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Innovation Ecosystems vs. Innovation Systems in Terms of Collaboration and
Co-creation of Value
Nataliya Smorodinskaya
Inst of Economics, RAS
smorodinskaya@gmail.com
Martha G. Russell
Stanford University
MarthaR@stanford.edu
Daniel Katukov
Inst of Economics, RAS
dkatukov@gmail.com
Kaisa Still
VTT of Finland
kaisa.still@vtt.fi
Abstract
In this paper, we explore the relevance of the term
“innovation ecosystem” to describe dynamic
collaborative networks of people and organizations
formed around projects with an innovation objective. We
present a survey of literature reviews on ecosystems
studies to clarify typical features and interpretations of
innovation ecosystems, and we highlight differences in
terms of collaboration and value co-creation. We
explore ecosystem thinking and illustrate patterns of
innovation ecosystems by describing the structure of
regional clusters, global value chains and platforms. We
offer policy insights on the role of governments in
stimulating innovation ecosystems and innovation-
conducive environments.
1. Introduction
The concept of innovation ecosystems has emerged
in early 2000s to meet the demands of emerging
knowledge-based economies, in which the production of
innovations and the associated development processes
are increasingly non-linear and network-based [1]. This
concept has remarkably enriched the idea of innovation
systems, coined in the industrial era in the research
streams of Freeman, Lundvall, Nelson, and their
followers [2–6]. In the 1990s, national or regional
innovation systems were seen as static structures
regulated by government bodies, with successful
performance depending on a critical mass of involved
actors and intentional infrastructure [1]. As a departure,
innovation ecosystems of the 2000s are considered
dynamic and agile collaborative structures that enjoy
self-governance as a necessary prerequisite for
interactive innovation [7, 8]. This approach is now
applied in innovation policies of many developed and
developing nations [9].
Meanwhile, some scholars and experts still seriously
doubt whether the introduction of the term ‘ecosystem’,
adding “eco-“ to “system”, is justified. In particular,
some papers argue that though writers on “innovation
ecosystems” have added some valuable ideas to the
innovation discussion, appending “eco-” to “innovation
systems” adds nothing of substance. Rather, “innovation
ecosystem” is a faulty analogy to natural ecosystems
[10]. A discussion on this problem of a better
terminology opened in the literature quite recently.
Against this background our paper is an attempt to
make a contribution to such discussion. With the updated
thinking of innovation (for example by the World
Economic Forum) [1], we conduct a review of literature
published from 2005 to 2016 on ecosystems,
concentrating on innovation ecosystems and
acknowledging the related terms of business ecosystem,
software ecosystem, industrial ecosystem, digital
business ecosystem, entrepreneurship ecosystem, and
knowledge ecosystem. We aim to clarify typical features
of innovation ecosystems as compared to systems and to
highlight the advantages of an ecosystemic mode of
producing innovations, while picking up interpretations
and definitions both from economic and business
literature.
2. On the definition and the variety of
ecosystems in literature
In the updated version of the Global
Competitiveness index (GCI), the World Economic
Forum draws from findings in the literature, and argues
in GCI that innovation now means not only
technological innovation but, in a broader notion, an
“ecosystem” (environment) conducive to the generation
of ideas and their implementation in the form of new
products, services, and processes in the global
marketplace [1]. This approach can be further described
with three important details: the wider-scope of
innovation, the innovation-conducive environment, and
various studies on ecosystems.
Firstly, regarding the scope of innovation, new ideas
can be generated by formal scientific R&D; they can
also result from non-R&D activities that do not require
fixed research costs yet increase the efficiency with
which a good or service is produced (such as
innovations in managerial and organizational
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Proceedings of the 50th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences | 2017
URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10125/41798
ISBN: 978-0-9981331-0-2
CC-BY-NC-ND
techniques, personnel, accounting, work practices, etc.)
The implementation of such ideas may be commercial
and non-commercial (the latter often treated as “softer”
innovation.)
