Fintech: research directions to explore the digital transformation of financial service systems

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to delineate a research agenda to guide future service research investigating the digital transformation of financial service systems through Fintech - disruptive innovations by new market entrants that challenge the position of mainstream financial institutions. Design/methodology/approach Rooted in the philosophical foundations of "use-inspired research," this paper addresses the managerially and societally relevant phenomenon of Fintech by identifying, and responding to, the individual challenges and problems associated with the digital transformation of financial services. This is accomplished through a computational text-mining approach to analyze the corpus of 1,545 published practitioner articles associated with Fintech, identification of managerial challenges therein and subsequent delineation of a novel research agenda. Findings By connecting managerial challenges relating to Fintech with the service literature, this paper develops a use-inspired research agenda that provides scholarly and managerially relevant research directions (RDs). These pertain to the complexity of digital financial service systems (micro level), orchestration of value co-creation with Fintech (meso level), and the development of elastic infrastructures, models and markets (macro level). Originality/value This empirical research contributes to the discourse regarding the role of information and communication technologies in service in general, and the digital transformation on financial services in particular. The in-depth computational text-mining analysis is unbiased, replicable and provides the foundation for a use-inspired research agenda that is subsequently delineated.