Stimulation of Open Data Ecosystems: Learnings from Theory and Practice

This chapter addresses the stimulation of open data ecosystems. Indeed, since the first data release, open data generated many expectations in the economic and social domains. Most of these benefits remain, however, limited and their sustainability might be challenged. Indeed, value creation from open data faces several challenges, among them are the risk of being too supply-driven, or the lack of incentives for the reuse. The idea of stimulating an ecosystem through the mean of innovative legal and financial frameworks is not entirely new. From an empirical point of view, we identify several meaningful initiatives undertaken by different countries and trying to bypass the obstacles faced by potential open data reusers to stimulate economic growth. For each initiative, the main lessons learnt are highlighted. From a theoretical point of view, the ecosystem perspective is widespread in open data research. In these systems, we find room for a new role, at least a transversal role, consisting in stimulating the ecosystem. This role is specific in that it implies to understand the configuration and the mechanisms of the ecosystems, and to define an influence strategy. We propose a framework able to guide a given stimulator in its analysis and related actions on its open data ecosystem. Then, we show in return how the practice could be enriched by this framework and how it could be instantiated and refined in a European program designed to foster the innovativeness of the open data ecosystems.