The Business Model Canvas was originally introduced by Alexander Osterwalder in his book Business Model Generation, and was based on his earlier work on Business Model Ontology. The Business Model Canvas is a design template that lays out nine building blocks for any business, whether a for-profit company or nonprofit organization. The different dimensions of business model design include:
- Customer segments: The different types of customers that a company targets to build a successful business model
- Customer relationships: The kind of relationships the company wants to have with its customer in order to be successful
- Value propositions: The things that distinguish a company from its competitors in order to better meet the needs of its customers
- Key activities: The most important activities directly related to reinforcing a company’s value proposition
- Key partners: The buyer-supplier relationships to create competitive advantage and reduce risk
- Key resources: The most important resources needed to create customer value
- Channels: Effective channels are important to distribute a company’s value proposition in ways that are fast, efficient and cost effective. This can be done through its own channels (store front), partner channels (distributors), or a combination
- Cost structure: The most important monetary consequences while operating under different business models
- Revenue streams: The way a company makes money from each customer segment.
The Business Model Canvas has become a global standard for business design and can be used to describe, design, challenge and pivot to a new business model. Derivatives of the Business Model Canvas have been created by various organization like Adobe, for example, which uses a modified version in their innovation toolkit called Kickbox.




