Resumo

Over the last decade, Entrepreneurial Ecosystems (EE) became the dominant analytical approach when it comes to assessing entrepreneurship from a contextual perspective. Notwithstanding, a substantial gap remains in terms of understanding the dynamics and governance systems operating within the scope of these networks of individuals and organizations. Recent studies have started addressing this gap by recognizing that entrepreneurial support organizations that have their own network of relationships can integrate efforts to implement different actions to develop EE´s and pursue opportunities.

Literature on Entrepreneurial Ecosystem has yet to provide a refined view on the integration among agents embedded in networks. Against this background, in this article, we take up the challenge of theorizing what the integration between these orchestrators actually is and explore its implications for the ecosystem, trying to answer the following research question: How do orchestrators in EEs integrate efforts and steer their networks to promote enhanced outcomes in the ecosystem?

Entrepreneurial ecosystems comprehend a community of multiple coevolving stakeholders. For the ecosystem to thrive, these agents need to join forces to promote better returns for the entrepreneurial environment. However, linkages per se do not generate symbiotic relationships that can engender vivacious EE. To strengthen aggregate capabilities in ecosystems, geographical proximity must be matched by other elements (cognitive, institutional, organizational and social) that promote alignment. Literature has referred to this as coherence, a driving force of shared knowledge in EE.

To move forward in our theoretical comprehension of linkages and networks in entrepreneurial ecosystems, we conducted a single case study on an entrepreneurial ecosystem comprising the city of Piracicaba, Brazil. This location demonstrates strong specialization in the development of innovation and entrepreneurial activity related to agricultural technologies, thus allowing a straightforward inspection on the dynamics playing out in terms of social and sectoral/technological levels of coherence. This EE received the name of AgTech Valley, in an allusion to the Californian Silicon Valley.

Our inductive approach suggests there are two sides to orchestrators coherence: Capabilities Coherence and Relationship Coherence. Capabilities refer to a general reliable capacity to bring something about as a result of an intended action. In turn, Relationship Coherence represents the fact that relationships are forged within specific social contexts. Our data suggests that capabilities and relationship coherence are intrinsically related. Ultimately, Orchestrators coherence is positively associated with the ecosystem health.

By unpacking foundational elements of network dynamics embedded in EE, our research represents a step forward in building a theoretically robust perspective on such ecosystems. Furthermore, it generates insights for scholars, managers and policymakers concerning the key factors that enable and hinder emergence and evolution of coherence through orchestration. We expect these elements to open up new avenues of investigation in the field of EE studies.

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