Entrepreneurship, Digital Capabilities, and Sustainable Business Model Innovation: A Case Study

Abstract

Sustainable business model innovation can effectively cope with the complex and changing external environment in the digital economy, which is the key for enterprises to gain sustainable competitive advantage, and entrepreneurship is closely related to sustainable business models. However, the process and mechanism of the role of entrepreneurship on sustainable business model innovation are not clear in existing studies. The purpose of this article is to illustrate how entrepreneurship leads to and influences sustainable business model innovation. Based on the perspective of digital capabilities, this article adopts an exploratory single-case study to explore the new connotation of entrepreneurship and its influence mechanism on sustainable business model innovation. The study found that innovation spirit, adventure spirit, and co-benefit entrepreneurship have emerged in the digital economy. Through the inherent role of digital sensing capabilities, digital seizing capabilities, and digital transformation capabilities, sustainable business model innovation is effectively designed and implemented to achieve multidimensional value creation and capture. This article adds to the latest literature on sustainable business model innovation for enterprises through case evidence.

Building new business models in MSMEs: digital capabilities, global value chains integration and the moderating role of entrepreneurial failure

“…Organizations often develop dynamic capabilities by integrating, building and reconfiguring internal and external competencies when operating in highly competitive and dynamic environments (Dejardin et al, 2022). The integration of digital technology has transformed traditional dynamic capabilities, creating multiple dimensions of digital capabilities with an impact on entrepreneurship and sustainable business model innovation (Anwar et al, 2022;Evans et al, 2017;Gao et al, 2022;Wang et al, 2023). The practical application of digital technology to dynamic capabilities, particularly in stages ranging from creativity to production, plays a crucial role in data collection and processing, formulating new value propositions and promoting an efficient and cyclical value creation process (Audretsch et al, 2022;Balta et al, 2023;Gao et al, 2022).…”

“…Digital capabilities in MSMEs play a central and transformative role in business models innovation, once they enable organizations to create new ways of delivering value, reaching customers and differentiating themselves in the marketplace (Gao et al, 2022). They empower organizations to be more agile, customer-focused and responsive to the opportunities and challenges of the digital age (Wang et al., 2023).…”

“…In a rapidly changing business environment, businesses that leverage digital capabilities effectively are more likely to innovate and adapt their business models to meet evolving customer needs and market dynamics. Digital capabilities can be divided into different types: digital sensing, digital seizing and digital transformation (Balta et al, 2023;Gao et al, 2022;Huikkola et al., 2022). The emergence and development of these capabilities in an organization is activated by the conditions of the external and internal environment and the available digital technologies and conditioned by the organization's digital culture (Balta et al, 2023;Proksch et al, 2021).…”

“…Such capabilities enable companies to continuously gather intelligence, develop new value propositions and create innovative business models. They are also instrumental in the rise of the innovation and adventure spirit, promoting entrepreneurship, which encourages the design of innovative business models (Gao et al, 2022). In turn, companies that invest in the development and strengthening of their digital capabilities (basic, operational and integration) perform better, which suggests that they are in a better position to develop more efficient and innovative business models (Wang et al., 2023).…”

The Impact of Digital Transformation on Manufacturing-Enterprise Innovation: Empirical Evidence from China

“…Based on the perspective of digital capability, Gao et al [14] studied how entrepreneurship in the era of digital economy affects enterprises' sustainable-business-model innovation.…”