In August 2011 the Wall Street Journal published an essay by Netscape co-founder Marc Andreessen titled ‘‘Why software is eating the world’’. He argues that ‘‘more and more major businesses and industries are being run on software and delivered as online services—from movies to agriculture to national defense. Many of the winners are Silicon Valley-style entrepreneurial technology companies that are invading and overturning established industry structures. [...] Companies in every industry need to assume that a software revolution is coming.’’ (Andreessen 2011). By pointing at examples in various industries from automotive and banking to defense, healthcare, music, retailing, and telecommunications, he illustrates the transformational power of information technology (IT) and software in particular. The discussion is not new and dates back to the early 2000s. For example, Power and Jerjian (2001, p. 99) mention for Heathrow airport that ‘‘software is the thing that runs the airport’’ and in a biological analogy they consider software to be the nervous system. Meanwhile, the large ‘‘big tech’’ software companies (e.g., GAFAM, BATX) have impressively confirmed this development: their digital platforms have spread over many industries with an impact on processes (e.g., interaction and transaction), on products (e.g., app stores and services) as well as on business models (e.g., streaming and as-a-service models). The recent tech-portmanteaus (e.g., Fintech, Insurtech, Regtech) also reflect the attitude of these startup businesses, which perceive themselves rather as IT (tech) companies than as representatives of the industry they are aiming to transform (Meijer and Kapoor 2014). In the same vein, the high valuation of Tesla Motors since early 2020 spurred an intense debate of whether the company is in the automotive or the tech business (e.g., Klebnikov 2020). Obviously, these developments have numerous implications for the field of IT management, which were discussed during a panel at the 82nd Annual German Business Researcher Conference on March 18, 2020. The panel builds on prior discussions regarding the impact of R. Alt (&) Leipzig University, Leipzig, Germany e-mail: rainer.alt@uni-leipzig.de

中文翻译：

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软件定义业务

2011 年 8 月，《华尔街日报》发表了 Netscape 联合创始人马克·安德森 (Marc Andreessen) 的一篇文章，题为“为什么软件正在吞噬世界”。他认为，“越来越多的主要企业和行业正在使用软件运行并作为在线服务提供——从电影到农业再到国防。许多获奖者都是硅谷式的创业型科技公司，它们正在入侵和颠覆既定的行业结构。[...] 每个行业的公司都需要假设软件革命即将到来。”（Andreessen 2011）。通过列举从汽车和银行业到国防、医疗保健、音乐、零售和电信等各个行业的例子，他特别说明了信息技术 (IT) 和软件的变革力量。这种讨论并不新鲜，可以追溯到 2000 年代初。例如，Power 和 Jerjian (2001, p. 99) 提到希思罗机场“软件是运行机场的东西”，在生物学上，他们认为软件是神经系统。与此同时，大型“大科技”软件公司（如 GAFAM、BATX）已经令人印象深刻地证实了这一发展：他们的数字平台已经遍布许多行业，对流程（如交互和交易）、产品（如、应用程序商店和服务）以及商业模式（例如，流媒体和即服务模式）。最近的科技组合（如金融科技、保险科技、监管科技）也反映了这些初创企业的态度，他们认为自己更像是 IT（科技）公司，而不是他们旨在转型的行业的代表（Meijer 和 Kapoor，2014 年）。同样，特斯拉汽车自 2020 年初以来的高估值引发了对该公司是从事汽车业务还是科技业务的激烈辩论（例如，Klebnikov 2020）。显然，这些发展对 IT 管理领域有许多影响，在 2020 年 3 月 18 日举行的第 82 届德国商业研究人员年会上的一个小组讨论中进行了讨论。该小组建立在先前关于 R. Alt (&)德国莱比锡莱比锡大学电子邮件：rainer.alt@uni-leipzig.de 自 2020 年初以来，特斯拉汽车的高估值引发了对该公司是从事汽车业务还是科技业务的激烈辩论（例如，Klebnikov 2020）。显然，这些发展对 IT 管理领域有许多影响，在 2020 年 3 月 18 日举行的第 82 届德国商业研究人员年会上的一个小组讨论中进行了讨论。该小组建立在先前关于 R. Alt (&)德国莱比锡莱比锡大学电子邮件：rainer.alt@uni-leipzig.de 特斯拉汽车自 2020 年初以来的高估值引发了对该公司是从事汽车业务还是科技业务的激烈辩论（例如，Klebnikov 2020）。显然，这些发展对 IT 管理领域有许多影响，在 2020 年 3 月 18 日举行的第 82 届德国商业研究人员年会上的一个小组讨论中进行了讨论。该小组建立在先前关于 R. Alt (&)德国莱比锡莱比锡大学电子邮件：rainer.alt@uni-leipzig.de