The platformisation of the PropTech and real estate industry - What are the determinants of success for digital PropTech platforms?

The increasing dominance of big tech companies has resulted in a surge of digital platformisation across various industries, including real estate. According to the annual PropTech Germany study, as an example, around 33% of PropTechs reported using a platform as their fundamental technology and business model in 2023. In 2021, the share was even 69%. The real estate sector in the DACH region has few dominant platform structures, particularly in the B2B market.The platform economy has the potential for significant disruption across sectors. Its characteristics can lead to oligopolistic market structures, especially if indirect network effects are used and a critical mass of users is reached by solving the chicken-and-egg problem. Academic research has examined individual success factors of digital platforms. However, this research has often been limited to qualitative analyses.This paper aims to fill a research gap in the literature by using extensive datasets to identify the success factors of digital platforms. The study focuses on examining individual characteristics of platform features that are still lacking in the scientific community, using a quantitative approach. Two different panel datasets from the Proptech industry in the DACH region will be analysed. The first stage involves developing hypotheses about the factors that contribute to success and identifying different clusters of digital platforms within the real estate industry. This will be done analytically, based on the first panel dataset and relevant literature. The second panel dataset will then be used to test these hypotheses quantitatively by incorporating individual characteristics of platform features. Results will be derived for the DACH region. The methodological design and suggestions will also be relevant for further international studies.This working paper is designed for the ERES PhD sessions. The discussion will focus on the study's initial empirical results and methodological design.