(Note: Opinions in the articles are of the authors only and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of the European Union).

A successful business ecosystem is not built simply by connecting organisations. It emerges when independent actors develop the trust, shared interests, and practical incentives needed to work together and create value that would be difficult to achieve individually.

This perspective is consistent with research on business ecosystems, which emphasises the importance of aligning interdependent activities around a shared value proposition (Adner, 2017).

This is particularly relevant in residential renovation, where fragmented services, complex procedures, limited financing options and uncertainty about quality often prevent homeowners from turning renovation intentions into real projects. Milin and Bullier (2021) also examined the importance of integrated home renovation services (IHRS) in overcoming market fragmentation and supporting large-scale renovation. As Europe seeks to accelerate the energy renovation of its building stock, One-Stop Shop services can help bridge this gap. Their effectiveness, however, largely depends on the strength of the local renovation ecosystem that enables them to deliver coordinated and reliable services.

The MultiHome experience in the Plovdiv Region offers practical insights into what it takes to develop such an ecosystem. Initiated in November 2023 and coordinated by the Energy Agency of Plovdiv (EAP), Bulgaria, the MultiHome project has developed an integrated home renovation service through its Service Hub and Platform, targeting multifamily buildings, vulnerable households and energy communities across 18 municipalities in the Plovdiv Region. The one-stop shop model brings together public authorities, technical experts, renovation businesses and financial stakeholders around a more integrated approach to residential renovation. Since the launch of the MultiHome Service Hub in 2024, the initiative has provided over 350 consultations to homeowners, delivered more than 200 renovation services and mobilised €23.4 million in investment.

Rather than providing an overview of all project activities, this article examines a specific dimension of the MultiHome experience: the process of building a renovation ecosystem capable of supporting coordinated services and creating value for both homeowners and market participants. It reflects on the practical challenges of moving from initial networking to trusted cooperation, the role of ecosystem orchestration and the conditions needed to sustain collaboration beyond a project's lifetime.

From networking to meaningful market cooperation

Bringing organisations together is challenging. However, turning their participation into meaningful cooperation requires understanding their different interests, motivations and expectations. Meetings, networks and partnership agreements can create momentum, but they do not automatically lead to coordinated action.

Building an ecosystem also means understanding the interdependencies between participants: whose contribution is needed, at what stage and under which conditions. In residential renovation, no single organisation can address the entire homeowner journey. The challenge is to connect complementary capabilities into more coherent services while ensuring that each participant recognises a clear role and value in the cooperation.

Through its bottom-up market approach, MultiHome brought together businesses and professional organisations from across the renovation value chain, laying the groundwork for a more structured regional business ecosystem. Business dialogue, professional exchange and direct engagement with homeowners helped participants identify potential areas for cooperation and express a shared willingness to collaborate on integrated renovation services.

An important starting point was the MultiHome Renovation Market Accelerator, which brought representatives of different renovation sectors into focused discussions. Separate sessions with construction companies, heating, ventilation and air-conditioning (HVAC) providers, renewable energy businesses and professional organisations allowed participants to explore sector-specific barriers before considering opportunities for wider cooperation. Discussions covered workforce shortages, regulatory complexity, coordination across renovation stages, and the potential for more integrated service offerings.

This approach revealed a practical lesson: stakeholders are more likely to engage meaningfully when discussions begin with the challenges and opportunities relevant to their own activities. A shared ecosystem vision becomes more credible when participants can see how their individual contributions fit into a broader renovation process.

MultiHome complemented these exchanges with direct market interaction through three editions of its Home Renovation Expo, organised in Plovdiv in 2024, 2025 and 2026. Combining exhibitions, practical demonstrations, homeowner consultations and business-to-business matchmaking, the events created opportunities for renovation providers to interact not only with potential clients but also with complementary service providers. This helped connect professional networking with a clearer understanding of homeowner demand.

