In 15 essays, business and management researchers from Europe, the US, Asia, New Zealand, and Australia examine the mechanisms that generate successful open innovation, noting that patterns of innovation differ by sector, firm, and strategy. They discuss taxonomies and modes of innovation, including ways to collaborate, open innovation strategies, and the links between open innovation and strategy; contexts and contingencies, including the impact of open innovation on new product success and the moderating role of environmental dynamics, the project level, approaches to service development, process innovations, and the international dimension of external technology sourcing; sector and industry studies of the effects of openness on the different stages of the innovation process and on performance at the firm level, the mobile phone industry, open innovation strategies data from the Dutch Community Innovation Survey, and differences in industries; and limitations and constraints, including the false dichotomy of closed and open approaches, a contingency model of inbound open innovation, and the limitations of practical application. Distributed by World Scientific. Annotation ©2014 Ringgold, Inc., Portland, OR (protoview.com)
The concept of open innovation has become increasingly popular in the management and policy literature on technology and innovation. However, despite the large volume of empirical work, many of the prescriptions being proposed are fairly general and not specific to particular contexts and contingencies. The proponents of open innovation are universally positive but research suggests that the specific mechanisms and outcomes of open innovation models are very sensitive to context and contingency. This is not surprising because the open or closed nature of innovation is historically contingent and does not entail a simple shift from closed to open as often suggested in the literature. Research has shown that patterns of innovation differ fundamentally by sector, firm and strategy. Therefore, there is a need to examine the mechanisms that help to generate successful open innovation. In this book, the authors contribute to a shift in the debate from potentially misleading general prescriptions, and provide conceptual and empirical insights into the precise mechanisms and potential limitations of open innovation research and management practice.
