Open Innovation Blog

Finalizing my dissertation (download of my defensio presentation)

Alexander Schroll — Mon, 25 Jun 2012 08:11:00 +0000

In the late 2000s researchers from all over the world published important research on various aspects of the open innovation concept. However, most of the work was of theoretical nature and the few available empirical papers were based on single-firm case studies. This was the reason why I focused on collecting a large-scale quantitative sample when I started my work with this dissertation in February 2008. During 2008 I began to narrow down my topic, define research questions and methodology. In early 2009 data collection was conducted over a period of around four months. The summer of 2009 was devoted to extensive data analysis and in fall and winter of 2009 the first paper was written. During 2010 another paper was written and submitted to a journal. Most of my working time during that year was devoted to the review process. In 2011 the first two articles were published, and work began on my third article which was finally published in 2012.

Today, over more than four years after I first read Chesbroughs initial book from 2003, and after hundreds of research articles and books I read during my research work, the most important thing I learned is not the pure ‘open innovation’-knowledge from the books. What I really learned over the last years is the way of scientific thinking, especially from an epistemological and methodological point of view. Despite all expert knowledge, what you really need as a scientist is profundity, accuracy and conciseness. In case you want to publish papers, also patience, persistence, and continuity are of essential nature. This is where my dissertation has changed me most in the last four years.

On June 19th, 2012 I held my Defensio Dissertationis - the final presentation of my thesis. I would like to share this presentation

Recent publications about open innovation adoption (by myself)

Alexander Schroll — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 09:50:00 +0000

Based on my research and data collection from 2008, the European Journal of Innovation Management and the International Journal of Innovation and Regional Development have recently published two articles of my work on Open Innovation Adoption:

The first paper ("Open innovation modes and the role of internal R&D: An empirical study on open innovation adoption in Europe") focuses on the adoption level in Europe in general, but also maps current adoption behaviours (outside-in, inside-out) on a 2x2-matrix and defines three clusters of open innovation adoption (closed, medium and open innovators).

The second paper ("Determinants of open innovation: an empirical study on organisational, market, and human drivers of open innovation adoption across Europe") focused on characteristics based in the industry (market), the company (organisational), and the company leaders (human) which are incluencing open innovation adoption. With our regression model we can predict open innovation usage (or variance of OI usage) with a relatively high R² of 0.380.

If your university doesn't provide you access to these papers, please contact me and I may send you the PDF-articles.

Also upcoming: A state-of-the-art review article on empirical open innovation publications between 2003 and 2012, with a special focus on quantitative (large-scale) empirical literature on open innovation adoption, open innovation modes and adoption drivers. This study will compare 30 empirical papers and will be published in 2012 in the Journal für Betriebswirtschaft (JfB) (Journal is partly in German, but article will be in English).

About the dispute between Open and User Innovation

Alexander Schroll — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 15:35:00 +0000

If you are working or researching in the area of innovation, you will propably know Eric von Hippel (MIT, Sloan School of Management) and Henry Chesbrough (UC Berkeley). Both represent a stream in innovation research. Although, the scientific world should pull together, it is quite interesting to find both groups separating themselves from each other. This is true on individual level, but also on university level.

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Open Innovation: A Future Research Outlook

Alexander Schroll — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 10:02:00 +0000

Last week I participated in a two-day PhD Workshop at ESADE Business School in Barcelona with the two leading researchers on open innovation: Henry Chesbrough (UC Berkeley) and Wim Vanhaverbeke (Hasselt University, Belgium). Over 20 PhD students working on open innovation or related fields participated in the workshop. Today, I would like to present the current state of research and future research perspectives as discussed at this workshop.

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Open Innovation in Politics

Alexander Schroll — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 17:54:00 +0000
Because of current developments we are leaving the firm perspective for this blogpost in order to focus on application of the open innovation paradigm in other areas, like politics. Innovation does not only include product innovation, but also includes service innovation, process innovation and business innovation. Hence, also Government, Non-Government Organizations and Political Parties could successfully apply Open Innovation.
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First results from the open innovation study

Alexander Schroll — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 12:51:00 +0000