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Knowledge Partner
Research Report
OPEN INNOVATION IN SMEs:
How can small companies and start-ups
benefit from open innovation strategies?
Prof. Dr Wim VANHAVERBEKE
In collaboration with :
Ine VERMEERSCH
Stijn DE ZUTTER
Publication date
March 2012
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FLANDERS DISTRICT OF CREATIVITY
Flanders DC is the Flemish organisation for entrepreneurial creativity and was established by the
Flemish Government in 2004. Flanders DC’s mission is to make enterprising Flanders more
creative and to make creative Flanders more entrepreneurial .
Flanders DC builds knowledge, raises awareness and designs practical tools for anyone wishing to
launch a creative and enterprising project. To this end Flanders DC established a Knowledge Centre
at Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School and the Antwerp Management School. Research themes
include: innovation, intra/entrepreneurship, internationalisation and the creative industries.
Flanders DC focuses on entrepreneurs, teachers, students, policy-makers and the general public.
Among the many options Flanders DC offers are: a free online training in creative thinking, a creativity
test, a brainstorm kit, invite an entrepreneur to speak in your class or at your event, take part in the De
Bedenkers (The Inventors) classroom competition and an online game to discover how you score as
an innovative manager.
Entrepreneurial creativity is not an end in itself for Flanders DC but a means to turn Flanders into
an international top region with increased competitiveness. This is necessary to ensure that
Flanders remains economically healthy and to create new jobs. Flanders DC wishes to contri bute to
this with more entrepreneurial creativity on the one hand and a stronger creative industry on the
other hand. Thanks to entrepreneurial creativity companies find new innovative and more creative
responses to their current and future challenges. They can anticipate change. This gives them a
competitive edge. Entrepreneurial creativity encompasses the non-technological aspects of innovation.
Flanders DC believes that creativity and innovation originate in new combinations. Flanders DC
therefore wants to be a networking platform where various initiatives, companies and regions can
easily find one another. In this way Flanders DC aims to facilitate fast and new combinations between
players in different domains.
More information: www.flandersdc.be . tel.016 24 29 24 . e-mail info@flandersdc.be
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Research reports:
De Vlaamse economie in 2015: Uitdagingen voor de toekomst, Koen De Backer and Leo
Sleuwaegen, September 2005, Published in Dutch
Ondernemingscreativiteit als motor van groei voor Vlaamse steden en Brussel , Isabelle De
Voldere, Eva Janssens and Jonas Onkelinx, November 2005, Published in Dutch
The Creative Economy: challenges and opportunities for the DC -regions, Isabelle De
Voldere, Eva Janssens, Jonas Onkelinx and Leo Sleuwaegen, April 2006, Published in English
Spelers uit de televisiesector getuigen: een verkennende studie in de creatieve industrie ,
Marc Buelens and Mieke Van De Woestyne, June 2006, Published in Dutch
Mobiliseren, dynamiseren en enthousiasmeren van onze toekomstige zilvervloot , Thomas
Dewilde, Annick Vlaminckx, Ans De Vos and Dirk Buyens, June 2006, Published in Dutch
Development of a regional competitiveness index , Harry Bowen, Wim Moesen and Leo
Sleuwaegen, September 2006, Published in English
Innovation outside the lab: strategic innovation as the alternative, Marion Debruyne and
Marie Schoovaerts, November 2006, Published in English
De creatieve industrie in Vlaanderen, Tine Maenhout, Isabelle De Voldere, Jonas Onkelinx and
Leo Sleuwaegen, December 2006, Published in Dutch
Het innovatieproces in grote bedrijven en KMO’s, Geert Devos, Mieke Van De Woestyne and
Herman Van den Broeck, February 2007, Published in Dutch
Creatief ondernemen in Vlaanderen, Tine Maenhout, Jonas Onkelinx and Hans Crijns, March
2007, Published in Dutch
Hoe ondernemers in Vlaanderen opportuniteiten identificeren. Een rapport met tips en tools
voor de ondernemer in de praktijk, Eva Cools, Herman Van den Broeck, Sabine Vermeulen,
Hans Crijns, Deva Rangarajan, May 2007, published in Dutch
Networking in multinational manufacturing companies, Ann Vereecke, July 2007, published in
English
How entrepreneurial are our Flemish students, Hans Crijns and Sabine Vermeulen, November
2007, published in English
Fashionate about Creativity, Isabelle De Voldere, Tine Maenhout and Marion Debruyne,
December 2007, published in Dutch
Find the innovator. Identifying and understanding adopters of innovative consumer
technologies in Flanders, Marion De Bruyne and Bert Weijters, December 2007, published in
English
De case Arteconomy, Eva Cools, Herman Van den Broeck and Tine Maenhout, December 2007,
published in Dutch
Entrepreneurship and globalization, Italo Colantone and Leo Sleuwaegen, December 2007
published in English
