Scalability of Digital Twins for Physical Infrastructure Management: A Dynamic Governance Approach

Digital advancements have demonstrated the potential of predicting the condition and status of physical critical infrastructures, in real-time. One notable application is sensor data to create Digital Twins (digital replicas of physical assets), which offer real-time insights into asset conditions, and drive asset management of critical infrastructures. However, despite their potential, infrastructure organizations encounter challenges in Digital Twin upscaling, due to fragmented data and disparate IT standards. This paper investigates the role of dynamic IT governance in addressing these challenges, focusing on a Dutch organization managing critical infrastructure. From our in-depth case study emerge data fragmentation and limited scalability of Digital Twins as critical for reaping the benefits of technology advancement. Our study highlights the necessity of appropriate IT governance mechanisms to overcome these issues. By conceptualizing these constructs from a dynamic governance perspective, this paper aims to provide both theoretical and practical insights for effective upscaling of Digital Twins.