MIT Sloan Management Review Article on How Digital Platforms Have Become Double-Edged Swords

To build successful platforms that will stand the test of time, businesses must harness power without abusing it.

It’s not difficult to see how digital technology and innovation have rapidly transformed our world over the last three decades. If the industrial revolution was built by the factory system, the changes we see today are organized around digital platforms.

Indeed, the most valuable companies in the world — Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, and Google — have harnessed platform power to achieve rapid growth and market dominance as their products and services permeate our daily life. And just as these platforms have grown in size and scale, the opportunity for abusing their power has also become very real.

About the Author

Michael A. Cusumano is the MIT Sloan Management Review Distinguished Professor of Management at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Sloan School of Management. Annabelle Gawer is a professor of digital economy at the University of Surrey Business School in Guildford, U.K. She tweets @annabellegawer. David B. Yoffie is the Max and Doris Starr Professor of International Business Administration at Harvard Business School. Ally MacDonald (@allymacdonald) is senior associate editor, digital, at MIT Sloan Management Review.

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