HR Tools als stimulans voor creativiteit bij uw werknemers, Kristien Van Bruystegem, Vickie
Decocker, Koen Dewettinck, Xavier Baeten, December 2007, published in Dutch
Internationalization of SMEs, Jonas Onkelinx, Leo Sleuwaegen, April 2008, published in English
HRM-uitdagingen voor groeiende ondernemingen, Mieke Van De Woestyne, Kristien Van
Bruystegem, Koen Dewettinck, March 2008, published in Dutch
Sociaal Ondernemerschap in Vlaanderen, Hans Crijns, Frank Verzele, Sabine Vermeulen, April
2008, published in Dutch
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Foreign direct investments. Trends and developments, Frederik De Witte, Isabelle De
Voldere, Leo Sleuwaegen, June 2008, published in English
De gezondheidszorg als complex adaptief systeem. Een ander perspectief op innovatie ,
Paul Gemmel, Lieven De Raedt, November 2008, published in Dutch
Downstream Competitive Advantage. The cognitive Basis of Competitive Advantage. How
prototypicality structures and the cognitive processes of satisficing confer strategic
benefts, Niraj Dawar, Frank Goedertier, February 2009, published in English
Determinants of successful internationalization by SMEs in Flanders, Jonas Onkelinx, Leo
Sleuwaegen, May 2009, published in English
Het gebruik van Web 2.0 ter ondersteuning van open innovatie en collectieve creativiteit.
Lessen uit theorie en praktijk in Vlaanderen. Stijn Viaene, Steven De Hertogh, Len De Looze,
May 2009, published in Dutch
Foreign Direct Investments. Location choices across the value chain , Frederik De Witte, Leo
Sleuwaegen, May 2009, published in English
Prototypically Branded Innovations. Effect of the Typicality of a Brand on Consumer
Adoption and Perceived Newness of Branded New Products, Frank Goedertier, July 2009,
published in English
Open innovation: The role of collective research centres in stimulating innovation in low
tech SMEs, André Spithoven, Mirjam Knockaert, Bart Clarysse, July 2009, published in English
From Creativity to Success: Barriers and Critical Success Factors in the Successful
Implementation of Creative Ideas, Inge De Clippeleer, Katleen De Stobbeleir, Koen Dewettinck,
and Susan Ashford, July 2009, published in English
Improving social performance in supply chains: exploring practices and pathways to
innovation, Robert D. Klassen, August 2009, published in English
The position of plants in Flanders within global manufacturing networks, Ann Vereecke,
Annelies Geerts, July 2009, published in English
Innovation In The Elderly Care Sector: At The Edge Of Chaos, Katrien Verleye, Paul Gemmel,
September 2009, published in English
Determinanten van het ondernemerschapsproces in Vlaanderen: een internationale
vergelijking, Roy Thurik, Olivier Tilleuil, Peter van der Zwan, September 2009, published in Dutch
Developing a go-to-market strategy: Art Or Craft?, Marion Debruyne and Febi Tedja Lestiani,
November 2009, published in English
EFFECTO. Op weg naar effectief ondernemerschapsonderwijs in Vlaanderen , Wouter Van
den Berghe, Jan Lepoutre, Hans Crijns, Olivier Tilleuil, December 2009, published in Dutch
Vrouwelijk ondernemerschap in Vlaanderen: Onontgonnen creatief potentieel , Hans Crijns
and Olivier Tilleuil, December 2009, published in Dutch
Sustaining Competitive Advantage Through Product Innovation: How to achieve product
leadership in service companies, Kurt Verweire and Judith Escalier Revollo, December 2009,
published in English
The roles of business centres for networking, André Spithoven and Mirjam Knockaert,
December 2009, published in English
Innoveren in tijden van crisis: opportuniteit of managementregressie? , Eva Cools, Jana
Deprez, Stijn De Zutter, Annick Van Rossem, Marc Buelens, December 2009, published in Dutch
The international expansion path of Bekaert, AB-Inbev and Belgacom, Priscilla Boiardi and
Leo Sleuwaegen, February 2010, published in English
De contextuele determinanten van het ondernemerschap in Vlaanderen , Reinout Buysse and
Leo Sleuwaegen, February 2010, published in Dutch
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Identifying opportunities in clean technologies, Jan Lepoutre, April 2010, published in English
The Legitimation Strategies of Internationalizing Flemish SMEs and their Subsidiaries,
Christopher Voisey, Jonas Onkelinx, Leo Sleuwaegen, Reinout Buysse, June 2010, published in
English
Ambidextrous Innovation Behaviour in Service Firms, Annelies Geerts, Floortje Blindenbach-
Driessen, Paul Gemmel, June 2010, published in English
Logistieke waardenetwerken als troef voor het aantrekken van buitenlandse investeringen ,
Robert Boute, Rein Robberecht, Ann Vereecke, June 2011, published in Dutch
The pillars of a creative innovative region, Leo Sleuwaegen, Priscilla Boiardi, June 2011,
published in English
Published research reports can be downloaded via the Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School
library catalogue or via www.flandersdc.be.
In addition to these research projects, the Flanders DC Knowledge Centre has also developed the
following tools and training sessions:
