A study on multi-sided platforms, sharing economy and related strategies

Abstract

Nowadays, Multi-Sided platforms are no longer a novelty. Amazon, Airbnb, Facebook and Uber are examples that do not even need to be introduced. What make sense to analyze, is the common business structure behind them. In fact, although each of these platforms has specific characteristics that differentiate it from the others, all of them belong to the family of the so-called "Multi-Sided platforms", sharing among each other’s much more aspects of what it could seems. The aim of this thesis, therefore, is to analyze the main aspects related to the business structure of these companies, highlighting the features that differentiate them from the traditional ones. In order to achieve that, has been chosen a semi-systematic literary review methodology. Summarizing, ordering, finding links and connections in academic papers, articles, web sites etc. present to this day in order to have a concise and schematic point of view on these extremely variegated and complex subjects. It is evident, however, the absence, in this work of themes of fundamental importance related to the main topics covered. In fact, it has chosen, for instance, to not analyze or deal in deep with, themes as governmental legislations, antitrust thematic or more specific informatic aspects. The reason behind it, it is the persistent willingness to approach the subject matter with an economic and managerial framework, avoiding diverting towards juridical, legislative, informatic or any different point of view that could distract the reader from the core objectives of this paper.