Are Services Functions?

This paper proposes an ontological definition of services. Such a definition is one of the fundamentals of service research. The understanding of essentialities of the notion of services as its definition, which differentiates services from the other notions, contributes proper modeling and conceptualization of services in services design and knowledge management of services. The existing definitions and characteristics of services, however, cannot differentiate services from other concepts: especially function of product. In this paper, we propose a new definition of services based on ontological consideration. Our definition can differentiate services from product functions. Firstly, we discuss the problem of the existing definitions and characteristics about the distinction. Secondly, we explain our definition and the essential characteristics of services using an ontological model of services. Lastly, we demonstrate its applicability of our definition using some examples and compare it with the existing definitions.