_{Consultations fair 2025. Source: Multihome Project.}

Beyond networking and market dialogue, MultiHome also took steps towards more structured cooperation through Memoranda of Understanding, reflecting a shared willingness to collaborate. However, such agreements are only an initial step towards developing an operational renovation ecosystem.

Trust, shared vision and ecosystem orchestration 

The MultiHome experience highlights the importance of building trust through continued dialogue, practical cooperation and a shared understanding of the value each participant brings to the renovation ecosystem.

In the early stages, the core partners needed to focus on listening to and understanding each other's institutional perspectives, recognising the different expertise each brought to the partnership and building on these complementary strengths to develop a shared vision.

As the ecosystem expanded to include new organisations, the challenge shifted towards communicating a shared vision, helping potential partners recognise their role within it and demonstrating the value of joining the collaboration.

At market level, MultiHome developed common quality standards, a Code of Conduct and a framework for professional cooperation and quality assurance as part of its Trusted Suppliers Network, and presented them to renovation businesses. These elements helped translate the broader vision of collaboration into practical expectations for participating businesses, clarifying the principles of professional conduct and service quality within the renovation ecosystem.

The development of participation criteria and shared professional expectations was particularly important because trust in a renovation ecosystem operates at several levels. Homeowners need confidence in the professionals delivering services; businesses need confidence in potential collaborators; and the One-Stop Shop operator needs transparent arrangements for connecting demand with appropriate expertise. Common standards cannot eliminate every risk, but they provide a clearer basis for cooperation and accountability.

MultiHome also used professional capacity-building sessions to explain the network's membership procedures, quality criteria and Code of Conduct. These activities created space to discuss practical cooperation between designers, contractors and installers, as well as administrative and financing barriers. The experience suggests that a trusted supplier network requires more than a label: participants need to understand the obligations, opportunities and working relationships associated with membership.

Yet trust and shared standards alone are not sufficient. Effective ecosystem building requires continuous dialogue across stakeholder groups and the ability to align different interests around practical solutions.

This is where ecosystem orchestration becomes essential. Rather than simply facilitating contacts, an orchestrator helps manage relationships, identify interdependencies, align incentives, and create conditions in which independent actors can work towards shared outcomes.

MultiHome's One-Stop Shop model provides a practical framework for this coordination. Its Service Hub and digital platform help connect homeowners' needs with market expertise and available services.

The service model combines local information points, a regional technical office and a network of renovation providers. These complementary functions show how ecosystem orchestration is embedded in the organisation of service delivery: homeowners need accessible initial guidance, independent technical expertise and connections to qualified professionals at different stages of the renovation journey.

For the ecosystem to function, these actors must understand when their involvement is needed, what information should be exchanged, and how responsibilities are coordinated. The broader lesson is that cooperation becomes more durable when it is translated into recognisable roles and practical processes rather than relying solely on informal contacts.

From partnerships to value creation 

The potential of a business ecosystem extends beyond establishing partnerships. When organisations with complementary expertise begin working together, new opportunities emerge to develop business models, products and services that would be difficult to realise independently.

Jacobides, Cennamo and Gawer (2018) highlight how complementarities between independent actors can underpin distinct forms of economic organisation and joint value creation.

In residential renovation, closer cooperation between technical assessment, design, financing, construction and quality assurance can reveal gaps in existing offers and opportunities for new or improved solutions. For homeowners, such cooperation can translate into more coherent, accessible and reliable renovation services.

For MultiHome, an important part of developing the regional renovation ecosystem has been encouraging businesses to look beyond their individual services and consider joint market offerings. The aim is to translate cooperation into tangible commercial opportunities for participating businesses and more integrated renovation solutions that deliver greater value to homeowners.

This shift from participation to value creation is particularly challenging in a fragmented renovation market. A construction company, an energy auditor, a technology supplier and a financial institution may all recognise the need for more renovation activity, yet their business models, decision-making processes and incentives differ. The existence of a shared market opportunity does not automatically mean that a commercially viable joint offer will emerge.

