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Technological ecosystems in capability development: A case study in emerging technologies
Author(s) -
Ivanova Ksenia,
Elsawah Sondoss,
Fidock Justin
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
systems engineering
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.474
H-Index - 50
eISSN - 1520-6858
pISSN - 1098-1241
DOI - 10.1002/sys.21535
Subject(s) - cognitive reframing , framing (construction) , computer science , technological change , ecosystem , emerging technologies , knowledge management , business , risk analysis (engineering) , management science , environmental resource management , engineering , ecology , environmental science , psychology , social psychology , structural engineering , artificial intelligence , biology
Abstract The concept of technological ecosystems has been increasingly applied across different domains but rarely in the area of capability development. This paper contributes to addressing this knowledge gap by demonstrating the potential value of applying the technological ecosystems perspective to support technology investment decisions. We present a practical step‐by‐step approach to show how this approach can be used in practice and illustrate it using two case studies in the military domain. Case A looks at emerging technologies in health support; and Case B is concerned with driverless vehicles in dangerous environments. In both instances, the concepts are developed via facilitated workshops and the technological ecosystem maps are derived by analyzing the enabling technological elements and the relationships between them. Subsequent analysis shows how the technological ecosystem framing assists in gaining a holistic picture of the potential impacts of technology adoption and how it can be used to reframe capability options in terms of technology groupings. Technological ecosystem analysis across the two cases is used to identify common capability enablers and multidomain capability enhancing elements. We discuss the types of components within the generated technological ecosystem maps and point to directions for future work enabled by technological ecosystem mapping in capability development.