Unpacking Open Innovation

Disintegrated or distributed innovation, collaborative innovation, collective invention, collegial innovation, free innovation, open knowledge disclosure, free knowledge disclosure: are these all the same thing? This shows us there is some confusion regarding open innovation, or at least there is a need to cast a wider net around what open innovation is all about. The prevailing thought is that open innovation allows organizations to simultaneously expand their breadth of ideas, opportunities, and know-how while minimizing the technical and market risks associated with innovation. As a result, open innovation appears to come with little down side. Del Giudice, Della Peruta, and Carayannis fill the gap in our understanding of this emerging research field of open innovation. Their work depicts the major tendencies of publications through identifying the main themes in literature and investigating the research frontier. It also discusses potentially important fields of investigation that are still left rather unexplored.

"An interesting book that will inform you clearly and effectively on the meaning, characteristics, and current and future research trends of open innovation. To read for every scholar and practitioner working in this field." - Francesco Schiavone, Assistant Professor of Management, University Parthenope of Naples, Italy "Unpacking Open Innovation both defines and wrestles with critical topics such as innovation (open and closed), innovativeness and inventiveness, the 'open' movement, and finally outsourcing, alliances, and intellectual property rights. It explores how these concepts relate to entrepreneurship, which is, as it has always been, the main driver of new inventions for the private sector. All in all, this collection is well worth the investment for anyone seriously interested in learning about innovation in the twenty-first century." - Detmar W. Straub, Regent's Professor, the University System of Georgia, USA; J. Mack Robinson Distinguished Professor of Information Systems, Georgia State University, USA "This book provides managers and academics with a detailed description of open innovation and examines its evolution from the first contribution of Chesbrough to the present date. The key value of the book is that it offers a comprehensive overview of open innovation, investigating its different aspects, types, and purposes, and demonstrating how, today, it has become a valuable driver of success for companies operating in hyper-competitive and global markets." - Elisa Arrigo, Assistant Professor of Management, University of Milano-Bicocca, Italy "This volume shows how open innovation can be a distinctly different approach. This book greatly advances the understanding of 'non-routine' innovation processes that look and sound a lot like open innovation but produce tremendous values for organisations. Blending together perspectives from economics, strategy and organization theory creates a wide range of examples of practically relevant processes that leaders use to execute innovation initiatives. A 'must read' for top managers in a competitive world." - Jens Mueller, Associate Professor of Entrepreneurship and Strategy, Waikato Management School, New Zealand; Professor of Governance, Cambodia Mekong University, Cambodia

Author Elias G. Carayannis: Elias G. Carayannis is Full Professor of Science, Technology, Innovation and Entrepreneurship; co-Founder and co-Director of the Global and Entrepreneurial Finance Research Institute (GEFRI); and Director of Research on Science, Technology, Innovation and Entrepreneurship, European Union Research Center (EURC) at the School of Business of the George Washington University in Washington, DC, USA. He can be reached at caraye@gwu.edu.