The European Union's Economy and Employment Growth is directly linked to the shift to an innovation and knowledge-based economy. Modern innovation processes require much faster reaction than ever before - organizations require the skilled labour to face the challenges of modern innovation-driven economies. It also creates certain challenges for universities who need to increase collaboration between each other as well as with other industry players in order to provide the market with the skilled graduates answering modern requirements.
The term 'open innovation' has various commonly accepted definitions, which are all subject to continuous change. It can defined as "...the use of purposive inflows and outflows of knowledge to accelerate internal innovation, and expand the markets for external use of innovation, respectively". The endgame of this new paradigm is to create economic growth by utilizing internal and external ideas and internal and external paths to market. To achieve this goal, new capabilities are needed to manage internal and external knowledge in open innovation processes. It has been recognized that the large, vertically integrated R&D laboratory systems of the 20th century are giving way to more vertically disintegrated networks of innovation that connect numerous companies into ecosystems.
Continue reading on Open Innovation Network page