Table 1. Literature reviews on the variety of ecosystems, 2005-2016
Review
Review source
Review result
(Peltoniemi, 2005) [11]
Literature review and conceptual
analysis of business ecosystem as
an organizational population model
Dynamics of conscious choice and limited
knowledge of an individual organization and
from the interconnected-ness and feedback
loops of an organization’s population;
differences in cluster and value networks
(Peltoniemi, 2006) [12]
(Manikas & Hansen, 2013)
[13]
90 papers relevant to software
ecosystem(s)
The software industry is moving towards
software ecosystems with platforms like
Google Android and Apple iOS
(Pilinkienė & Mačiulis,
2014) [14]
Literature review of ecosystem
analogies: industrial ecosystem,
innovation ecosystem, business
ecosystem, digital business
ecosystem, entrepreneurship
ecosystem
Ecosystem analogies have various scopes
and objectives having an impact on micro-
level, associated with actions of internal
actors; (eco)system can be a significant
determinant of sustainable economic
development
(Gawer, 2014) [15]
Review of management research on
technological platforms: industrial
economics and engineering design
Platforms operate along an organizational
continuum, including firms, supply chains,
and industry ecosystems
(Gawer & Cusumano,
2014) [16]
Platform-based ecosystem
innovation; review of research on
internal and external platforms
A critical issue for managers is to learn to
manage the evolution of their industry
platforms and accompanying ecosystems
and make interrelated technological and
business decisions
(Thomas, Autio, & Gann,
2014) [17]
183 publications of platforms in
management context
Four streams of platform research identified:
organizational capability, product family,
market intermediary and technology system
(Kortelainen & Järvi,
2014) [18]
72 empirical articles on ecosystems
in a business context
Research on ecosystems is still a long way
from the stage of theory testing (i.e., using
multivariate statistical methods) or of
replication studies across ecosystems
(Valkokari, 2015) [19]
Review of types of business,
innovation and knowledge
ecosystems and the relationships
between them
In order to survive and thrive in an
ecosystem, a variety of forms of interaction
are required; the interaction between various
types of ecosystems is an unexplored area
(Suominen, Seppänen, &
Dedehayir, 2016) [20]
4681 publications to look at
innovation systems literature, 427
ecosystem research articles
The literature on national, regional and
technological innovation systems, as well as
literature on corporate competitiveness and
the ecosystem approach, has both shared and
divergent intellectual roots
(Aarikka-Stenroos, Peltola,
Rikkiev, & Saari, 2016)
[21]
Systematic content analysis of 157
articles of innovation and business
ecosystems
Multidisciplinary perspectives exist on
ecosystem phenomenon; research gaps exist,
including a gap in policy-making; the
business ecosystem stream is dominant
Source: Authors’ elaboration
Secondly, an innovation-conducive environment,
comprised of ecosystems and networks, can increase
the likelihood that “softer” innovation takes place.
This environment encourages collaboration,
connectivity, critical and creative thinking, diversity,
and confrontation across different visions and angles.
By bringing new products and services to market,
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such ecosystems and networks foster productivity
though embedded technology, with efficiency gains.
Thirdly, to achieve a complete picture of an
innovation-conducive environment one needs to
consider both economic literature (which focuses
more on system incentives to spur idea generation at
the aggregate level) and business literature (which
identifies important factors that generate innovative
companies and/or motivate them to innovate).
To this end, and particularly to explore the
contemporary perception of innovation ecosystems,
we examined relevant scholarly literature in the field
of management and economics. We found eleven
(11) literature reviews, identified through previous
literature reviews themselves. For example,
Kortelainen and Järvi [18] acknowledge seven
primary reviews, while Valkokari [19] draws from
the review by Thomas, Autio and Gann [17]. In
addition, participation in scientific conferences
allowed us to include other very recent reviews. The
range of primary sources covered by reviews during
the 2005 to 2016 period is diverse, as some are based
on tens of scholarly articles, others are based on 100+
articles, and one even considers close to 5000
publications, as shown in Table 1.
