Author: Nga Lai Wong

Publisher:

Published: 2019

Total Pages:

ISBN-13:

Baidu, Alibaba and Tencent (BAT), the three leading internet companies in China, are rapidly expanding and catching up with their western peers. The business ecosystems they operate in, adopt organizational design that differs from their American counterparts. This qualitative thesis aims at addressing the factors that influence BAT's business model design, their business ecosystem strategies and the role of value co-creation in ecosystems. Literature review is conducted on the notions of business model, business model innovation, business ecosystem, service-dominant logic and value co-creation. Case-study method is applied to analyze the business ecosystem strategies employed by the Chinese tech titans through identifying common patterns matched to their business model components. The research findings show that BAT implement various strategies to enable value co-creation in business ecosystems they are part of. They emphasize ecosystem cultivation and interest-balancing to ensure that the vast majority of participants, if not all, thrive. BAT coordinate, orchestrate and integrate operant resources. Interaction and interconnectedness among customers, third-party partners and other participants are crucial in the process of value co-creation. Co-created value is then shared on the platforms to help improve offerings to increase customer satisfaction and stickiness. Synergy is achieved through entering various business areas and implementing numerous complementary services and products to reduce costs and increase efficiency. The explorative and investigative thesis consolidates literature on business model, business ecosystem and value co-creation. It offers both theoretical and practical implications and sets the basis for research of the emergence of BAT-style business ecosystems in the future.