Phygital technologies and environments for breakthrough innovation in customers' and citizens' journey. A critical literature review and future agenda

Pasquale Del Vecchio, Giustina Secundo and Antonello Garzoni

Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 2023, vol. 189, issue C

Abstract: Digital transformation is radically impacting on society and market by disclosing unexpected implications for scholars and practitioners. As enablers of a pervasive innovation process, digital transformation relies on different categories of digital technologies with a breakthrough profile. Among them, phygital arises as a promising topic defined as the use of technology to bridge the digital with the physical world with the purpose of providing a unique interactive experience for the user. Due the actuality of the issue, the literature on phygital is fragmented and far from a full understanding of its meaning and implications. Moving from these premises, our research attempts to analyse the current state of the debate about the promising role of phygital environment to identify how digital technologies are transforming physical world. At this aim, a critical literature review is performed to identify how the customer experience is undergoing a renaissance due to the Covid-19 pandemic that forced organisations to improve the customer experiences. Our findings allow to identify main trends in the academic debate as grouped into five main clusters, related to the adoption of phygital technologies for: i) Marketing and Consumers' Behaviour; ii) Cultural Heritage, Tourism and Urban Development; iii) Education and Learning; iv) Social issues and Politics; v) Technical and Legal Issues. These areas are linked together showing how the different phygital environments lead to the provisions of novel and immersive experience for customers involved into strategic industries such as retail, tourism and education. Directions for future research and management implications are finally provided.

Keywords: Phygital; Customer; Customer experience; Mixed reality; Critical literature review (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0040162523000276
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:tefoso:v:189:y:2023:i:c:s0040162523000276

DOI: 10.1016/j.techfore.2023.122342

Access Statistics for this article

Technological Forecasting and Social Change is currently edited by Fred Phillips

More articles in Technological Forecasting and Social Change from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().