At present, industrial dynamics are becoming increasingly complex. In particular contexts, it is difficult to analyze the reasons for slow or rapid growth and the roles of certain actors who do not appear to act in the classic or expected way. Understanding the dynamics of actors in the context of a strong demand for innovation is highly relevant for firms that seek to adopt the best innovation strategy within a particular environment. The concept of a “business ecosystem” was introduced to facilitate this type of analysis. Here, we examine the various uses of this concept in the management sciences to understand the reasons why scholars have used it. We will show that the richness of this concept is most likely still underexploited. In addition, we propose a new beginning from the foundations of ecology to elucidate the notion of an ecosystem in a new and deeper way. From this notion, we deduce a new model for a business ecosystem and a typology of its possible evolutions in the context of external perturbations. Finally, we draw some conclusions that have managerial implications and give perspectives for future studies.