Our overarching survey has highlighted a broad
variety of related terms, used simultaneously in
literature to describe organizational continua or
network interactions. Particularly, there are business
ecosystems, software ecosystems, platforms,
industrial ecosystems, digital business ecosystems,
entrepreneurship ecosystems and knowledge
ecosystems; in addition, start-up ecosystem is
mentioned [21]. Overall, these entities are seen as
vital in sustainable economic development [14].
Our findings confirm that the ecosystem idea is
often applied without clear definitions [19] and that
there is increased conceptual ambiguity of the
terminology [20]. Terms denoting different types of
ecosystems are often used interchangeably [21],
although some differences between biological and
business ecosystems are articulated [11, 12, 14]. It
has been noted that research on ecosystems is still a
long way from the stage of theory testing [18].
3. Synthesis for interpreting innovation
ecosystems
In previous writings, we viewed innovation
ecosystems as networks of sustainable linkages
between individuals and organizations, which emerge
from a shared vision of desired transformations and
provide an economic context (milieu) to catalyze
innovation and growth [22]. As applied to the variety
of inter-firm or inter-organizational networks, this
definition implies innovation ecosystems are oriented
either to the direct co-creation of innovations or to
the formation of innovation-supportive milieu [23].
As our literature review shows, innovation
ecosystems may be treated both as business networks
and as communities meant for innovation. They may
assume different scale and design, functioning as
regional innovation hubs, nation-wide innovation
communities, local inter-firm networks, very small
network-based ad-hoc groups of individuals, or
global wide networks [7].
However, neither geography nor industry sector
expose the essence of innovation ecosystems as
compared to systems. Noticeably, in management
studies, one of the primary motivations for
addressing the ecosystem concept has been the desire
to explore self-organizing properties of natural
ecosystems [24]. In studies on innovation dealing
with generation and implementation of new ideas,
ecosystems are usually considered a means for co-
creation and market introduction of inventions [1].
Literature on economic competitiveness incorporates
the idea of ecosystems in the context of the broad
impact of digital technologies (IT, ICT) on the
changing nature of innovation process, especially
regarding implications of non-linear innovation for
alternative organizational designs. Such thinking is
reflected in modern production systems at all levels
(firms, clusters, regions, national economies, global
economy).
Summarizing the relevant points in literature, as
they highlight the origin and properties of innovation
ecosystems, we come to the following conclusion. In
the age of non-linear innovation and digital
technologies, innovation can be better nurtured
within a special, innovation-conducive environment.
Such an environment may be seen as an ecosystem
meant for co-creation of value through collaboration.
The concept of value co-creation is basically
associated with a business strategy focusing on
interactive relationships between producers and
consumers (the latter are becoming productive
workers, or prosumers, who are granted authority by
companies to articulate their specific requirements
and at times contribute to design considerations).
Initially elaborated by the business and market
literature, this concept started to gain momentum in
the post-2000 period, expanding further in its two
dimensions, as both the idea of value co-production
and the idea of value-in-use [25].
According to an updated definition, as introduced
in management studies, particularly by LSE
Enterprise [26], co-creation of value is an active,
creative and social process, based on collaboration
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between producers and users, which is initiated by
the firm to generate value for customers and compete
to pass others in the category (i.e., the Nike approach
constitutes a full spectrum of customer involvement
and competition). While consumers benefit from
greater personalization and value, companies build
competitive advantage by turning just-in-time
knowledge from customers into just-in-time learning
for their organizations. Relationships for co-creation
may also be established between and among
businesses and service organizations. Such
collaboration might include global introduction,
competitive analytics and tolerance for inefficiency.
The co-creation concept highlights not only the
frequency of interaction, but also the quality of
relationships between companies and their customers,
or among companies, to determine how knowledge is
created, shared and transferred [27]. In terms of
modern economics literature, this concept can be
applied to the architecture of the innovation-led
economy based on customized products. In this
sense, the co-creation process may imply the
possibility of collaboration between different types of
actors across the economy, enabling them to co-
produce new goods and values, i.e., innovations.
