From the Wikipedia:
Value networks are complex sets of social and technical resources. They work together via relationships to create economic value. This value takes the form of knowledge, intelligence, a product (business), services, innovation or social good. Examples of business value networks are research, development, design, production, marketing, sales, organizational learning, procurement and distribution (business). Value networks exhibit interdependence. They account for the overall worth of products and services. Companies have both internal and external value networks. External facing networks include customers or recipients, intermediaries, stakeholders, complementors, open innovation networks and suppliers. Internal value networks focus on key activities, processes and relationships that cut across internal boundaries, such as order fulfillment, innovation, lead processing, or customer support. Value is created through exchange and the relationships between roles. Value network operate in public agencies, civil society, in the enterprise, institutional settings, and all forms of organization. Value networks advance innovation, wealth, social good and environmental well-being.
Verna Allee on the origin:
I have no idea where the term originally was used, but it began to come into general usage in the late 1990s in the supply chain world, e- commerce, customer relationship management, and industry analysis. There was some interest in the KM community but most of the network thinking there is still focused on communities of practice and knowledge networks, which are best understood with social network analysis. The term seems to resonate with a growing interest in understanding organizations as complex adapative systems.
There are a couple of other books on value nets (Bovet and Martha, Cinzia Parolini) and many that include the topic either directly (Christensen’s Innovator’s Dilemma) or indirectly (Iansiti and Levie, Keystone Advantage). Stabel and Fjelstad also are known for comparing value networks and value shops and there is an academic group in Finland that also does work in value networks. A complementary method was developed by Jeff Shuman and Jan Twombly that is described in Collaborative Communities and Everyone is a Customer, but their method is proprietary other than what lis in their books. Their includes a similar value network mapping method and an analysis table configured for understanding the value exchanges with customers and stakeholders. Jeff teaches at Bentley College in the Boston area.
Most other methods seem to fall into two categories. The first is the process view of the world where value network is a term used to refer to complex supply chains. Such methods build on process tools, the most common of these being value stream mapping, which is used a lot in Lean. The Parolini value net method, which is quite solid work, also comes from the same perspective.
The second category is a type of cluster analysis which looks at various attributes and relationships of stakeholders in industry clusters. Cluster analysis has been around for quite some time and is of course complementary to value network analysis, as are all of these other methods. Christensen’s work would fall into this category I believe and we recently saw a draft of a good critique of his work that we hope to include on the www.value-networks.com site when it is finalized.
