Business Ecosystems (Moore)

Overview

Moore's business ecosystem framework conceptualizes industries as co-evolving communities of firms, customers, and other stakeholders that collectively create and capture value. Ecosystems progress through four stages (birth, expansion, authority, renewal), and participants occupy distinct roles — keystone, dominator, or niche player — each with different strategies and implications for ecosystem health.

When to Use

• Analyzing platform-based markets or multi-firm value creation networks
• Evaluating strategic positioning within an industry ecosystem
• Assessing why an ecosystem is thriving, stagnating, or collapsing
• Planning entry strategy into an existing ecosystem or designing a new one

When NOT to Use

• When the industry is best modeled as atomistic competition (no co-evolution)
• When the analysis focuses on a single firm's internal strategy (use RBV or dynamic capabilities)
• When formal supply chain analysis with contractual specificity is needed