingly seeking to marry the two worlds together to fight back against global competition.

Servitisation means manufacturers no longer just making products but adding services as well. According to The Manufacturer’s Annual Manufacturing Report 2018, 79% of manufacturers believe it will help broaden their customer base.

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How manufacturers can survive this period of radical change – move into services

The Conversation  online

2020-05-18

Change, a 1985 paper argued, can be characterised as a “punctuated equilibrium”: long periods of relative calm and small incremental alterations that are interrupted by brief, but radical, seismic shifts. COVID-19 means that we are now living through one of those revolutionary moments.

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Research Grants

Pathways towards Servitization: A trans-national study of Organisational Transformation

ESRC

Feb 2018 – Feb 2021

Ziaee Bigdeli, A. (PI), Baines, T.

Digital Servitization Demonstrator. In collaboration with BAXI Heating

Innovate UK

2020 - 2022

In collaboration with BAXI Heating, University of Sheffield, University of Exeter, Digital Catapult, and Siemens.

Digitally-enabled Advanced Services: Developing Research Agenda for Manufacturing Sector

EPSRC

2019

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Articles

Servitization implementation in the manufacturing organisations: Classification of strategies, definitions, benefits and challenges

International Journal of Information Management

The integration of products and services into a bundled product/service offering by manufacturing organisations is seen as a global trend in today’s competitive business environment. The shift of product-based manufacturers towards offering business solutions and value-added services to consumers is termed as ‘Servitization’. Contrary to the potential benefits expected by adding service activities to the offerings, advocates voice their concerns towards experiential problems and challenges in employing the servitization strategy – termed as ‘Servitization Paradox’.

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Context matters: how internal and external factors impact servitization

Production Planning & Control

The study investigates how internal and external context factors impact a manufacturer’s servitization process (i.e. the strategic transformation from competing through products towards competing through services). A theoretical framework was developed that integrates a multi-stage conceptualisation of servitization with a focus on the wide range of internal and external context factors that support or oppose the transformation.

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Business Model Innovation in Established SMEs: A Configurational Approach

Journal of Open Innovation: Technology, Market, and Complexity

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are at the heart of a nation’s wealth creation, employment generation and economic development. To help SMEs stay competitive in a fast-changing environment, researchers have recently emphasized the relevance of business model innovation (BMI). However, BMI and its performance are not linear but rather a complex phenomenon that depends on contingency factors.

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