Business model
rationale of how an organization creates, delivers, and captures value in economic, social, cultural or other contexts
A business model describes how a business organization creates, delivers, and captures value, in economic, social, cultural or other contexts. The model describes the specific way in which the business conducts itself, spends, and earns money in a way that generates profit. The process of business model construction and modification is also called business model innovation and forms a part of business strategy.
In theory and practice, the term business model is used for a broad range of informal and formal descriptions to represent core aspects of an organization or business, including purpose, business process, target customers, offerings, strategies, infrastructure, organizational structures, profit structures, sourcing, trading practices, and operational processes and policies including culture.
Context
The literature has provided very diverse interpretations and definitions of a business model. A systematic review and analysis of manager responses to a survey defines business models as the design of organizational structures to enact a commercial opportunity. Further extensions to this design logic emphasize the use of narrative or coherence in business model descriptions as mechanisms by which entrepreneurs create extraordinarily successful growth firms.
Business models are used to describe and classify businesses, especially in an entrepreneurial setting, but they are also used by managers inside companies to explore possibilities for future development. Well-known business models can operate as "recipes" for creative managers. Business models are also referred to in some instances within the context of accounting for purposes of public reporting.
“Business model” enters the record as rationale of how an organization creates, delivers, and captures value in economic, social, cultural or other contexts. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Business, model and rationale can confirm, complicate or overturn.
Why this record matters
“Business model” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Business, model and rationale provides the most credible route into that argument.
The record creator and administrative purpose are central evidence, because official documentation reflects both action and institutional priorities. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 14, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q815823. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference.
Official terminology may obscure informal participation, dissent or communities documented only indirectly. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Compare institutional narratives with records created by participants and affected communities. Dates and formal titles are useful anchors, but not substitutes for context.
- Event chronology
- Institutional context
- Locating named record creators
Contemporary correspondence, government or organizational records, oral histories and cited historical scholarship.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Business model”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Business model primary sources, Business model archive and Business research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Business model”?
- Which voices are present, absent or mediated by the institution?
- What chronology connects this entry to wider political or social change?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Business model” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.