Ondernemen.meerdan.ondernemen, an online learning platform
Creativity Class for young high-potentials
Flanders DC Fellows, inspiring role models in business creativity
Creativity Talks, monthly seminars on business creativity and innovation
Innovix, online innovation management game
Flanders DC Academic Seminars, research seminars on business creativity and innovation
TeamScan, online tool
Web 2.0 Readiness Scan
HR Toolbox
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Table of Contents
1 Why does open innovation in SMEs deserve more attention?.......................................... 9
1.1 The urgent need to study open innovation in small firms ..................................................9
1.2 The approach: The role of open innovation in value creation and value appropriation ....... 10
1.3 Research method ........................................................................................................ 12
2 Business model innovation in low-tech SMEs ..................................................................14
2.1. Business model innovation in SMEs to sidestep the commodity trap ............................... 14
2.2. The role of the initial business concept or vision ............................................................ 15
2.3. Innovate beyond products and services: the relevance of the experience economy for
innovating SMEs ......................................................................................................................22
2.4. Different ways SMEs can create value .......................................................................... 31
3 A dynamic view on business model innovation ................................................................37
3.1. Stepwise discovery of new business models ................................................................. 37
3.2. The process of discovering new applications ................................................................. 40
3.3. Diversify or not? .......................................................................................................... 45
3.4. Building and exploiting reputation and brand ................................................................. 51
4 How SMEs build new business models through open innovation? ..................................54
4.1. Benefiting from open innovation: value creation ............................................................. 54
4.2 Capturing value in open innovation ............................................................................... 63
4.3 Managing innovation partners and the innovation network .............................................. 69
4.4 Managing intellectual property in open innovation .......................................................... 72
5 Cooperating with giants: Organizing and managing open innovation successfully .........77
5.1 Collaborating with large companies .............................................................................. 77
5.2 A start-up creating a business from unused technology in a large firm ............................. 78
5.3 A large company creating value for a small firm’s technology ......................................... 83
6 Conclusion .......................................................................................................................89
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List of tables
LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1: Case Devan ...................................................................................................................19
Figure 2: Case Curana ...................................................................................................................24
Figure 3: Case DNA Interactif Fashion ............................................................................................29
Figure 4: Case Segers & Balcaen ....................................................................................................35
Figure 5: Business model innovation at Curana ..............................................................................38
Figure 6: Case Innovacelli..............................................................................................................42
Figure 7: Case Jaga .......................................................................................................................47
Figure 8: Case PRoF ......................................................................................................................59
Figure 9: Case Quilts of Denmark ..................................................................................................65
Figure 10: Case Isobionics .............................................................................................................81
Figure 11: Case Airfryer ................................................................................................................86
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1 Why does open innovation in SMEs deserve more
attention?
