Seminar（Dept. of Trade Economics）

Title:Marching to the beat: The role of complementor alignment in the architectural evolution of ecosystems

Speaker:Liang Chen(Singapore Management University)

Time:10:00-11:30 (Thursday), June 5th, 2025

Venue:Room 1008, Mingde Business Building

Language:English

ABSTRACT:

The evolution of innovation ecosystems hinges on the effective coordination between ecosystem leaders and complementors. While ecosystem-sponsored architectural innovations create new technological opportunities for complementors, they may unintendedly disrupt the performance of complementor products that were originally developed based on legacy architectural designs. This study provides empirical evidence of these disruptive effects and explores how complementors’ alignment with the ecosystem leader mitigates such challenges. Focusing on Apple’s release of CoreML in its mobile ecosystem, we employ a difference-in-differences design to investigate variations in complementor performance after adopting this ecosystem-sponsored architectural innovation. Our findings reveal that complementors’ technological and flow alignment with the ecosystem leader is critical for minimizing performance disruptions and enhancing value creation during ecosystem evolution. This study enriches our understanding of architectural changes and complementor heterogeneity in innovation ecosystems.

SHORT BIOGRAPHY:

Liang Chen is Associate Professor of Strategy & Entrepreneurship and Lee Kong Chian Fellow at Singapore Management University. His recent research on platform ecosystems and digital strategy appears in the Academy of Management Review, Strategic Management Journal, Journal of Management, Journal of International Business Studies, and Harvard Business Review. He also has lasting research interests in multinational firms, emerging markets, global strategy, corporate strategy, and the theory of the firm. Liang was awarded the AOM IM Division Emerging Scholar. He is Deputy Editor at Management and Organization Review, Senior Editor at International Business Review, Consulting Editor at Journal of International Management and Business & Society, Guest Editor and Best Reviewer at JIBS.