In turn, collaboration, taken in a broad sense,
denotes various forms of interactive communication
between networked actors. For example, some
experts argue [27] that collaboration is important for
both R&D and non-R&D innovation but each type
uses different networks. In a more exact definition,
collaboration is seen as the most developed form of
interactive cooperation. It implies that in order to co-
create innovations, networked actors must rely on a
common vision, strategy, common identity, and joint
obligations [28].
To further explain the term of innovation
ecosystems and its implications, we have developed
additional perspectives.
3.1 ‘Innovation ecosystem’ as a metaphor
for collaborative innovation networks
Ecosystems can’t be deliberately established as
system-like organizations. Rather they emerge as
innovation-conducive environments in the course of
collaboration among networked actors. Meanwhile,
collaborative networks themselves, tailored to co-
creation of value in various forms and ways, can and
should be treated as modern agile organizations
typical of the 21st century. One of the first
descriptions of such dynamic and innovative entities
appeared in early 1990s in the “New Society of
Organizations” by P. Drucker [29], in which he
underlined the ability of such organizations for
continual “creative destruction” and predicted their
future global domination.
Later, a more exact term of ‘collaborative
innovation networks’ appeared in literature to denote
typical organizational forms of production in the age
of digital technologies. This term was popularized by
Gloor in 2006 [30] and further explored conceptually
[31] and empirically [32] by other authors. Such
networks may be local, national, transnational or
global; they may have different configuration and
patterns of collaboration [31]. Their growing
proliferation implies that in the 21st century,
innovative goods, technologies and values will be
typically co-created through collaborations of
networked entities that form relatively sustainable
ecosystems of actors, linkages and assets [33].
Since innovativeness of networks can be revealed
only through their collaboration activities, we can
consider them innovation ecosystems and use this
term as a metaphor for denoting their specific
organizational and functional features, as compared
to systems. Ecosystems are tailored to interactive co-
creation of values, while systems are not.
Taken as a metaphor of collaborative networks,
the term ‘innovation ecosystem’ provides a highly
useful image to draw a difference between the rigid
hierarchical design of economic systems in the age of
linear development and their dynamic network-based
architecture in the 21st century. Hence, this term helps
to highlight the newly emerging economic milieu, in
which innovative goods and values are created at the
level of networks capable of shaping an effective
ecosystem. “Eco” stands to emphasize the non-linear
nature of innovation and the crucial role of
collaboration in producing innovations to achieve
sustainable development in non-linear environments.
The ability of collaborative networks to adapt
themselves to a non-linear environment implies they
assume certain features of complex adaptive systems -
agility, self-organization, self-governance, and
synergy effects [34]. When it comes to such
ecosystems as innovation clusters, cluster literature
(originated by Porter and followers) directly
interprets them as complex dynamic systems, noting
their unique synergy effects [35–37].
Also important, collaborative networks that form
an ecosystem of actors and linkages to co-create
innovations are designed as temporary projects,
around a common project idea. For this reason, the
emanating network economy is also called a project
economy [38], as an alternative to a traditional
economy, in which interactions are not necessarily
collaborative and long-term systems are intended.
Collaborative networks and their ecosystems are
distinguished by different design, functional purpose
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and pattern of collaboration. These differences can be
easily seen when comparing regional innovation
clusters, global value chains and digital platforms.
3.1.1. Innovation clusters as formalized
innovation ecosystems. Innovation clusters are
geographically localized agglomerations of
collaborating firms and organizations, which enjoy a
highly developed pattern of collaboration, associated
with a triple-helix model, i.e. an interactive pairwise
collaboration between three types of networked
institutional actors, namely companies, research
centers and authorities [39]. As follows from cluster
literature [37], innovation clusters constitute a special
variety of innovation ecosystems, in which triple-
helix interactions enable unique economic effects of
innovation synergy, or co-creation of innovative
goods and services on a continual basis. According
to this literature, among the various kinds of
collaborative networks only innovation clusters can
provide a sustainable rise in productivity based on a
continual innovation [40]. Initial systemic findings
[41] confirm that successful innovation clusters can
function as poles of growth for a given region.
