Search results

This paper aims to provide a broad overview of the corpus of studies on digital finance in relation to small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and startups.

Bibliometric analysis was used, allowing to investigate the relevant literature (735 articles). In accordance with best practices, relevant articles were identified on the topic following the PRISMA 2020 framework that ensures reproducible and rigorous results. The search then proceeds with performance analysis, identifying key trends at the intersection of research fields, including distribution of articles by year, citations by year, most cited contributions and most cited and prolific authors. This is followed by analyses of co-citation, co-authorship and co-occurrence with a detailed description of the thematic clusters identified.

Performance analysis shows that scholarly output covers a 12-year period, starting in 2011, and demonstrates a growing interest in this topic. Co-occurrence analysis reveals a significant intellectual structure which allows numerous knowledge gaps to emerge, and these offer new opportunities to be addressed in future research.

This study uniquely focuses on the evolution of the research domain related to digital finance associated with SMEs and startups. It provides implications for practitioners and avenues that researchers can develop in the future to produce impactful studies.

The growing interest on ecosystems on both managerial and academic side reflects a vibrant field of study, nevertheless, the subject is very heterogeneous and in particular concerning a particular form of ecosystems: collaborative ecosystems, the purpose of this study is to shed light on these.

The definition gap existent and the multiplicity of fields and composite studies on collaborative ecosystems have made it necessary to conduct a systematic literature review of the phenomenon, a bibliometric analysis and content analysis.

The research offers an overview of the phenomenon, three main cluster categories emerged: ecosystem, competition and open innovation; this cluster offers a comprehensive schematization of the research topics.

Limitations of this research are that the investigation has been confined to specific keywords related to collaborative ecosystems that led to a strict selection of papers to be analyzed and in having confined the investigation to publications in the managerial area. Further research will be able to expand the selection of keywords or use more strings and proceed to a comparative analysis of results. Another limitation is the small number of databases assessed (only Scopus and Web of Science) and have confined the analysis to specific clusters that emerged from the quantitative analysis of papers.

By proposing a taxonomy of collaborative ecosystems, the paper highlights what solutions and architectures an ecosystem manager must consider when developing collaborative ecosystems, what factors he or she must pay attention to in order to ensure their development and survival, and what elements determine the development of an ecosystem, in particular, the management of innovation and knowledge and the scarcity of resources in a hyper-competitive environment.

A combination of research methods was used to identify the intellectual structure of collaborative ecosystems. In addition, we propose a taxonomy for collaborative ecosystems, opening the study to new lines of investigation and providing a new research agenda.