MultiHome's engagement with financial institutions highlighted opportunities for cooperation between banks, renovation businesses and integrated renovation service providers such as MultiHome. Banks want to see tangible homeowner demand before developing tailored financing products. Collaborative structures providing integrated renovation services can play a key role, as they have the capacity to develop pipelines of renovation projects with financing potential and make this demand visible to financial institutions.

Discussions also explored potential bank–supplier partnerships as a way to develop more flexible financing solutions, including approaches that assess renovation needs and investment costs at the whole-building level while enabling individual homeowners to access financing without relying on collective loans.

Even a gradual shift away from fully grant-funded renovation schemes towards blended finance models that encourage homeowner co-financing and private investment could create more favourable conditions for financial institutions to engage in the renovation market, develop tailored financing products and explore risk-sharing mechanisms.

The practical implication is that ecosystem development must address both sides of the market. Homeowners need a comprehensible renovation pathway and confidence in the available services. Businesses need sufficient visibility of demand, workable cooperation arrangements and a credible prospect of commercial benefit. An effective One-Stop Shop can help connect these needs, but creating viable joint offerings remains a longer-term task that requires continued market engagement.

The MultiHome experience therefore distinguishes between three levels of progress: establishing connections, formalising cooperation and translating that cooperation into integrated services and commercial opportunities. Each level matters, but they should not be treated as interchangeable measures of success.

Lessons for building ecosystems that last

The MultiHome experience offers several lessons for other regions seeking to strengthen their renovation markets:

1. Ecosystem building requires different approaches at different stages. The priorities and stakeholder engagement methods need to evolve as the ecosystem grows and relationships between participants mature.

   In practice, this means beginning with stakeholder mapping and sector-specific dialogue, then moving towards shared expectations, cooperation arrangements and opportunities for joint service development. Trying to formalise an ecosystem before participants understand its value can produce agreements without meaningful engagement.

2. Meaningful dialogue must involve the entire ecosystem, not stakeholder groups in isolation. Municipalities, businesses, technical experts, financial institutions and homeowners approach renovation from different perspectives. The value of dialogue lies in bringing these perspectives together, understanding their interdependencies and addressing challenges that no single actor can resolve alone.

   The MultiHome experience also shows why different dialogue formats are complementary. Sector-focused meetings help identify specific barriers, while cross-sector exchanges and homeowner-facing events reveal how those barriers interact along the renovation journey. Both are needed to move from separate professional perspectives towards coordinated solutions.

3. Cooperation must deliver benefits that matter to each participant. Businesses need credible market opportunities, public authorities benefit from access to technical expertise and implementation support through specialised partners, and homeowners need reliable, accessible services. The sustainability of an ecosystem depends on whether these different expectations can be reconciled in practice.

   A shared vision is therefore necessary but not sufficient. Ecosystem organisers must be able to explain the value proposition for each participant and create practical opportunities to test cooperation. This may involve clearer referral pathways, shared service standards, joint consultations or the exploration of complementary commercial offers.

4. Trust needs to be supported by transparent cooperation mechanisms. Initial contacts can open the door to collaboration, but clear participation criteria, professional expectations and defined responsibilities make cooperation more predictable. For renovation One-Stop-Shops, this is particularly important because the quality of the homeowner experience depends on services delivered by several independent actors.
    

5. Ecosystem building is an ongoing process rather than a one-off achievement. Relationships require continued attention, expectations evolve, and cooperation mechanisms must adapt to changing circumstances. For MultiHome, the challenge is to sustain and further develop the established partnerships and cooperation mechanisms to stimulate further investment in residential renovation beyond the project's lifetime. 

   For regions developing or strengthening one-stop shop services, the wider implication is clear: the effectiveness and long-term viability of homeowner support depend not only on the services offered, but also on the capacity to maintain and adapt the cooperation that makes those services possible.

_{Image source: https://www.multihome-project.eu/}