Building a digital innovation ecosystem is an important way for enterprises gaining competitive advantage in the digital economy era. It is necessary to understand evolution patterns of digital innovation ecosystem. This paper divides the ecological flow into economy flow, technology flow and relationship flow, and studies the digital innovation ecosystem of 12 listed companies in artificial intelligence industry through qualitative text analysis and exploratory data analysis methods. We identify two types of evolution patterns, including the economic flow dominant evolution pattern of the hub-based digital innovation ecosystem and the ecological flow transition evolution pattern of the platform-based digital innovation ecosystem. This paper provides a new perspective and analysis framework for studying the evolution of digital innovation ecosystem, and also provides implication for enterprises’ ecological strategy practice.