استفاده از تکنولوژی و استاندارد سازی: بازی تغییر استراتژی در زمینه تکنولوژی اندازه هوشمند  Technology users and standardization: Game changing strategies in the field of smart meter technology

1. Introduction Technology standards play a key role for the development of technological fields. Standards facilitate the integration of different technological components such as computer platforms, periphery devices and software into coherent systems (Jain, 2012; van de Kaa et al., 2011). Furthermore, standards reduce variety and lower transaction costs (Brunsson et al., 2012; David, 1994), thereby eventually creating economies of scale (West, 2007). Finally, standards also facilitate coordination and cooperation among actors (Brunsson and Jacobsson, 2000; Lawrence, 1999; Timmermans and Epstein, 2010). For firms and other actors, standards are of major strategic importance as they affect the distribution of resources and the relative positions of players in a field (Brunsson et al., 2012; Lawrence, 1999; Garud et al., 2002). Standard battles, i.e. struggles of organizations over the dominance of standards are therefore a common phenomenon in the development of technological fields (Suarez, 2004). Well-documented examples include VHS winning over Sony’s Betamax in the field of video recorders (Cusumano et al., 1992), the struggle of IBM, Apple and Sun for dominance in the field of IT platforms (West, 2003) or the long lasting competition of different standards for mobile telecommunication (Funk and Methe, 2001; Lyytinen and Fomin, 2002). In most cases, standard battles are fought between competing technology providers that seek to get most out of their proprietary technologies. In contrast to technology providers, technology users typically do not play much of a role in standard development (West, 2007; Hawkins, 1995). In fact, there are indications for users being underrepresented in the committees of standard development organizations (Jakobs et al., 2001; de Vries et al., 2003) and the literature reports just a few instances of users actively taking part in the development of technology standards (Lyytinen and Fomin, 2002; Bresnahan and Chopra, 1990; Dankbaar and van Tulder, 1992; Koehorst et al., 1999). A prime reason for this is that most technological fields are characterized by a large number of different users (individuals, private and public organizations) with potentially fragmented interests.