The Orchestration Dynamics for Creating Urban Innovation Ecosystems

Abstract

Many cities around the world have sought to become "cities of the future", betting on projects to create urban innovation ecosystems. Most of these projects bet on the orchestration of resources and actors, to transform the local urban reality. The aim of this study is to analyze how orchestration dynamics occur for the creation of urban innovation ecosystems. Therefore we used a procedural approach to study an emblematic case in Latin America, the Pacto Alegre. It is a project developed in the south of Brazil, where from the orchestration of local actors, it was possible to give life to an ecosystem dynamic in the city of Porto Alegre. Our study showed that the first dimension of orchestration that must be in action in projects to create ecosystems is the dimension of Agenda Setting, followed by Knowledge Mobility Management. The dimension of Coordination appears as a way to boost innovation and finally, appears the dimension of Management of the Appropriability of innovation, which is related to the generation of value from the materialization of the previous dimensions. Furthermore, we demonstrate that the role of the quadruple helix actors’ changes over time and according to the mobilized orchestration dimension. Universities and public entities have been shown to have a prominent role in orchestration when the agenda definition and mobilization dimensions occur. This article contributes to the literature on innovation ecosystems, demonstrating how the orchestration dynamics to create an urban innovation ecosystem happen and, for the orchestration literature, reveals the existence of a hierarchy of dimensions over time. For future studies, we suggest analyzing the orchestration dynamics in mature ecosystems, which thus have more than one cycle.