1.1. The urgent need to study open innovation in small firms
Today, many small companies are confronted with harsh market conditions. The current economic
crisis has weakened the financial health of many small and medium-sized firms (SMEs), especially in
industries in which foreign, low-cost producers have entered the market and are threatening the
survival of the existing competitors. In addition, new government regulations can change a profitable
SME niche business into a nightmare in just a few weeks or months. High-tech start-ups have cutting-
edge technology in-house, but no manufacturing capabilities or distribution channels to turn the
technology into a successful and profitable business. Changing market conditions thus force smaller
firms to adapt or reinvent their business through new technologies or unique value propositions. At the
same time, small firms face several constraints in differentiating their products and changing their
business model. A major liability is that small firms lack the required internal financial resources and
technical capabilities. They therefore must collaborate with external partners to innovate successfully,
to develop new sources of income, and to reach more profitable positions in the competitive
landscape. Open Innovation is thus a logical step for many SMEs to take.
Open Innovation has been 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.”
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In this research report, we investigate how SMEs can use external knowledge to develop new
products and services or how they can generate income by licensing their technology to other
companies.
Large-scale surveys have confirmed that SMEs are collaborating more frequently with external
innovation partners than large companies. The last Community Innovation Survey in Belgium shows
that large firms (> 250 employees) are collaborating on average with more external partners than
small firms. Yet, smaller firms rely more on open innovation than their larger counterparts —when the
number of collaborative deals is divided by the number of employees—thus measuring the open
innovation intensity. This is the case for overall open innovation indicators, as well as for different open
innovation dimensions such as external search, external research and development (R&D), or
cooperative agreements with different types of partners. This evidence confirms that open innovation
is even more important for SMEs than for larger companies
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.
Despite the fact that open innovation has developed rapidly as a new wave of research in innovation
management, most insights are based on individual cases of large manufacturing firms. Open
innovation has been studied mainly in large, multinational enterprises, of which most have large
internal R&D departments or operate in technology intensive industries. Chesbrough defined the
concept of open innovation using case studies of large, technology savvy firms
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. Open innovation in
small and medium-sized companies (SMEs) has received much less attention. Current research on
open innovation in SMEs is still very limited and is not yet revealing the creative use of open
innovation that many innovating SMEs around the globe are implementing
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. SMEs in low-tech
industries have proven to be very successful, however, in using and integrating knowledge from
external partners to create new products or services. An urgent need exists, therefore, to study how
collaboration or open innovation is managed and organized in small firms. The current report is one of
the few attempts to take a broader perspective on open innovation by focusing on how these practices
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are organized and managed in SMEs, in high-tech and low-tech industries. Open innovation in SMEs
has been examined in a few studies based on large quantitative databases
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. These pioneering articles
have explored why SMEs engage in open innovation activities, what the major impediments are to
reach success, and how SME management should organize open innovation activities to become
successful. In contrast, in the current report we rely on in-depth interviews with SME managers who
successfully developed open innovation strategies within their companies. Managing and organizing
open innovation in SMEs is quite specific, and the lessons learned from open inno vation in large firms
are not readily transferable to the context of SMEs. These factors make the need for specific studies
on open innovation in SMEs even more urgent.
