Multidimensional Characteristics and Construction of Classification Model of Prosumers

Abstract

To explore how to effectively identify and select prosumers to promote the innovation capabilities of manufacturers, this paper focused on the potential value of the rise in prosumers. By means of documentary, this paper sorts out the development origin and conceptual characteristics of prosumers and further specifies the concept of prosumers from the general explanation. It includes the characteristics of prosumers derived from consumers and features of the prosumers’ participation in production, creative potential, collaboration and interaction, use of resources/tools, and new value production. Through a terminology comparison and evaluation, three classified dimensions based on the characteristics of prosumers were refined: degree of participation, range of interaction, and capacity of prosumption. The case induction method was further adopted to subdivide the levels of prosumers in different feature dimensions. Finally, a classification model based on the multidimensional characteristics of prosumers was proposed, and combined with the functional analysis method, the model can be described by metric space, and subspaces for collaboration-oriented prosumers were divided. It provides a reference basis for evaluating different types of prosumers. This paper not only promotes the development of the theory of prosumption, expanding the collaboration toward prosumers, but also helps to provide a reference and basis for manufacturers to select prosumers for collaborative co-creation.