Open Innovation for Digital Transformation in Low- and Medium-Tech SMEs: Analysis of Pre-competitive Collaborative Projects

Alberto Bertello (), Paola Bernardi and Francesca Ricciardi
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Alberto Bertello: University of Turin
Paola Bernardi: University of Turin
Francesca Ricciardi: University of Turin

A chapter in Exploring Innovation in a Digital World, 2021, pp 182-197 from Springer

Abstract: Abstract Digital transformation poses different challenges to small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Governments and policymakers are launching several initiatives to engage SMEs in open innovation (OI) and to promote collaborative models oriented to facilitate the adoption of new digital technologies. However, most of the OI literature focuses on large companies and high-tech start-ups and we have little evidence about the barriers to OI in low- and medium-tech SMEs. This paper develops a multiple embedded case-study on seven Italian R&D pre-competitive collaborative projects in the domain of Industry 4.0. We have collected semi-structured interviews, triangulated with participant observation and document analysis to develop an exploratory analysis to individuate the barriers to OI in low- and medium-tech SMEs in inter-organizational projects. We classified barriers in four different dimensions (administration/finance, organization, strategy, and collaboration), analyzing every dimension in detail.

Keywords: Digital transformation; SMEs; Inter-organizational projects; Open innovation; Barriers (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:lnichp:978-3-030-87842-9_14

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DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-87842-9_14

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