1.2. The approach: The role of open innovation in value creation and value
appropriation
The in-depth interviews with managers of small firms that have been engaging successfully in open
innovation resulted in a range of fascinating and diverse insights how those companies benefit from
open innovation and how they set up and managed partnerships with their innovation partners. These
stories about applying open innovation in small firms successfully can barely be compared with the
open innovation ventures of large manufacturing companies, such as Xerox, P&G, Philips, Lego, and
IBM. The open innovation practices of these companies have been documented widely in the
professional press. Large companies deliberately introduce open innovation practices and are
consequently looking for benefits by switching from closed to open innovation. The interviews reported
here, however, teach us that we cannot apply these benefits (e.g., sharing costs, sharing risks, faster
product introduction, etc.) to small firms in low- and medium-tech industries. Most companies we
interviewed were not interested in open innovation as such. Instead, small - and medium-sized
companies engage in open innovation as a consequence of their search for major changes in their
business model to seize new business opportunities and boost profitability. Their limited financial and
human resources and the lack of technological capabilities force them to look for different types of
innovation partners.
It is therefore impossible to consider open innovation in isolation from the strategic objectives of
SMEs. In large companies, managers work out ways to overhaul their strategies from closed to open
innovation without touching the company’s overall strategic objectives. In contrast, all interviewees
emphasized that a small firm first defines its overall strategic change and this, in turn, prompts the
company to establish a long-term relationship with different innovation partners. Furthermore, the
benefits of strategic change based on open innovation in small firms differ and are more interesting
than the classic benefits of open innovation identified for large firms. In short, our findings call for a
more rigorous analysis of the links between open innovation on the one hand and strategy or business
modeling on the other hand.
Researchers and practitioners generally misunderstand, however, that open innovation is necessarily
linked to technology and that the latter is the source of value creation. Chesbrough showed that
business models are crucial for unlocking the latent value of new or existing technologies
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.
Technology per se has no economic value; indeed, the economic value of technology is realized when
companies develop and commercialize it through a particular business model. In all our interviews,
managers emphasized that business models play a primary role in SMEs in low- and medium-tech
industries, not the technology. Most SMEs we examine in this report did not have internal
technological competencies, but they set up new business models to leverage commercial value from
technologies that existed in other organizations or that had been co-developed with partners. They
developed an open innovation network with several partners and in this way created value for
customers by leveraging their partners’ or other organizations’ different competencies. In other words,
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open innovation creates new business opportunities for SMEs because they can develop business
model innovations without having the required technologies in-house. Instead, SMEs can leverage
external technologies by setting up a network with partners who have the required compet encies or
own assets to develop and commercialize a new offering.
A business model has two important functions: it must describe the way in which the company creates
value but also how it captures part of that value
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. Value creation and value appropriati on can be
analyzed using a business model framework. Despite the fact that the term “business model” is used
widely in the business world, academic research is relatively sparse, and there is no consensus
because researchers define business models in different ways
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. Applying existing business model
(innovation) frameworks to low-tech SMEs is not trivial because the open innovation network is at the
core of the business model. The existing business model (innovation) frameworks do not pay attention
to strategic partners or they incorporate them as a module in the model without analyzing interactions
with other modules in the framework. We will examine in detail, therefore, how a business model
framework must be adapted to fit business model innovations based on open innovation in low-tech
SMEs. Examining which implications our findings have for the theoretical modeling of business model
innovation, which has received significant attention among strategy scholars, is beyond the scope of
this report.
Business model innovations based on an open innovation imply that there are cost -increasing effects
of technology sourcing and technology co-development
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. The new revenue streams resulting from
business model innovation must be balanced against the costs of setting up and managing the
external network of partners. Moreover, SMEs have limited financial means to seize new business
opportunities. Accordingly, they may have to work in several consecutive steps, which in some cases
look like a bootstrapping strategy.
