This research extends literature on the emergence of service ecosystems by developing new theoretical insight and explanation into how service ecosystems experience change and stability over time. Empirically, our case study focuses on digital transformation in the New Zealand public sector and the enterprise services market in 2010–2017. The exploratory and illustrative study builds on 22 in-depth interviews and extensive document analysis. We reveal three key mechanisms of service ecosystem emergence: compression, ecotonal coupling, and refraction. These mechanisms contribute to overcoming conflationary theorizing and the value of emergence in service research by establishing emergent relationality and a processual intertwining of being and becoming. These become the basis of multi-levelled, multidimensional complexity and cumulative organizing. We conclude the work by discussing the paper’s contribution to service research.

这项研究通过对服务生态系统如何随着时间的推移经历变化和稳定性发展新的理论见解和解释，扩展了关于服务生态系统出现的文献。根据经验，我们的案例研究侧重于 2010-2017 年新西兰公共部门和企业服务市场的数字化转型。探索性和说明性研究建立在 22 次深度访谈和广泛的文件分析的基础上。我们揭示了服务生态系统出现的三个关键机制：压缩、生态耦合和折射。这些机制通过建立涌现关系和存在与生成的过程交织，有助于克服合并理论和服务研究中涌现的价值。这些成为多层次、多维复杂性和累积组织的基础。