Research On The Effects Of Enterprise's Innovation Ecosystem Strategy On The Competitive Advantage

Peter Drucker,the father of modern management,believed that great changes taking place in business and industry were driven by the acceleration of partnerships.Philip Kotler,another management master,added that the only sustainable competitive advantage of a company was the good relationships with consumers and business partners in the current era.Those views also revealed that the changes in corporate competition from industrial economy era to network economy era,were updated from“competition between products/supply chains” to “competition between innovation ecosystems”.In recent years,the term “innovation ecosystem strategy” appears frequently in academic research and enterprise management practice.Guided by the traditional competitive strategy with “self-profit competition” as the core,the acquisition of competitive advantages is based on “defeating all competitors”,while the innovation ecosystem strategy with “win-win symbiosis” as the core advocates “winning users” and“maximizing ecological value” to gain competitive advantages.Theoretically,the researches on innovation ecosystem strategy are underdeveloped,and pay little attention on the definition,dimensions and effects of innovation ecosystem strategy on competitive advantages.In practice,Microsoft,P&G,Xiaomi and many other enterprises have carried out the exploration of the innovation ecosystem strategy and made many achievements,which urgently needs to form a development model for other enterprises.Concerning the deficiency of theoretical development and problems in practice,from the perspective of the focal firm,the paper is written in accordance with the main line of“construct of innovation ecosystem strategy--static analysis of effect mechanism--dynamic analysis of evolution”,combining with the theories of innovation ecosystem,value co-creation,inter-organizational dependence and dynamic capability,to solve the core issue of “How does the innovation ecosystem strategy effect on competitive advantages?” The contents are as follows:First,it systematically sorts out domestic and foreign relevant researches on competitive advantage theory,innovation ecosystem theory,innovation ecosystem strategy,value co-creation theory,inter-organizational dependence theory and dynamic capability theory according to the development of the theory.Second,taking an analysison five typical enterprises by using grounded theory,this paper sets up the construct of enterprise's innovation ecosystem strategy and proposes the theoretical model of“enterprise's innovation ecosystem strategy-(stimulate)synergistic effect-competitive advantage”.Third,based on the static perspective,the data of 208 valid responses are statistically analyzed by using a multiple linear regression model to test the effects of the innovation ecosystem strategy on competitive advantage and the mediating effects of synergy effect between the innovation ecosystem strategy and competitive advantage.Finally,based on the dynamic perspective,the longitudinal single-case study is adopted to analyze the dynamic evolution process of enterprise's innovation ecosystem strategy and effects on competitive advantage.The following five main conclusions are obtained in this paper:(1)The innovation ecosystem researches have formed a theoretical system of multi-disciplines and multi-fields integration.(2)The innovation ecosystem strategy is an aggregate multidimensional construct,including(ecosystem's)value proposition,organizational coupling and network orchestration.(3)(Ecosystem's)value proposition,organizational coupling and network orchestration have positive effects on efficiency and sustainability of competitive advantage respectively.Network orchestration has the highest degree of effects on competitive advantage,organization coupling has the lowest degree of effects on competitive advantage,and(ecosystem's)value proposition has the degree of effects on competitive advantage between the former two.(4)(Stimulating)Synergy effect plays a partial mediating role between(ecosystem's)value proposition,organizational coupling,network orchestration and competitive advantage(efficiency and sustainability).(5)At different stages of the life cycle,the intensity of(ecosystem's)value proposition changes from strong to weak to strong,the intensity of organizational coupling changes from weak to strong to weak,and the intensity of network orchestration changes from weak to strong to weak.The intensity of synergy effect changes from weak to strong to weak.The degree of efficiency and sustainability varies from weak to strong.(Ecosystem's)value proposition,organizational coupling and network orchestration,have the characteristic of ambidexterity,which are “customer demand-oriented + technology innovation-oriented”,“open coupling + centralized coupling” and “extrusion mechanism + benefit mechanism”in turn.The focus firm presents a roles transformation path of “the(strategy)sponsor--thedominator/the regulator-the leader-the(new strategy)sponsor”.At the same time,dynamic capabilities of the focal firm play a moderating role between the innovation ecosystem strategy and competitive advantage.During the period of initiation and renewal,dynamic capabilities of focal firm are represented as opportunity-recognizing capability.During the period of expansion and leadership,they are represented as opportunity-recognizing capability and opportunity-capitalizing capability.In this paper,the main contributions are the following two aspects:(1)The logical framework of competitive advantage theory under ecology-based view is developed by setting up the construct of innovation ecosystem strategy and taking quantitative analysis on effects of innovation ecosystem strategy on competitive advantage.It is proposed that the isolating mechanism which drives competitive advantages changes from “resource isolation” based on the resource-based view to “ecosystem isolation” based on the ecology-based view.(2)It shows that different from a single “competitive advantage”produced by the traditional competitive strategy,the innovation ecosystem strategy can produce a combined “competitive advantage” which consists of cost advantage,differentiation advantage and ecological advantage.The results also provide useful inspirations for enterprise strategic management in practice:(1)The innovation ecosystem strategy reveals that the competition changes from “self-profit competition” to “value co-creation” and provides practical enlightenment for the enterprise strategic logic and competition paradigm transformation.(2)The traditional competitive strategy makes it impossible for enterprises to solve the problem of “making bricks without straw”,and the innovation ecosystem strategy will bring the challenge of “dancing with wolves” to enterprises.Therefore,it requires to take measures to deal with potential risks in the innovation ecosystem strategy.