Network board continuity and effectiveness of open innovation in Swedish strategic small‐firm networks

Abstract

Increasing adoption of open innovation as an alternative route to research and development necessitates the development of new ways to organize innovation, as well as reassessment of existing ways. Much like traditional corporations that subscribe to the closed innovation paradigm, novel organizational arrangements targeting open innovation, such as small-firm networks, employ boards to effectively manage joint research-and-development activities. These boards are similar yet different from traditional corporate boards; as such, they may have different requirements for proper functioning. We use 5-year longitudinal data on 53 Swedish strategic small-firm networks to investigate how the boards should be organized to help improve the innovative status of network participants. We expand the set of tools available for effective organization of the boards' operations and emphasize the effects of network board continuity (rates of renewal) on network members' innovative performance. We argue that the relationship is curvilinear (U-shaped) and demonstrate that it is more pronounced in larger networks.

Inovação Aberta e Redes: Enfoques, Tendências e Desafios

“…Anteriormente, destacou-se, na seção 2.1, que um dos desafios metodológicos ligados à escolha dos artigos devia-se ao fato de que as redes apareciam em poucos estudos de inovação aberta como sendo o objeto da investigação empírica, tendo sido superada pela inclusão de artigos em que os resultados teriam apontado a relevância da rede para o sucesso do modelo de inovação aberta. Assim, dos 19 artigos, sete estudaram propriamente a rede e a sua relação com a inovação (Belussi et al, 2008;Siedlok et al, 2010;Muhdi & Boutellier, 2011;Jarvenpaa & Wernick, 2011;Wincent et al, 2009;Chanal & Caron-Fasan, 2010;Lee et al, 2010). Nos demais, os objetivos foram distintos e avaliavam o papel das incubadoras públicas de startups (Clausen & Rasmussen, 2011), e, na sua maioria, o foco dos artigos foi o modelo de inovação aberta adotado pelas firmas individuais (Angehrn et al 2009;Watkins, 2010;Hughes & Wareham, 2010;Chiaroni et al, 2010;Han et al, 2012;Buganza et al, 2011;Chiaroni et al, 2011;Dittrich & Duysters, 2007;Paasi et al, 2010;Asakawa et al, 2010;Westergren & Holmström, 2012).…”

“…Ainda, no que tange ao estudo de redes, apenas um dos artigos destacou entrevistas às universidades e agências governamentais pertencentes ao grupo (Jarvenpaa & Wernick, 2011), assim como aspectos ligados à liderança em rede (Wincent, Anokhin, & Boter, 2009). …”

“…Isso é o que faz o sistema funcionar segundo Chesbrough (2003). Entende-se, por conseguinte, que todos os projetos de inovação desenvolvidos em rede dependam de interação, confiança entre os atores e também de um certo nível de governança, destacado pelo estudo de Wincent et al (2009), ao investigar a postura do conselho de administração da rede. uma empresa, um instituto de pesquisa privado ou até mesmo público.…”

Open Innovations and International Collaboration in the Context of Emerging Economies

“…The literature on innovation collaboration suggests that firms participate in international markets to learn and obtain new knowledge, eg, technology or/and market know-how (Wincent, Anokhin & Boter, 2009). More specifically, to gain access to other firms' capabilities, gain access to new markets, and obtain support to exploit their existing capabilities (Chiesa & Toletti, 2004;Dyer, Kale & Singh, 2004).…”

Implications of Openness: A Study into (All) the Growing Literature on Open Innovation

“…For instance an open information infrastructure proposed by Kuschel (2008), network boards suggested by Wincent et al (2009) or treating project management under the OI paradigm. Cooper's (2008; suggestion to adjust their stage gate model to include the OI paradigm throughout the whole process of new product development, scenarios and GDSS to complement the heuristic scenario development process to support knowledge creation in the OI process (Bergman et al 2009) are also useful suggestions.…”