Let me make some guesses, although I worry I'll only say some formal things you already know (or that are wrong). 

One description of the Waldhausen K-theory of a pointed connected space $X$ is that it is the algebraic K-theory of the group algebra $\mathbb{S}[\Omega X]$ of its loop space over the sphere spectrum. Module spectra over $\mathbb{S}[\Omega X]$ have the following equivalent descriptions:

 * Representations of $\Omega X$ on spectra.
 * Families of spectra over $X$ (Koszul duality).

What Waldhausen seems to mean by "linearization" is passing from the sphere spectrum to $\mathbb{Z}$. Now we want to look at the algebraic K-theory of the group algebra $\mathbb{Z}[\Omega X]$. A more familiar avatar of this, passing through stable Dold-Kan, is chains $C_{\bullet}(\Omega X)$. Module spectra over this group algebra have the following equivalent descriptions:

 * Representations of $\Omega X$ on $\mathbb{Z}$-module spectra.
 * Representations of $\Omega X$ on chain complexes over $\mathbb{Z}$ (stable Dold-Kan).
 * Under a connectivity hypothesis, representations of $\Omega X$ on simplicial abelian groups (ordinary Dold-Kan).
 * Under a connectivity hypothesis, representations of $\Omega X$ on topological abelian groups (simplicial ~ topological).
 * Families of topological abelian groups over $X$, or abelian groups in families of spaces over $X$ (Koszul duality).