Our society is increasingly characterized by inequality and faced with grand sustainability challenges, such as climate change, degrading natural ecosystems, and species mass extinction. This is among others owed to the dominant business models our economies are operating on, which draw on neoclassical economic theory and have the primary goal of creating financial value and maximizing profits for shareholders. We need to transform these into sustainable business models, which create value for environment and society. This requires challenging innovation processes.

Secondary stakeholders that do not have direct links with innovating firms, such as business networks, local governments, or universities can support these processes and help firms overcome barriers they face. Often, these stakeholders are also found to be involved in shaping industrial ecosystems, where co-located firms form a community and engage in inter-organizational collaboration that enhances environmental and social performance. Secondary stakeholders effectively take an orchestrator role - they carefully arrange innovation and evolution processes to achieve the materialization of sustainable business models and industrial ecosystems. Nevertheless, in the field of sustainable business models, the role of orchestrators has not yet been investigated.

This thesis sets out to explore the efforts of secondary stakeholders in assisting sustainable business model innovation and developing industrial ecosystems by answering the following question:

What is the role of the orchestrator in sustainable business model innovation and industrial ecosystem evolution?

The purpose of this research is thus to explore how actors simultaneously shape industrial ecosystems, such as industrial symbiosis networks and eco-industrial parks, and orchestrate collaborative innovation processes that lead to sustainable business models.

To answer the research question, this thesis 1) investigates how industrial ecosystems evolve 2) explores how sustainable business model innovation is orchestrated, and 3) explains how a Systems Thinking perspective helps sustainable business model innovation.

The studies conducted for this purpose are based on a triangulation of methods, including systematic literature reviews, longitudinal participant observation, interviews, surveys, and desk research. The focus was on analyses of orchestrators' experiences in the Nordics, a process analysis of the case GreenLab in Skive, Denmark, and a longitudinal study of the Port of Aalborg's orchestrator role.

The results show a demanding role with potential to further support the processes leading to industrial ecosystems and sustainable business models. 

First, the results show how industrial ecosystem evolution can follow four distinct phases of development, outlining the factors critical to each phase and analysing them in a specific case.

Second, a detailed picture of the orchestrator role for sustainable business model innovation is drawn, presenting what it looks like in terms of activities, their patterns, and experiences and skills of this role. Third, the results suggest how the integration of a Systems Thinking perspective in practical tools used in early stages of such innovation processes allows a more thorough and impactful evaluation of potential sustainability impacts. Lastly, the results suggest that the orchestration of industrial ecosystem evolution and sustainable business model innovation are not only parallel processes but should be treated as interrelated and interdependent. The discussion suggests viewing the orchestrator role as multi-layered and interdisciplinary.

The findings expand the thin overlap between the emerging, integrative sustainable business model field and the established industrial ecosystem literature. It contributes to the study of the orchestrator role in both, and highlights pitfalls and benefits for both of viewing the intersection with the other. The results question a narrow understanding of industrial ecosystem orchestration within the industrial ecology field and invite to start considering orchestration in the sustainable business model field.