Abstract
In this paper we present a framework that attempts to explain the impact of digital platforms on the evolution of an industrial cluster. The topic of the organizational role of IT along a company life-cycle is very well known in the IS field, research on IT enabling the evolution of meta-organizations is still limited, while a number of digital platforms - often also referred as social networks (or social networking services) - are broadly in use to support the collaboration among different companies. To understand the evolving role of digital platforms along the life cycle of an industrial cluster we applied the methodology of the Design Science Research process to design a framework based on two dimensions. The first is Venkatraman's model of IT-enabled business transformation, applied to a cluster instead to a single firm (as in Venkatraman's original proposition). The second dimension is based on a model of clusters life cycles. Matching the two dimensions leads to a four-quadrants matrix and eventually to the identification of a possible path that a cluster follows during its life.