Value co-creation in university-industry collaboration. An exploratory analysis in digital research projects

Abstract

Purpose of the paper:The paper aims to investigate how academic and business actors co-create value when collaborating in digital research projects.Methodology: Qualitative research was conducted according to a social constructionism approach. Thirty participants comprising Italian university researchers and industry practitioners took part in three focus groups.Findings: The interplay among resources, interactions, and outcomes was analysed across individual, organisational, and institutional layers to provide a comprehensive understanding of the value co-creation process between university and industry. Some barriers to the co-creation of value also emerged.Research limitations: The study had some limitations related to the generalisability of the research results. These limitations nonetheless represent potential avenues for future research.Practical implications: The study contributes practically to the debate on value co-creation between university and industry in the context of digitalisation, highlighting some actions aimed at developing successful research collaborations and facilitating the transfer of knowledge between scientific and economic actors.Originality of the paper: The entire value co-creation process was examined, as well as both sides of university-industry (U-I) collaboration, which were considered simultaneously. A conceptual framework consisting of building blocks and contextual layers is proposed drawing on the service-dominant (S-D) logic perspective.

A bibliometric performance analysis of publication productivity in the corporate social responsibility field: Outcomes ofSciValanalytics

“…As noted by Kieser and Leiner (2012, p. 15), collaborative research is seen “as ensuring alignment of researchers' and practitioners' interests in management research.” In this sense, this study suggests investigating the more suitable mechanisms through which the collaborative work of academia and industry could be improved and supported. The contribution of this form of collaboration to the research quality on CSR arises from matching different perspectives and competencies to co‐produce knowledge about a complex phenomenon (Polese et al, 2021). From this point of view, we suggest to journal editor(s) that they include a requirement for published research to include a practitioner as author(s).…”

Co-patenting, co-ownership, and co-ideation as drivers for university business innovation: the case of public universities in Spain

“…There is currently a lack of academic research on how these formulas of value co-creation can be integrated into the transition from closed economies (based on closed R&D and closed innovation) to open economies, in which universities are embedded (Polese et al. , 2021).…”

“…There is growing interest in the process by which universities obtain value from research and technology transfer (Polese et al. , 2021; Galan-Muros and Davey, 2019; Perkmann et al.…”

“…(2016, p. 1386) contend that “university policies can play a crucial role in influencing spinoff creation” while Hayter et al. (2018, p. 1039) consider, in the same sense, that an “ecosystems perspective has not been fully leveraged to influence policy decisions.” Based on the extant research, we find service-dominant logic (SDL) (Vargo and Lusch, 2017) to be a useful framework with which to bring an ecosystem perspective to the U–I context in terms of enabling an improved approach to the network of actors in which the university develops its value co-creation process (Polese et al. , 2021; Ramaswamy, 2020; Obstfeld et al.…”

Co-creation of innovation in higher education - the Portuguese case

“…Countries are increasingly looking for new tools in order to satisfy the demand for innovation in economy. Currently, policies are evolving towards more agile processes of knowledge transfer in order to face global competition, economic instability and rapid technological advancements (Polese et al, 2021). In this context, co-creation methodology appears as an alternative to more traditional solutions focused in science based projects led by a few relevant organizations and research centers (Raunio et al, 2018).…”