Service and Experience Design as an enabler of Digital Servitization: Insights from University-Industry Collaboration with a Security company

• Aiur Retegi Uria ^[1] ; Leire Bereziartua-Gonzalez ^[1] ; Mónica Elices ^[1]
  1. [1] Universidad de Deusto

     Universidad de Deusto

     Bilbao, España

     
• Localización: Book of abstracts: 12th International Conference on Business Servitization (ICBS 2025), 2025, ISBN 978-84-129686-4-4, págs. 158-165
• Idioma: inglés
• Enlaces
  • Texto Completo Libro
• Resumen

  • Servitization, the transition from product-centric models to integrated product–service systems, is increasingly evolving into digital servitization through technologies such as IoT, AI, and digital twins. Yet, in sensitive domains like security, the adoption of digital services requires more than technological deployment: it depends on designing user experiences that foster trust, usability, and scalability. This paper presents insights from a university–industry collaboration between the University of Deusto and Prosegur’s Innovation Department, in which design students addressed real challenges in areas such as robotics, AI-supported monitoring, digital twins, and security in the metaverse. The projects followed a participatory action research approach over ten weeks, progressing through framing, exploration, conceptualization, and materialization. Findings show that Service and Experience Design methodologies help reframe technological opportunities into understandable services by emphasizing deeper motivational dimensions of user experience. They also highlight how principles such as clarity and transparency can reinforce trust in sensitive services, while design tools like service blueprints and journey maps provide scalable models deployable across multiple contexts. The collaboration functioned as a living lab, enabling rapid prototyping and low-risk experimentation while simultaneously fostering talent attraction for the company. The case demonstrates that Service and Experience Design act as strategic enablers of digital servitization, ensuring that technological solutions remain human-centered, trustworthy, and scalable. Future research should examine the long-term organizational and cultural impacts of design-led approaches to digital servitization.