Business models take thus a central place in analyzing open innovation in small firms. This has
implications for the structure of this report. In Chapter 2, we analyze the business model innovations of
the SMEs we interviewed. First, we pay attention to how small firms develop strategies to create value
for customers. Several firms faced rapidly increasing commoditization in their product markets and had
to find new ways to create value for existing or new customer groups. We also focus on the role of the
experience economy as one way to create value. Besides value creation, we also examine how small
firms can appropriate part of the value they create with the new business model. Appropriating value
can be non-trivial for a small company, but most of the firms we examined were successful in crafting
new ways to gain significantly more profits with the new business models. In Chapter 3, we enter the
dynamics of business model innovation. The firms that have reached the most spectacular results with
their business model innovation realized this in several consecutive steps. In SMEs, new businesses
are developed stepwise using new product projects as tools to move forward. In Chapters 2 and 3, we
do not explicitly talk about open innovation. This changes in Chapter 4, however, where we analyze
how the companies set up partnerships and broader innovation networks to seize new business
opportunities. Setting up and managing innovation partnerships for most SMEs is a new challenge.
SMEs are not accustomed to sharing information, to co-aligning objectives, and managing networks of
partners that might be several times larger in sales volume than themselves. Managing open
innovation is challenging. In our view, this report’s most valuable contribution is that we explore
several best practices for how SMEs can manage innovation partnerships and boarder innovation
networks. Managing partnerships and networks among large companies has been analyzed in detail
in the literature. SMEs collaborate in a completely different way: personal relationships play a crucial
role, collaboration rules are usually informal, and trust oils the cooperation. As a result, we cannot rely
on the insights of best practices from large companies, but instead must develop a different set of
guidelines that are specific for small innovative firms.
In Chapter 5, we shift focus to collaboration between SMEs and large firms. Increasingly, small
companies are becoming the innovation partners of large partners. We have two examples. One
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illustrates how an experienced entrepreneur can set up a business, license the technology of a large
company, and build a highly profitable business. In this case, we focus on how fostering a good
relationship between the new venture and the company that developed the technology is instrumental
in producing a commercially successful venture. The second example illustrates the opposite case: A
small engineering company licensed its technology to a large company to develop a new product for
the large company. In this case, we examine how both parties can negotiate a deal that provides each
with ample opportunities to benefit from the new technology. In Chapter 6 we summarize this report’s
main findings and draw conclusions. We also offer some recommendations for entrepreneurs who
intend to develop a new business using an open innovation network.
We chose to distinguish between a more descriptive story about companies’ open innovation initiatives
and analyzing different research topics in open innovation. The research topics are analyzed in
different chapters. Each story has been nicely packed into a text box. In most cases, links and pictures
of companies’ products are included. We refer systematically to the different case studies (text boxes)
each time we illustrate a particular research topic with an example of a case. In the report’s main text,
we move from one topic to another, and you can find more information about the small companies in
the text boxes if necessary. At the end of Chapters 2 to 6, we include key learning points. These lists
of learning points can be consulted as a checklist when you are setting up a new business with your
innovation partners. These learning points are gathered at the end of each chapter so you can easily
check them whenever you want a quick review of what you have learned.
1.3. Research method
To explore the link between open innovation and market success of SMEs, we conducted a multiple-
case study using in-depth interviews with representatives of SMEs to find commonalities and success
factors. Open innovation is a relatively young economic phenomenon, and case-based research is an
appropriate research method to analyze this explorative research topic. Although the main implications
of this project are related to management practices, it is also possible to build theory from these
cases
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.
For each company, we called the contact person in each company—in most cases, this was the
CEO—and sent an additional email with detailed information about the study. In total, we contacted 18
companies that have been mentioned as having been involved in open innovation activities. Some of
them we found through publications, others by contacting a large European network of open
innovation experts. Some cases where not useful to illustrate open innovation in SMEs. Other
companies were just acquired or had other good management reasons not to participate in this study.
