Functional Service Economy (FSE) and Industrial Ecology (IE) are operational business models which claim to contribute to sustainable development. Economic literature mainly focuses on the role of technological and organizational innovations within these models. This article shows that the ability to meet sustainable development is not only dependent on these innovations. The ability of these coordination forms to cover the different dimensions of sustainable development can be questioned. This study is based on the analysis of IE or FSE case studies carried out by the author or coming from economic literature in order to analyze the innovation trajectories mobilized by these partnerships. The complexity of the externalities generated by these models requires coordination at a systemic level which takes into consideration the micro, meso and macro scales. These models involve a service-based innovation trajectory which plays a role in the implementation and the sustainability of these projects.JEL Codes: Q57, L21, O30, L80, Q01