Purpose: In recent years, firms have faced increasing dynamism resulting from rapid technological development, digitalization, and sustainability requirements. This condition creates new opportunities for innovation within ecosystems. This issue is particularly evident in capital-intensive and network-based industries such as steel and highlights the importance of capabilities that can manage such dynamism and create sustainable value flows within the ecosystem. By adopting the perspectives of dynamic capabilities and innovation ecosystems, this study examines the pattern through which network-oriented dynamic capabilities contribute to value creation and value orchestration in the Iranian steel innovation ecosystem and seeks to provide an integrated understanding of these capabilities at the ecosystem level.



Methodology: This applied study was conducted using a qualitative approach. The research population consisted of key actors in the Iranian steel innovation ecosystem. Using purposive and snowball sampling, ten participants, including managers, industry experts, academics, and representatives of technology-based firms, were selected until theoretical saturation was achieved. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews and analyzed using thematic analysis to identify and explain the mechanisms through which network-oriented dynamic capabilities contribute to the realization of value flows.



Findings: The findings indicate that network-oriented dynamic capabilities contribute to value flows in the Iranian steel innovation ecosystem through a set of ecosystem mechanisms in a processual and continuous manner. The sensing capability guides value flows from the initial identification of opportunities to the formation of actual value creation pathways through exploratory activities, identification of actors’ potential capacities, creation and development of informational and knowledge linkages, and recognition of structural positions and interdependencies. The seizing capability transforms identified opportunities into sustainable value flows by relying on the adjustment and alignment of activities, adjustment and stabilization of actors’ roles, configuration of organizational positions and boundaries, and coordination of interorganizational linkages. Simultaneously, the reconfiguring capability contributes to strengthening and sustaining value flows under technological changes, market dynamics, and structural transformations in the Iranian steel industry through the rearrangement of activities, redefinition of actors’ roles, reconfiguration of linkages, and redefinition of positions.



Conclusion: The results show that, in the Iranian steel innovation ecosystem, network-oriented dynamic capabilities do not operate as isolated firm-level capabilities but rather as network, interactive, and institutional mechanisms at the ecosystem level. Through the orchestration, exploitation, and regeneration of value flows, these capabilities enable coordination, joint learning, and continuous renewal in response to environmental changes. Accordingly, by extending the dynamic capabilities perspective from the firm level to the ecosystem level, this study demonstrates that value creation and value continuity in complex and capital-intensive industries depend less on the independent performance of individual actors and more on the organization and alignment of ecosystem mechanisms. Therefore, the proposed model can provide a basis for designing and orchestrating innovation ecosystems and for strengthening sustainable innovation, ecosystem resilience, and collaborative value creation, particularly in capital-intensive and network-based industries.