Open innovation clusters are considered the
most convenient ecosystem model both for
continuous co-creation of innovations and for
disseminating them across an economy. These
ecosystems are shaped by collaborative partners of
various profiles, who are free to join and leave the
open cluster network [40]. According to observations
[42–44], mature clusters have a sophisticated
ecosystem of functional linkages, formed both by
deeply embedded actors and by flagship firms that
have already expanded beyond the cluster’s bounds
and are reinvesting money in their business projects
By virtue of the coordinating work of cluster
organizations, a co-located group of companies is
able to transform itself into a self-governed and self-
sustainable network that can achieve innovation
synergy. Due to their relationships developed as
ecosystems, entities in agile innovation clusters can
combine and rapidly recombine their shared assets in
varied and novel configurations and, in this way, can
flexibly start new venture business projects to meet
the rapidly changing market demands. Their “design”
is evolved through a combination of market forces,
organizational efforts of triple helix actors [45], and
value transactions [46].
3.1.2. Global value chains as innovation
ecosystems of cross-cluster collaboration. Regional
innovation clusters are seeking to develop their
specializations in ways that enable them to become
geographically localized network nodes of global
value chains (GVCs). The latter are the result of
globalization, when traded goods and services are no
longer produced or consumed within a single country
but instead, through dispersion of the production
processes and marketing, across several countries.
GVCs are now horizontally crossing countries and
territories, with value added flows circulating
between their cluster nodes. Meanwhile, GVCs
themselves constitute a special kind of collaborative
networks, and therefore, a kind of ecosystem to co-
create value.
GVCs emerged in the late industrial era due to
outsourcing business practices. Initially, they were
governed by hierarchic multinationals that were
building vertical systems of actors under their
control, while looking for expansion in size at local,
not yet globalized markets. Nowadays, multinationals
tend to become more horizontally dispersed and
network-based [47].
One can see a GVC as a horizontally dispersed
ecosystem for value co-creation, formed by a
network of legally independent and functionally
interdependent actors that are collaborating across
countries and territories within a common project.
The participating actors create initial and
intermediary products (knowledge, technologies,
goods, services) that move along the chain in an
upstream way, generating flows of a consecutively
added value, until the final product is co-created and
delivered to external customers, embedding
productivity into a dynamic cluster ecosystem.
3.1.3. Platforms as ecosystems for value co-
creation. Digital platforms are oftentimes regarded
as technological systems, as a technical artifact, “as
the extensible code-based system that provides core
functionality shaped by the modules that interoperate
with it, and the interfaces through which they
interoperate” [48, p. 677]. Increasingly they are also
seen as management and economic concepts, creating
value by providing products and services that enable
two or more different types of customers to find each
other and exchange value [49]. Importantly, the
overall value of platform requires players, such as
developers who build tools, to operationalize the
exchange [50]. Conceptualization of platforms has
been developed separately by two streams of
academic literature – industrial economics and
engineering design.
The industrial economics perspective associates
platforms with a new, network type of markets (two-
sided or multi-sided), focusing on how platforms
create value by coordinating transactions between
two or more groups of consumers who would not
have been able to connect without the platform. This
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literature highlights that platforms generate a virtuous
cycle of indirect, or cross-group network effects (the
value that consumers and the platform owner can
capture increases with increasing customer bases),
which dynamically reinforces incumbents’ early-
gained advantages.
