Managing trust in your partner ecosystem

How do we ensure fair governance in managing ecosystem relationships?

This article is part of the Digital Platforms hub

Platforms that require partners to commit resources towards open innovation on the platform need to additionally build innovation trust.

Development platforms, for instance, require significant commitment and investment from developers who come on board. These developers – both freelancers and businesses – are investing to build their business on the platform and are particularly concerned about the platform owner and sponsor’s commitment: what if the platform owner is not committed to the success of the platform in the long run and ceases further investment into the platform if it does not take off? What if the developer has already invested in creating applications and the platform owner suddenly calls off further investment?

To solve this dilemma for developers, a platform firm must signal its commitment to long-term investment into the platform. When Microsoft launched the Xbox, it publicly announced its commitment to spend $500 million promoting the new gaming platform. Along with Microsoft’s brand, this commitment helped attract third-party game developers to the emerging platform.