Innovation in the sharing economy: A systematic literature review and research framework

The advancements of the sharing economy (SE) have sparked growing interest among scholars. However, the literature on innovation in the SE remains fragmented and without a systematic research agenda for future studies. Aiming to fulfill this gap, this paper follows a systematic literature review encompassing 85 papers. In this study, SE organizations are defined as all commercial or non-commercial product-service systems that capture and redistribute idle resources or assets in crowd-based networks through true sharing, pseudo-sharing, or collaborative consumption, and that use mediation platforms, that are most often electronic and accessible via the internet, to promote an efficient use of resources and value creation. Our findings, based on a framework for mapping types of innovation, suggest that previous studies focus mostly on how the business models of SE organizations impact cities and urban areas and contribute to sustainability. Moreover, process innovation and position innovation are the types of innovation most reported in the SE literature. The results show that the engagement of new social actors in innovation activities is essential in the SE. Some emerging topics for future research in the SE field include the co-creation of product innovation, network-based process innovation, technology-based service position innovation, and evasive innovation.