The engineering design perspective views
platforms as purposefully designed modular
architectures organized around a ‘core’ (the platform
leader) and a ‘periphery of users’ (which complement
the platform leader), providing a respective
technological interface between these two sides. This
literature posits that platforms can network and
coordinate users not just in the role of consumers but
first of all in the role of suppliers and innovators, thus
helping firms to achieve the economy of scope
effects and facilitate innovation [51].
The literature on platforms distinguishes three
broad types of platforms, namely platforms within
firms (like Sony Walkman’s platform servicing
constituent sub-units of one firm in consumer
electronics), platforms across supply chains,
including GVCs (like Boeing’s platform for the GVC
in aerospace manufacturing, or Renault-Nissan’s
platform for the GVC in automotive manufacturing),
and industry-wide platforms (like Facebook’s
platform across the sector of social networking) [52].
Industry-wide platforms are considered as generators
of the most open ecosystems. They are defined as
technological building blocks (technologies,
products, or services), which act as a foundation for
organized array of interdependent firms (sometimes
called an industry ‘‘ecosystem’’) to develop a set of
inter-related products, technologies and services [15].
On top of this, there exists a special class of
platforms for joint action, tailored to overcome
coordination problems and to directly support
collaboration in the process of the project realization
[52]. These platforms enable cluster participants to
better exploit potential linkages among existing
capabilities and to make better decisions on investing
into new capabilities, taking into account the
externalities of such actions across the cluster [53].
These platforms aim to provide innovation synergy
effects that lead to individual and aggregate
‘competitiveness upgrading’ across the cluster [37].
Insights from different research streams move us
closer to understanding platforms from the
perspective of value co-creation. Platforms can form
or promote the emergence of ecosystems enabling the
co-production of innovations [25]. Much of this
ability concerns the value-in-use dimension of the
value co-creation concept, i.e., using and transferring
value. Cluster platforms for joint action enable
networked actors (producers, suppliers, customers) to
exchange their knowledge, transfer value and
reshuffle their resources for the purpose of direct co-
production of innovations [45].
Overall, digital platforms are redesigning
traditional industrial landscapes towards ecosystemic
perspective. Literatures on platforms and ecosystems
have started to merge and have introduced the term
‘platform ecosystem’ (for example Basole & Karla
54). Scholars are examining platform roles in
ecosystems that generate large populations of
networked users, who carry different functions and
interact in a wide variety of ways to co-create value.
This makes it reasonable to associate platforms with
innovation ecosystems rather than with technological
systems. And as studies on platforms suggest
(McKinsey Global Institute, 2015 55), the digital
sector provides several widely recognized examples
of platforms and their associated platform leaders,
such as Apple, Facebook, or Google (which became
Alphabet) with each of these leaders playing an
orchestrating role within a network of firms and
individual innovators that have come to be
collectively referred to as the platform’s “innovation
ecosystem” [56].
3.2 Transition of economies to ecosystem
organizational design
Although the word ‘ecosystem’ derives
linguistically from biological ecology, the use of this
term in the context of innovation is not about
connotations with Darwin’s natural order. Rather it
reflects the growing organizational complexity of
economic systems, which denotes the formation of a
new, more sophisticated social order, based on
network coordination [27].
The shift of the technological paradigm [57]
associated with non-linear innovation and
proliferation of digital technologies is occurring hand
in hand with a concomitant shift in the paradigm of
social interactions. While industrial economies of
mass production rested on a combination of market
and hierarchic patterns of coordination, the emerging
innovation-intensive economies (also called post-
industrial systems, or knowledge-based economies)
rely on a more sophisticated, network pattern of
social coordination, constituting a functional hybrid
between rigid hierarchies and atomistic markets [58,
59]. As applied to these changes, the term
‘innovation ecosystem’ can be used to denote the
ongoing organizational transformation of economies
into network-based production systems. This change
is accompanied by a deconstruction of hierarchies
both at micro- and macro-levels of social activity. In
a growing number of countries private firms and
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public bodies are meeting the challenge of
restructuring, transforming themselves from
vertically built entities into more flexible and
horizontally oriented [47, 60].
