Overcoming Challenges in Implementing Condition Monitoring Services: Recommendations from an Expert Elicitation Exploratory Study

The revised manuscript differs substantially from the original version in terms of its theoretical framing, methodological rigor, analytical depth, and overall contribution. The original manuscript focused primarily on the technical aspects of Condition Monitoring Services (CMS) and discussed implementation challenges largely as practical barriers. In contrast, the revised version repositions CMS implementation within the broader context of digital servitization and adopts a socio-technical perspective as its main theoretical lens. This shift enables a deeper interpretation of CMS implementation as an organizational transformation process involving technological, organizational, human, and relational capabilities rather than a purely technological undertaking.
The theoretical background was completely restructured. The revised version now includes dedicated sections on CMS implementation challenges, approaches to successful implementation, and a clearly articulated research gap. Recent literature on digital servitization was incorporated to strengthen the theoretical foundation and better justify the research questions.
The methodology section was also significantly expanded. The revised manuscript provides a clearer justification for the expert elicitation approach, more detailed expert selection criteria, enhanced participant descriptions, a transparent explanation of the thematic analysis procedure, and a dedicated thematic saturation assessment. The coding process and theme development are now explicitly documented, improving methodological transparency and rigor. The findings, discussion, and conclusions were extensively rewritten. The findings are now structured around the three research questions and distinguish clearly between implementation challenges, solutions, and managerial recommendations. The discussion provides a deeper theoretical interpretation of the results and explicitly answers each research question. Finally, the conclusions now clearly articulate the theoretical and managerial contributions of the study, provide a more critical reflection on limitations, and offer more specific future research directions. Overall, the revised manuscript provides a more coherent, theoretically grounded, and practically relevant explanation of CMS implementation by OEMs.