The purpose of this paper is to build up a theoretical framework to study university‐industry interorganisational relations (U‐1 IOR) and formulate hypotheses which will be tested on empirical data in a future research phase. Then, a taxonomy for university‐industy relationships is proposed. Finally, the problem of evaluating relationships between universities and industries by defining the concept of ‘relationship performance’ is addressed.

Scientific and technological knowledge is considered the most important raw material for economic growth. The attention on the exploitation of public research, undoubtedly one of the main sources of new scientific and technological knowledge, has increased in recent years. After reviewing some concepts regarding the exploitation of public research results, the paper focuses on the analysis of academic spinoff companies as one of the most promising ways to transfer research results to the market place. The phenomenon of academic spin-off companies is described using both international evidence and a recent survey regarding 48 Italian spin-off companies.

Purpose This paper aims to shed light on how family firms execute open innovation strategies by managing internal and external knowledge flows. Design/methodology/approach First, through a comprehensive literature review, the paper identifies the barriers to the acquisition and transfer of knowledge in open innovation processes. Second, it presents and discusses the results of an exploratory case study on Loccioni, an Italian family firm providing high-tech measurement solutions, highlighting how this family firm managed to overcome the barriers in executing an open innovation strategy. Findings The case study shows that Loccioni faced specific challenges in acquiring and transferring knowledge in its open innovation processes and developed two idiosyncratic capabilities – labelled imprinting and fraternization – that helped the firm overcome the barriers to knowledge acquisition and transfer. The analysis shows that these two capabilities are enabled by the distinctive goals and social capital characterizing family firms. Originality/value The paper creates a link between open innovation and family business research with an empirically grounded model illustrating how the idiosyncratic capabilities of a family firm help overcome the critical barriers to the acquisition and transfer of knowledge in executing an open innovation strategy.

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