A reference model for digital transformation and innovation

Digital Transformation (DT) has a direct impact on relations and forms of consumption. New technologies are being incorporated continuously into our day-to-day life, introducing new shapes for traditional and original kinds of businesses. Nevertheless, it is interesting to notice that most novelty is based mainly on processes, rather than on technology. A DT initiative should start with conceptual modeling to organize and structure knowledge of its scope. However, there is not a specific proper language to model DT initiatives. Based on an extensive literature review, we propose an Ontology - the DI-BPM-Onto - with this purpose. The ontology proposed conceptualizes three aspects: Digital Transformation and Innovation (DT&I), Business Process Management Contextual Factors, and Digital Technology, which are independent layers, but orthogonally related. On the other side, modeling tools like the well-known standard ArchiMate are widely used by companies to provide an unambiguous understanding of their businesses, and already support the description, analysis, and visualization of most enterprise architecture (EA) elements. Therefore, in this paper, to better model DT initiatives, we propose a Reference Model that extending the ArchiMate with the main concepts of DT identified in the DI-BPM-Onto to better model DT&I initiatives and to discuss to what extent ArchiMate would support the implementation of DT&I initiatives. A practical modelling scenario concerning UBER is used to carry out a preliminary evaluation of the proposal.