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Previous studies have identified a variety of Internet of Things (IoT) business models and have recognised the complexity related to the application of IoT technologies in business, along with the potential of the modularity concept application in organisational design. The purpose of this paper is to identify the main building blocks for the development of a business model canvas for companies that adopt the IoT in their business.

First, the authors carried a systematic literature review to identify theoretical, experimental and practical IoT business model canvas recorded in the literature. Then, the authors identified and analysed the characteristics of the building blocks present in these canvas using a statistical cluster technique. Based on the outcomes, the authors proposed a framework with standard and optional modules to allow flexible arrangements and suit different IoT business goals.

The results revealed that the IoT business model canvas recorded in the literature had been grossly designed to attend two drivers: manufacture and service organisations. Therefore, based on the frequency of building blocks present in IoT business model canvas recorded in the literature, it has been proposed two flexible frameworks which can be tailored to accommodate the immense variety of possibilities offered by IoT technologies in manufacture and service business.

The business model frameworks proposed in this research can support entrepreneurs structuring new IoT businesses or upgrading existing businesses.

This research offers a comprehensive IoT business model framework with their respective building blocks built from an extensive literature review.

This study is to propose a procedure to support decisions on which enablers should be employed to minimize the impact of barriers to implementing mass customization strategies in food companies.

Through interpretive structural modeling, the authors analyzed the relationships between barriers. Then, with an approach similar to the quality function deployment technique, commonly used in general product and process development, the authors clarified the relationships between barriers and enablers.

The results revealed 19 barriers and 17 enablers for implementing food mass customization. The analysis indicates that most of the barriers (16) present strong associations with each other. The barrier “products with non-customizable features” depends on the whole chain of associations and causes a minor impact on the other barriers. In turn, the barrier “ingredient incompatibility” causes impact over the whole chain, and its dependence on other barriers is very low.

The results were tested in a single Brazilian company in the food sector.

The findings can allow food manufacturing companies to focus their efforts on the improvement of enabling technologies, such as smart packaging, Internet of Things and additive manufacture.

This study would help food companies to improve their business and provide better products to society.

There are few recommendations in the literature to how to implement mass customization strategy in companies from the food sector. This study fills in this gap presenting a procedure to guide managerial staff to develop this promising approach for food companies.