The runtime economy: designing for generative capacity
11 Mar 2027
11:00 -12:30
Times shown in local time
Open to: All
Room W4.05 (Cambridge Judge Business School)
Trumpington St
Cambridge
CB2 1AG
United Kingdom
Join our Organisational Theory and Information Systems seminar
Speaker: Professor Youngjin Yoo, London School of Economics and Political Science
About the seminar topic
In this talk, I describe the runtime economy, in which value is constituted at the moment of use, when models, data, tools, and human knowledge come together in a particular situation. Its basis is not the scarcity of these components, but the uniqueness of their combination and its fit with that moment. Generative AI makes this economy possible through two technological shifts. The semantic flip enables computation to operate on meaning through learned representations. The organic flip moves computation from fixed configurations and predetermined outputs to emergent compositions formed at runtime. Together, they make it possible to constitute contextually meaningful value that was not specified in advance.
I introduce three interrelated constructs at two levels. At the individual level, endogenous utility describes how successive interactions become more valuable as the individual and the system co-evolve. At the organisational level, generative externalities are the resulting surpluses, which exceed what the individual anticipated and what any contributor could have produced alone. They can arise from one individual’s repeated engagement with a system, and they expand both productive capacity and demand. Generative capabilities enable an organisation to produce these surpluses: to formulate new problems, compose solutions, and undertake activities previously beyond its reach.
In the runtime economy, architecture matters. Because value is constituted when resources come together at runtime, architecture determines who can bring them together, who controls their use, and who can retain and build on the learning they generate. These choices shape whether generative capabilities accumulate among participants or become concentrated in the systems they depend on. The central design problem is how to organise runtime value creation so that individuals and organisations continually expand what they can do.
Speaker bio
Youngjin Yoo is Professor of Information Systems and Innovation in the Department of Management at the London School of Economics and Political Science, where he also serves as Academic Director of LSE Lifelong Learning Digital & Innovation. He was elected a Fellow of the British Academy in 2026 and is a Fellow of the Association for Information Systems.
His research examines how digital technologies reshape the way organisations innovate and create economic value. His work on layered modular architecture, experiential computing and the digital-first ontology has contributed to the study of digital innovation, platforms and generativity. His current research develops a theory of the generative economy, examining how generative machines change the creation and distribution of value and the organisation of firms.
He has published more than 170 peer-reviewed articles, cited over 33,000 times, in journals including MIS Quarterly, Information Systems Research, Organization Science, the Academy of Management Journal and Communications of the ACM. His research has attracted over $10 million in funding from organisations including the US National Science Foundation, NASA, the Knight Foundation, the Walmart Foundation and Samsung Electronics.
Professor Yoo serves as Senior Editor of Information Systems Research and has held senior editorial roles at MIS Quarterly and the Journal of Strategic Information Systems. Before joining LSE, he held the Elizabeth M and William C Treuhaft Professorship in Entrepreneurship at Case Western Reserve University, the Harry A Cochran Professorship of Management Information Systems at Temple University, and the WBS Distinguished Research Environment Professorship at Warwick Business School. He holds a PhD in Management from the University of Maryland.
He founded xLab at Case Western Reserve University and the Urban Apps & Maps Studios at Temple University, connecting research with industry and civic practice. He also served as Chief Innovation Architect at University Hospitals Cleveland and co-founded Halo Harbour, a privacy-preserving AI platform.
Register
No registration required. If you have any questions about this seminar, please email Luke Slater.