The business ecosystem shares many unique features with the biological ecosystem due to its origins. Similar to the biological ecosystem, the business ecosystem also emphasizes symbiotic relationships among symbionts (i.e., participants of a business ecosystem). In this study, we have broadened and deepened our knowledge of symbiosis in a business ecosystem, focusing on how each relationship develops and evolves through the interaction between keystone species and symbionts. We have introduced the typology of symbiotic relationships and highlighted the significant role of keystone species in business ecosystems. We defined three symbiosis types based on the analysis results: mutualism, commensalism, and parasitism. The findings indicated that each relationship continuously transitions into different symbiotic relationships as the relationship between the participants changes. The results also showed that a keystone species, a leader of a business ecosystem, can contribute to the success of a business ecosystem by strategically managing their relationship with symbionts.

In recent years, the innovation ecosystem concept has received much attention in the strategy and innovation fields to address radical or discontinuous innovation. This study aims to explore the innovation ecosystem construct of incumbents in the face of technological discontinuities, focusing on the ecosystem actors (that is, incumbents, component providers, and complementors) and their activities for sustainable value creation. First, we conducted a literature review of 34 highly cited and relevant research documents discussing the innovation ecosystem concept to extract key phrases for the innovation ecosystem’s research framework. Then, through the lens of dynamic capabilities, the five core capabilities of incumbent focal firms—collaboration and networking, opportunity sensing, entrepreneurial orientation, knowledge management, and strategic flexibility—are derived as key elements of the research framework. In addition, the following case study conducted by the content analysis of two leading automobile incumbents, Volkswagen and Toyota, supports and concretizes the established research framework. We conclude that as the value chain in the industry is open to diverse emerging experts holding critical technologies in the era of discontinuous innovation, the ecosystem actors are extensively linked beyond existing industry boundaries. Next, incumbents’ proposed five core capabilities are essential for their successful navigation of the complex innovation ecosystem. Finally, the case study also indicates that the traditional automobile giants in the existing ecosystem are heading toward sustainable value creation via technology internalization and dominant platform building to transform themselves into leaders of a new innovation ecosystem in the era of Connected, Autonomous, Shared and Services, and Electric (C.A.S.E.) innovation in the automobile industry.

We consider the node clustering problem that arises in designing a survivable two-level telecommunication network. The problem simultaneously determines an optimal partitioning of the whole network into clusters (local networks) and hub locations in each cluster. Intercluster traffic minimization is chosen as the clustering criterion to improve the service quality. Various constraints on the clustering are considered which reflect both the physical structures of local networks, such as the connectivity requirement, and the node compatibility relations such as community of interest or policy. Additional constraints may be imposed on the hub selection to ensure network survivability. We propose an integer programming formulation of the problem by decomposing the entire problem into a master problem and a number of column generation problems. The master problem is solved by column generation and the column generation problems by branch-and-cut. We develop and use strong cutting-planes for the cluster generation subproblems. Computational results using real data are reported.