The Service Design (SD) stage of the ITIL lifecycle is explicitly focused on the design and development of new IT services and the improvement of existing ones. This stage acts as the blueprint, translating strategic objectives from the Service Strategy phase into a concrete plan. It involves creating the service solution, management systems, processes, and procedures required to deliver and support the service effectively. Key activities include designing the service architecture, defining service level agreements (SLAs), and ensuring the new service is fit for purpose and fit for use before it moves to the transition phase.

B. Service transition (ST): This stage focuses on building, testing, and deploying the designed services into the live environment, not on the initial creation or design of the service and its procedures.

C. Service strategy (SS): This stage is concerned with defining the high-level strategy, policies, and objectives for IT services, determining which services to offer, rather than designing the specifics of their creation.

D. Service operation (SO): This stage focuses on the day-to-day management, maintenance, and support of services that are already live and in use by customers.

1. AXELOS. (2011). ITIL® Service Design (2011 ed.). TSO (The Stationery Office). Section 3.1

"Purpose and objectives of service design

" states

"The purpose of the service design stage of the service lifecycle is the design of new or changed services for introduction into the live environment."

2. University of Washington. (n.d.). ITIL Service Lifecycle. IT Connect. Retrieved from https://itconnect.uw.edu/learn/training/itil/itil-service-lifecycle/. The documentation describes Service Design as the stage that "provides a blueprint for new or changed services."

3. Barafort

B.

& de la Vina

A. L. (2011). A Maturity Model for IT Service Management based on ITIL V3. In Software Process Improvement and Capability Determination (pp. 26-37). Springer

Berlin

Heidelberg. The paper outlines the ITIL V3 lifecycle

describing Service Design's role in defining and documenting services before they are built and implemented. (DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-24647-54)

4. University of Texas at Austin. (n.d.). ITIL Foundation - Service Design. IT Service Management Documentation. This resource explains that Service Design's purpose is "to design IT services

together with the governing IT practices

processes and policies

to realize the service provider's strategy."