Evolution of innovation and its strategies: from ecological niche models of supply chain clusters

Generally, supply chain cluster (SCC) evolution follows innovation and its selection strategies. To further reduce the innovation risk, SCC must seek the feasible innovation strategies to match ecological niche‐matching degree; within a competing cluster, it should avoid the hazardous nature of pure competition that affects the innovation output, and within a cooperation innovation cluster it should look carefully for the cooperation innovation mechanism. This paper examines the impact of growth of SCC from a perspective of ecological niche, the innovation strategy and the expansion of ecological niche, and its matching degree on the influence of the growth in SCC; and presents the ecological niche expansion model, growth model and growth evolution model of SCC. The findings of this research suggest that there is a five‐stage evolution of which the characteristic is different in different innovation strategies. The ecological niche width of SCC is connected by each member’s ecological niche, and the expansion process is constituted by the members’ ecological niche expansion. In each stage, SCC should identify ecological niche‐matching degree between members and innovation modes when the SCC expands the niche width to a certain limit. Finally, a case study demonstrates the application potential of the model and its implications.