SVEL – Introducing the Standardised Visualising Ecosystem Language for Temporally Capturing Competitive Dynamics in Evolving Innovation Ecosystems

Abstract

We propose a visual method, namely the Standardised Visual Ecosystem Language (SVEL), for capturing and analysing the static structure, structural changes, and dynamic forces and effects in evolving innovation ecosystems. SVEL closes a gap in the methods toolbox of researchers, practitioners, and policy makers that we identified from conducting a systematic review and evaluation of 32 relevant visual methods, namely the capture and analysis of processes affecting industrial organisation and interfirm alignment in evolving ecosystems.

We demonstrate SVEL’s effectiveness and practicability by validating it in a case study from the commercial aircraft aftermarket sector. In this sector, manufacturers transform to offering services in a bundle with their products in a process called servitization, thereby triggering competitive tensions with established specialist services firms, which we label Incumbent Service Providers (ISP). Empirical data was collected from ten semi-structured, in-depth interviews with senior managers and decision-makers at one large, established, and leading OEM-independent ISP.

The results of our study are two-fold. First, we introduce SVEL that consists of three clusters of standardised symbols: (i) structural elements, (ii) dynamic forces and effects, and (iii) structural changes. Second, using the SVEL we produce a set of four aggregated innovation ecosystem maps that visually capture the static structure of the commercial aircraft aftermarket ecosystem prior to servitization, and the dynamic co-evolutionary processes triggered by manufacturers entering as new competitors to ISPs during servitization.

Thus, we contribute to the methodology literature by narrowing the gap in the methods toolbox for researchers and practitioners in the field of innovation ecosystems by proposing and demonstrating SVEL as a visual method for capturing and analysing changes to industrial organisation and dynamic co-evolutionary processes.