Uncovering the potential of innovation ecosystems in the healthcare sector after the COVID-19 crisis

•Industry 4.0 technologies can enhance the quality of healthcare services.•The design of Industry 4.0 solutions benefits from interactions among multiple stakeholders.•Innovation ecosystems identify the interactive dimensions affecting the design of new solutions.•The model is applied to an Italian healthcare ecosystem addressing general practitioners.•COVID-19 changed the ecosystem dimensions and revealed the barriers that need to be addressed. Industry 4.0 technologies are expected to enhance healthcare quality at the minimum cost feasible by using innovative solutions based on a fruitful exchange of knowledge and resources among institutions, firms and academia. These collaborative mechanisms are likely to occur in an innovation ecosystem where different stakeholders and resources interact to provide ground-breaking solutions to the market. The paper proposes a framework for studying the creation and development of innovation ecosystems in the healthcare sector by using a set of interrelated dimensions including, technology, value, and capabilities within a Triple-Helix model guided by focal actors. The model is applied to an exemplary Italian innovation ecosystem providing cloud and artificial intelligence-based solutions to general practitioners (GPs) under the focal role of the Italian association of GPs. Primary and secondary data are examined starting from the innovation ecosystem's origins and continuing until the COVID-19 crisis. The findings show that the pandemic represented the turning point that altered the ecosystem's dimensions in order to find immediate solutions for monitoring health conditions and organizing the booking of swabs and vaccines. The data triangulation points out the technical, organizational, and administrative barriers hindering the widespread adoption of these solutions at the national and regional levels, revealing several implications for health policy.