Strategic Management of Open Innovation in the Service Sector

The purpose of this paper is to design R & D strategy which is based on Open Innovation. Open innovation and open business models are believed to be powerful tools which enable companies to have competitive edge over competitors. Even if open access to innovation is becoming more popular within the innovation community, there are neither formalized guidelines nor "best practices" which would illustrate feasibility of this approach. Shortages of both scientific research and practical experience in this field are considered the gap which is filled out by this paper. The paper aims at providing guidance to practical application of these approaches.Design/methodology/approach: Case Study approach as well as ethnographic research were chosen as appropriate research methods. Case study deals with strategic management of open innovation in the company operating in service sector, specifically in ICT sector. The service sector is a suitable choice for OI adoption because there is a lower demand to protect IP. To achieve the goals, the analysis of current company foothold was performed by means of contextual interview. The target group were top and middle managers and company specialists who were engaged in processes improvement and corporate strategy elaboration. Findings: The findings revealed that the company in question suffered from suboptimum innovation performance. The rectification of shortcomings was rendered through Open innovation approach which was preferably executed on a strategic level. Structured process how to grasp Open innovation approach to be viable and functional from strategic point of view is proposed.Research/practical implications: The paper identifies main shortcomings in innovation performance and offers remedial actions. Moreover, the paper makes an induction to the elaboration and implementation of R & D strategy based on Open innovation. It also indicates the way which future research of Open innovation should focused on.Originality/value: Since the term Open innovation was coined by Henry Chesbrough in 2003, this concept is still under exploration. The main contribution of this paper consists in deepening applied research of Open innovation and providing clear practical guidance for the development of R & D strategy which involves attributes of Open innovation.