Governance of core and periphery ecosystems: The role of entrepreneurial support organizations

We investigate how entrepreneurial support organizations (ESOs) act as governance actors within their ecosystems while also managing their ecosystem’s relationships to neighboring ecosystems with resource imbalances. Our research setting is one U.S. state, Georgia, which presents a unique setting for analyzing the relationship of core and peripheral entrepreneurial ecosystems, since it is economically dominated by one metropolitan area (Atlanta). We use qualitative data from over 40 interviews with ESO managers in six Georgia regions to ask how ESOs day-to-day operations relate to their roles as ecosystem intermediaries, nested within a broader system of ecosystems. We then examine how ecosystem governance actors in the core ecosystem perceive their relationships and role with respect to peripheral ecosystems, and vice versa. Our results highlight the ways in which entrepreneurial ecosystems develop and relate to each other through their intermediaries as governance actors across an uneven geography of entrepreneurial activity. We contribute to the literatures on entrepreneurial ecosystems and ecosystem governance, and conclude with practical implications for policy and planning.