The newly emerging design of economies can be
called ecosystemic, to emphasize the crucial role of
networking and dynamic connectivity between actors
(including interpersonal linkages) to work within the
dispersed non-linear space. As a result, an
innovation-conducive context is emerging. This
context implies an inclusive institutional environment
in the terms of Acemoglu and Robinson [61], or the
idea of building ‘commons’ in terms of Ostrom [62],
or simpler, the culture of win-win games in economic
and political markets to meet challenges of the global
competition.
As rigid vertical hierarchies, typical of the
industrial era, are being replaced by agile horizontal
networks, the traditional patterns of governance are
giving way to collective decision-making, in which
investment priorities, lines of business activity and
conventions are defined through interactive
consensus-building among networked actors. This
non-hierarchic model of governance, associated with
proliferation of platform-based communication, is
often called collaborative governance [63].
Collaborative governance in its various patterns
is now emerging for region-wide or national-wide
innovation ecosystems that are gradually evolving
within countries and territories under government
support. Collaboratively governed ecosystems
provide an alternative to the former, “linear”
innovation systems of regional or national scale,
which governments have tried to develop not through
promoting collaboration and connectivity but through
initiatives that concentrated on the individual roles of
actors, or the establishment of innovative
infrastructure or structures as such [64].
3.3 The new mission of governments in the
age of ecosystems. Policy implications.
The global trend in the transformation of the
hierarchical systems of the past into network-based
and self-supportive ecosystems of the post-industrial
era doesn’t mean that the governments are becoming
less active. On the contrary, governments’ best
interests require being even more proactive now than
in the late industrial epoch, associated with
liberalization of markets. However, the functional
purpose and the manner of government interventions
into markets are drastically changing.
In the industrial age, various national
governments, especially in developing economies,
took the upper hand in defining strategic priorities for
the private sector, which was associated with a
classical model of industrial policy. During times
when modernization in many developing economies
had been driven by their market-oriented transition,
direct state interventions into industrial structures
have been replaced by mild indirect initiatives aimed
at building a better institutional environment.
The situation has changed in recent years, when
all types of economies (developed, developing and
those in transition) have been faced with a common
need to accelerate their transition to knowledge-based
systems and adapt themselves to the non-linear
world. At the organizational level, this challenge is
concerned with promotion of a network-based and
ecosystem-oriented transformation. As a result, since
2010s, a new model of industrial policy has emerged
in many developed and developing countries, one
which seeks to upgrade their industrial structure and
enhance competitiveness through a collaborative
organizational environment for a continual
innovation [65].
The new industrial policy is not limited to
manufacturing or to material goods. Rather it's about
acceleration of the ecosystem-oriented restructuring
in the whole industrial (economic) landscape,
implying that under this new design the market forces
will self-discover the most innovative business
projects and re-direct resources into those projects
and industries [66]. Under this policy, national
governments don't seek to build specialized
innovation clusters in "priority" industries, but
instead help localities create platforms and
infrastructures for networking and collaboration.
Though modern industrial policy is aimed at
generating macro-level structural shifts, it is based on
removing barriers at the micro-level, in order to
cultivate organizational and social transformations
through inter-firm and inter-organizational
networking. The ecosystem approach implies that
network linkages interconnect the micro- and macro
levels of economies, corresponding to the core idea
of Porter’s Diamond model of competitiveness [40].
4. Concluding findings
The term “innovation ecosystem” symbolizes the
newly emerging, network mode of arranging business
activity and economic governance, which enables
companies and territories to master innovation-led
growth and benefit from rapid technological changes.
This mode requires horizontal and inclusive
economic thinking, as well as enabling certain
organizational continua, relevant for interactive
innovation and dispersed patterns of production.
