The Product Service Systems (PSS) concept is presented from the point of view of the "strategic design for sustainability": the design of an innovation strategy offering a marketable mix of products and services that is coherent with the medium-long term perspective of sustainability, being - at the same time - economically feasible and socially appreciable today.

Benefits and barriers to adopting PSS are analysed through some business cases, answering the following question: what motivates a company to consider a PSS within the emerging social and economical scenario characterised by the processes of globalisation leaded by the new ITC.

These examples derive from both desk research and - as primary data - from an analysis of the submissions of a yearly-endowed prize targeted to business's "Sustainable Innovation". The Politecnico di Milano University together with Legambiente (an environmental NGO) promotes the initiative in Italy (more than a hundred are the year 2001 submissions, and come from various industrial sectors).

All cases and examples are classified in two categories. "Services providing final results": the company offers customised mix of services, as a substitute for the purchasing and use of single products providing of a specific final result with a low-level of client participation. "Services providing enabling platforms": the company offers the access to products, tools, opportunities or capabilities (platforms) that enable clients to get the results they want.

Furthermore, it is discussed how PSS could be applicable to developing countries as well.

How a business application of PSS can be an opportunity to facilitate the process of industrialisation, by jumping over or by passing the stage characterised by individual consumption/ownership of mass-produced goods towards the more advanced service-economy.

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Last updated: 13 November, 2008