The past, present and future of open innovation

Barbara Bigliardi, Giovanna Ferraro, Serena Filippelli and Francesco Galati

European Journal of Innovation Management, 2020, vol. 24, issue 4, 1130-1161

Abstract: Purpose - Through a comprehensive review of the literature on open innovation (OI), this study aimed to achieve two objectives: (1) to identify the main thematic areas discussed in the past and track their evolution over time; and (2) to provide recommendations for future research avenues. Design/methodology/approach - To achieve the first objective, a method based on text mining was implemented, with the analysis focusing on 1,772 journal articles published between 2003 and 2018. For the second objective, a review based on recent and relevant papers was conducted for each thematic area. Findings - The paper identified nine thematic areas explored in existing research: (1) context-dependency of OI, (2) collaborative frameworks, (3) organizational dimensions of OI, (4) performance and OI, (5) external search for OI, (6) OI in small and medium-sized enterprises, (7) OI in the pharmaceutical industry, (8) OI and intellectual property rights, and (9) technology. The analysis of the most recent papers belonging to the more investigated areas offers suitable suggestions for future research avenues. Originality/value - To the best of the authors’ knowledge, no review has yet been undertaken to reorganize the OI literature.

Keywords: Open innovation; Review; Text mining; Future research avenues (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eme:ejimpp:ejim-10-2019-0296

DOI: 10.1108/EJIM-10-2019-0296

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