Ultimately, ten companies where willing to participate. Seven of them are Belgian companies, two are
Dutch, and one company is Danish: Curana (bike accessories), Patient Room of the Future (interior
and decoration), Quilts of Denmark (quilts and pillows), Devan (functional textiles), and DNA Interactif
Fashion (fashion goods), Isobionics (flavors and flagrances), Airfryer (kitchenware), Jaga (radiat ors),
Segers-Balcaen (plastic packaging), and Dingens (mercury free barometers). These companies all
use open innovation to produce and deliver products or services.
Each of these SMEs provided an interesting case to examine how SMEs apply open innovatio n. We
did not restrict our attention to any industry or size class (taking into account that small companies
should have less than 500 employees). The companies are active in a wide range of industries. Some
of these are high-tech start-ups, others are low-tech companies that changed strategy dramatically
and used open innovation as one of the central strategic tools to grow and improve profitability. Some
companies are several decades old and have 500 employees; other companies are just a few years
old and have less than five employees. The reader should thus not be surprised by the heterogeneity
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of the cases. The diversity of the themes we will discuss illustrates how open innovation can take
different shapes within each specific firm or industry. This is also a major message of our study: Each
manager must develop open innovation activities that are relevant within the framework of the
company’s strategy. The benefits of open innovation are therefore also specific to the strategic
position and situation of each firm. In addition, we did not limit our attention to open innovation cases
where SMEs only sell or license technology.
After getting the approval of each company, we scheduled a meeting for a first interview. The interview
was conducted by Prof. Dr Wim Vanhaverbeke, who was accompanied by one or two researchers. We
started by explaining the method and goal of our study and then used a semi -structured questionnaire
to guide the story line of the company representative. Most questions were related to firms’ open
innovation practices, but we realized in all interviews that open innovation cannot be isolated from the
broader strategic ambitions of the companies. When necessary, we also prompted for additional
questions regarding contracts, how the collaborations were managed and organized, success factors,
and difficulties they experienced. Interviews were recorded with permission of the interviewees.
As soon as the transcripts of the interviews were finished, this document was sent to the interviewee,
to screen it for potential mistakes and misinterpretations. In a few cases, the interviewee asked us to
adapt the transcript or make particular parts of the interview anonymous. The reviewed transcripts
were used to write the case descriptions and to facilitate the analysis of open innovation in SMEs
along different themes. Some additional interviews were scheduled with the firms’ innovation partners.
In this way, we were able to calibrate opinions of different managers and to obtain a richer picture of
how the collaboration among partners unfolded. Most interviews were conducted between November
2010 and May 2011.
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2 Business model innovation in low-tech SMEs
Analyzing the open innovation activities of SMEs in traditional industries starts with a broader analysis
of the business model innovation of those companies. The role of open innovation can only be
understood within this broad strategic setting: companies engage in open innovation to create value
for customers in new ways and to create a more profitable business. The analysis of the business
model innovation, therefore, logically comes first, and the usefulness of open innovation hinges on the
role it plays in achieving broader strategic goals. In the next section, we illustrate how the different
companies we interviewed sidestep the commoditization pressure by changing their business model.
Next, we focus on the initial entrepreneurial act to initiate such a business model change. In section
2.3, we look at how several companies transitioned from products or services to experiences in their
search to offer more value to the customer. Finally, we examine the different drivers that enable SMEs
to accomplish these major business model changes.
2.1. Business model innovation in SMEs to sidestep the commodity trap
Many SMEs face severe commoditization pressure in their markets. Just as each product or
technology has a li fe cycle, price competition and commoditization pop up and start dominating market
dynamics at a particular point in time. When products or services commoditize, price competition
becomes predominant and results in intensive price battles and industry shake -outs. SMEs usually do
not have the scale and scope to compete effectively on price and have no other choice than to find
new ways to differentiate their offerings or capitalize on new growth opportunities beyond their existing
business.
