Classroom Companion: Business

4.8 
 Conclusions
The ecosystem metaphor is an important tool for strategic planning in the digital 
economy. The ecosystem analysis reveals, among others, stakeholders that may 
influence the business performance directly or indirectly, the type and strength of 
the interactions with these stakeholders, and possible vulnerabilities and weak-
nesses with the chosen business model.
The ecosystem does not only consist of cooperating and competing companies 
but also less obvious stakeholders such as consumers and authorities. To estimate 
the performance of the company or the mere survivability of it in the marketplace, 
public opinion and government regulations must also be considered.
Some ecosystem aspects are related to the technology such as the underlying 
Internet and access technology, own computer infrastructure and computer infra-
structure owned by other parties (e.g., cloud services), and the development envi-
ronment for apps and other software and hardware components.
The aspects outlined in this chapter are applied in 
7
Chap. 
19
 where several 
case studies are presented.
 
?
Questions
1. Which information and communication technologies (ICTs) does Dropbox 
depend on?
2. What digital services depend on Dropbox?
3. What impact has the authorities on the business operations of Google?
 
Chapter 4 · Digital Economy Ecosystem

---

59
4
 
v
Answers
1. Internet, smartphones, personal computers, cheap mass storage of data, cryp-
tography, digital payment solutions, and mobile apps.
2. Cloud storage, file sharing, file synchronization, and project collaboration.
3. Google’s business operations have been under investigation by both the US 
authorities and the EU. Authorities in the USA have filed a lawsuit against 
Google in 2020. The EU has fined Google several times in the past decade for 
a total of €8 billion.