Industry Evolutionary Behavior Driven by Sandpile Model Dynamics

Is there an unbridgeable gap between complexity and simplicity? Industry evolution is a complex dynamic self-organizing process. The sandpile model is a simple dynamical system. This paper uses the sandpile model to explore the computer industry’s operation mechanism. It reveals the interoperability between the sandpile and the industry’s underlying evolutionary logic and realizes the leap from complexity to simplicity. Specifically, three new sandpile evolution rules are proposed to reenact the computer industry’s evolution process based on real enterprise data from 1953 to 2022. It is shown that the “pentagonal” sandpile model can efficiently simulate the evolution of the computer industry. The results indirectly reveal that the stability of industry systems depends on the survival status of five forms directly associated with the core firms in different regions. Lastly, it is suggested that the enhancement of corporate innovation capability and differentiation strategy has become the key to development in the face of the computer industry’s competitive pattern solidification. The nature of complex systems is “simple iteration”, which revolutionizes the research paradigm for industry development.