{"id":1182,"date":"2021-01-09T10:55:11","date_gmt":"2021-01-09T10:55:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/janbosch.com\/blog\/?p=1182"},"modified":"2021-01-09T10:55:13","modified_gmt":"2021-01-09T10:55:13","slug":"ecosystem-repositioning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/janbosch.com\/blog\/index.php\/2021\/01\/09\/ecosystem-repositioning\/","title":{"rendered":"Ecosystem repositioning"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Image by FunkyFocus from Pixabay<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In many industries, there\u2019s an implied, often underspecified, architecture of how the different stakeholders in the ecosystem interface with each other. By defining their mutual interfaces, it allows for better alignment. For the typical interactions within the ecosystem, this is very helpful as the different parties have predefined expectations about one another, and transactions and integrations can be conducted, built and deployed more easily.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The existing business ecosystem gets encoded in the way a company \norganizes itself, including the work processes, workflows, automation, \ntooling and even job titles. For instance, a company that buys embedded \nsubsystems for its products from suppliers will have processes for \ndefining the requirements, purchasing professionals who negotiate the \nbest deal with suppliers and tooling for testing deliveries from \nsuppliers as well as for tracking the realization of requirements to \nsign off on contracts and allow suppliers to get paid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, there\u2019s a downside to this implied ecosystem architecture: \nit tends to hinder innovation and experimentation by companies. \nExperimenting with different business models, introducing DevOps for the\n product throughout its lifetime, exploring new customer segments with \nthe product \u2013 it all tends to upset the existing relationships in the \necosystem. This may easily cause a situation where the cost of \ninnovation and experimentation is so high that it doesn\u2019t get done. This\n is especially so when innovations require changes by multiple ecosystem\n partners \u2013 generally, the more partners are involved, the less likely \nit is that the innovation is even experimented with.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s say, for example, that the aforementioned company decides to stop using a supplier and bring the development of the subsystem back in-house \u2013 something that happened in the automotive industry during the past years with in-vehicle software. This isn\u2019t simply a technology decision. Rather, it requires changes to the tooling, reassigning of people in purchasing, significant changes to ways of working and internal processes as well as a potentially challenging legal situation with the former supplier.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Where the architecture is especially rigid, for instance driven by regulation or a strong government customer, the ecosystem runs the risk of becoming stale. Due to the difficulty of incorporating change, the ecosystem\u2019s ability to adopt productivity-improving innovations is so limited that, rather than individual players, the ecosystem as a whole may be disrupted. Industries such as construction, healthcare and university education are illustrative examples of where the pace of innovation in the ecosystem is particularly slow and where some are predicting that a fundamental disruption may happen in the foreseeable future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When it comes to the digital transformation of your company, this \nvery often requires the organization to strategically reposition itself \nin its business ecosystem. Digitalization often causes a transition from\n a transactional to a continuous value delivery to end-customers. This \nmeans that companies that happily used wholesalers, resellers, \ninstallers and other partners to get their product out in the market are\n now looking for ways to build direct customer relationships. Removing \nthe intermediaries requires careful management of the relationship with \nthese partners as the old, transactional, and the new, continuous, \nbusiness often have to coexist for several years, if not longer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A second typical pattern is that work that was outsourced needs to be\n brought back in-house as the suppliers are unable to change their \noperating model to faster feedback cycles, there\u2019s no good business \nmodel or the company considers the technology to be so critical that \nthey want to own the competence internally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course, the opposite happens as well: a technology and associated \nsubsystems that were done in-house because of their strategic nature \nlose that status due to digitalization and need to be outsourced to new \npartners that might even have been competitors earlier.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A fourth pattern is that the company needs to involve new partners to\n manage new digital technologies, such as data and AI, or because the \nnew position in the ecosystem requires new relationships with others \nserving the same customers. This often calls for a careful strategy as \nto where the company wants to own the market and where it\u2019s open to \npartnering and letting others coexist.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finally, there\u2019s the challenge of startups and established, \nrepositioning companies entering your existing or intended market. The \norganization needs to decide whether to partner or compete with these \nnew entrants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The digital transformation almost always requires strategic repositioning in your business ecosystem. You need to have a direct relationship with your end-customer, adopt new technologies and associated with new partners, reinvent your business model, jump over existing partners without ruining the relationship for your legacy business and so on. This is complex and calls for careful strategizing and execution. But the alternative is that you get disrupted together with the existing business ecosystem. So, next to executing your New Year\u2019s resolutions, also spend some time thinking about how you\u2019ll initiate the work on repositioning your company in your business ecosystem. I wish you a prosperous 2021.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To get more insights earlier, sign up for my newsletter at <\/em>jan@janbosch.com<\/em><\/a> or follow me on<\/em> janbosch.com\/blog<\/em><\/a>, LinkedIn (<\/em>linkedin.com\/in\/janbosch<\/em><\/a>), Medium<\/a> or Twitter (<\/em>@JanBosch<\/em><\/a>).<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In many industries, there\u2019s an implied, often underspecified, architecture of how the different stakeholders in the ecosystem interface with each other. By defining their mutual interfaces, it allows for better alignment. For the typical interactions within the ecosystem, this is very helpful as the different parties have predefined expectations about one another, and transactions and … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"generate_page_header":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5,8,10],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/janbosch.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1182"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/janbosch.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/janbosch.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/janbosch.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/janbosch.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1182"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/janbosch.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1182\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1186,"href":"https:\/\/janbosch.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1182\/revisions\/1186"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/janbosch.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1182"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/janbosch.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1182"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/janbosch.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1182"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}