The Degree-of-Engagement diagram

Universities and the industry are increasingly collaborating in innovation ecosystems that aim to develop sustainable technology to contribute to solving societal challenges.

New business models are seen as boundary-spanning devices that can demonstrate the value potential of new sustainable technology and facilitate its breakthrough (Bidmon & Knab, 2018). However, sustainable business models require a multi-stakeholder perspective and need to integrate economic, environmental, and social value (Evans et al., 2017; Breuer et al., 2018). A key challenge for innovation ecosystems is to manage their relationships with stakeholders as these have different and sometimes conflicting interests and value goals (Ritala et al., 2013). As most tools for stakeholder mapping and collaborative business modeling do not facilitate changes in the innovation ecosystem’s stakeholders and partner roles over time (Breuer et al., 2018), practitioners need a tool that helps to span and to manage the boundaries of the innovation ecosystem.