From a marketplace of electronics to a digital entrepreneurial ecosystem (DEE): The emergence of a meta‐organization in Zhongguancun, China

Abstract

Extant studies on digital entrepreneurship have mainly focused on firm-level characteristics and overlooked the external environment, ie, the digital entrepreneurial ecosystem (DEE). This study intends to fill that gap by exploring how a DEE emerges. We adopt the metaorganization theory as our theoretical lens and conduct an in-depth case study at Zhongguancun, a budding DEE often referred to as China's Silicon Valley. Case analysis reveals that the emergence of a DEE is a process of forming a meta-organization, whereby labour is divided into 3 roles and effort is integrated via 2 processes. Our study contributes to the digital entrepreneurship literature by offering a community perspective. It also contributes to the literature on meta-organization, which has mainly focused on the globally distributed meta-organizations and overlooked the collocated metaorganizations such as a DEE. Regarding practical implications, policymakers and community leaders responsible for DEE development can use our findings to develop their local DEEs. KEYWORDScase study, digital entrepreneurial ecosystem, digital entrepreneurship, meta-organization "IT is the magic ingredient that inspires and most often enables contemporary entrepreneurial endeavours."-MIS Quarterly Editor note by Del Giudice and Straub (2011, p. vi).

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