Shaping the Boundaries of a Service Ecosystem: The Case of Udacity

Abstract

Service-dominant logic highlights the ability of service ecosystems to ‘self-adjust’ as a reaction to systemic inefficiencies or external changes [1]–[3]. We contribute to the question on how focal actors shape the boundaries of service ecosystems through service innovation. This is a single case study on a digital ecosystem focused on a first mover in digital platforms for Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs): Udacity. We found two mechanisms, where Udacity shaped the boundaries of its ecosystem: ‘user self-service integration’ and ‘gradual partner disintegration’. Throughout three phases between 2011 and 2015 they disintegrated services from higher education, namely offering courses online, designing courses, and accreditation due to lowly perceived adaptability of univer-sities and external pressures for finding a sustain-able business model. Additionally, they disinte-grated self-organized solutions of user needs and re-integrated them with new actors. This led to newly shaped boundaries of the service ecosystem.