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Innovation ecosystems can’t be referred to as
subjects of decision and action. Rather they are
special organizational spaces, tailored to co-creation
of values through collaboration. More exactly, they
constitute a sophisticated milieu of actors, assets and
linkages, generated by collaborative activities of
networks. Such networks of various forms, sizes and
profiles can play the role of modern-type
organizations meant for a collective decision-making
and collective action, and innovation ecosystems
should be seen as the native environment of such
networks. However, since collaborative networks and
their ecosystems are functionally inseparable (in
terms of interactive co-creation of value), both terms
may be perceived and used interchangeably. This
admission corresponds to findings in literature on
complexity, viewing collaborative networks as
complex adaptive systems that are inseparable from
their changing environment by definition [66].
A multifaceted variety of ecosystem models,
meant for various functional purposes, is now
emerging and developing. Irrespective of their
dispersed titles in different research streams, most of
them can be referred to the class of innovation
ecosystems, since the modern non-linear pattern of
economic activity and economic growth is inherently
connected with innovation. Our exploration of this
variety through comparison of three different cases
(platforms, clusters and value chains) suggests that
all ecosystem models are complementary and
predetermine each other in terms of design, pattern of
collaboration and functionality.
Digital platforms, while coordinating broad
groups of networked actors that interact in different
functional combinations (consumers-consumers,
consumers-producers, producers-producers), can be
easily seen as universal tools to generate various
kinds of ecosystems at various levels of social and
economic activity. Platform-generated or platform-
enhanced ecosystems have their own platforms
tailored either to co-usage or to co-production of
innovations, or both. Regional clusters of triple-helix
design can form advanced and convenient
ecosystems to co-create innovations continuously,
allowing clusters to serve as multi-faceted tools for
upgrading industrial structures of modern economies.
Meanwhile, collaboration between clusters of
different geographical locations leads to the
evolvement of GVCs and global production networks
that can shape more powerful ecosystems, able to co-
create innovations continuously across the world.
Collaborative networks and hence innovation
ecosystems may evolve and proliferate in the future
across all sectors and levels of modern economies, be
they region-wide, country-wide, or global-wide.
Plainly speaking, networks and their ecosystems
shape the modern mode of production, making
economies both more cohesive to meet the challenges
of high uncertainty, and more innovative to become
globally competitive and self-sustainable. Overall,
innovation ecosystems concern the social,
organizational and cultural shifts that facilitate the
formation of the knowledge-based economy.
Social and economic ecosystems are surely not
the same as natural ones. But both types are
populations able to self-organize and self-develop in
a similar, agile manner of complex adaptive systems,
associated with inter-relationship of elements, as well
as with the ability to adapt in and evolve with a
changing environment [66], with mutual respect. In
particular, the ecosystems can obtain new sources for
growth and achieve dynamic sustainability through
internal, self-correcting structural changes – rather
than through top-down intervention of any
centralized bodies, or from an external intervention,
as typical for traditional systems.
All this supports the rationale for using the term
‘ecosystem’ far beyond a mere metaphor to systems,
to highlight both the network-based organizational
design and the collaborative organizational culture
of the emerging innovation-led economies. Because
of its relevance for the contemporary reality, it is no
surprise that this term is widely popular in
management studies and economics communities, as
shown in our literature review.
Nevertheless, returning to publications that argue
in favor of the classical term 'innovation systems', we
admit that this option may still be regarded as a
problem of academic taste in introducing
contemporary realities. Some researchers may find it
convenient to consider ecosystems as a new
generation of systems and may respond by describing
their growing complexity and ever changing features
in the era of non-linear innovation. Others may prefer
to call them ecosystems from the outset and underline
the key role of collaborative interactions and value
co-creation, including the historically new enabling
role of government interventions.
In our view, the idea of ecosystems provides a
much better image for effective policymaking across
countries. It offers instructive insights on the framing
and implementation of further research on
innovation. Additionally, it acquires an especially
important practical notion for the post-Soviet and
other transition economies (in contrast to the situation
in US and other technologically advanced nations), in
which innovation systems are often perceived as
special infrastructure projects realized by
governments, and not as the result of networking and
collaborative dialogue developed across the society.
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