As the burgeoning management literature on business model innovation has shown during the last
decade, SMEs can take different approaches to reshaping offerings and seizing new growth
opportunities. A business model defines the way companies deliver value to a set of customers at a
profit. It consists of tightly interlocking elements: companies create a customer value proposition,
identify key resources and processes needed to deliver that value, and design a profit formula.
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The
attractiveness and financial viability of a business model erodes over time as price competition starts
to dominate. Sooner or later, firms’ existing businesses are prone to commoditization. Firms
subsequently engage in so-called “strategic innovation” or “business model innovation” to find new
ways to create value for customers. Business success comes from satisfying real, although frequently
latent customer needs, but a customer value proposition must also deliver value for the firm as well.
Next, the company must decide which key resources and processes it needs to achieve the required
profitability. Companies that are successful in business model innovation gain a unique position in the
competitive space that is difficult for others to imitate. Different strategies have been developed
explaining how to attain a unique position through s trategic innovation. Kim and Mauborgne
12
developed their blue ocean strategy and Johnson
13
talked about a company’s white space. White
space represents the business opportunities outside a company’s current businesses that require a
different business model to exploit. Each in their own way, many other management authors have
suggested methods and models to implement business models and business model innovations.
SMEs that successfully sidestepped the commodity trap have changed their existing business model
successfully to deliver more value for the customer at a profit. In contrast with large firms, SMEs
15
sometimes develop their business model in a rather intuitive way, based on strong but informed vision,
conviction or basic insight. We observed in all the SMEs we interviewed that open innovation is always
embedded in the company’s broader strategic goals. The value of opening up innovation process,
acquiring and developing new technology, and setting up a network with several types of partners can
only be understood in a meaningful way when these innovation activities are placed within the S MEs’
overall strategy or business model. We thus explore the strategy of innovating SMEs in this and the
following chapter before we move into how small firms manage and organize the challenges of open
innovation.
Technology developments play a crucial role in the SMEs we analysed—even those operating in so-
called low-tech industries such as textiles, furniture, and bicycle accessories. However, technology by
itself has no single objective value. The economic value of a technology only emerges when it is
commercialized in some way.
14
It is the business model that determines the economic value of a new
technology by indicating how customer value will be created and how the company can capture value
from that technology. In contrast with other innovation reports, therefore, research and technology are
not the main theme of this report. Scientific discoveries and new technologies may be crucial
ingredients in open innovation strategy, but when isolated from SMEs’ strategies and business model
development, they are useless in explaining why and how several innovating SMEs successfully
sidestepped the commoditization trap.
2.2. The role of the initial business concept or vision
Developing a start -up’s business model or reinventing the existing strategy of an SME usually starts
with developing basic insight into how a company can deliver value for a specific target customer.
Specifying the customer value proposition can be fairly simple, but can also be a tough process that
takes months and sometimes years to get right. Imagine, for the moment, the following example:
Today, more and more large manufacturing companies share their view on abandoned research
projects with outside managers and potential investors. Likewise, DSM, a large and innovative Dutch
chemical company showed Toine Janssen, a seasoned manager of Philips, a new biotechnological
process. This process had the potential to develop several aroma substances for the food, beverage,
and flavour and fragrance industries worldwide at half the cost of conventional production techniques.
DSM had abandoned the project because they estimated that the market was too small and the
company was not really seeking to develop a strong position as a supplier of flavours and flagrances.
In this case, the business model’s customer value proposition for the customer of Isobionics (see p 81),
the Dutch start-up Janssen established in 2008, was fairly simple; indeed, the company delivers
existing flavours at reduced costs to customers in the flavour and flagrance market. The value
proposition for the customer was well articulated: a considerable reduction in the production costs of
existing flavours and flagrances through a new proprietary technology based on a new
biotechnological process.
15
It is therefore also not surprising that it took Toine Janssen only a week
before he decided to pursue the venture.
In other cases, it takes more time to articulate the customer value proposition of a new business model
in small firms. Large companies may detect new business opportunities by carefully analysing market
trends, spotting new technologies with promising applications, and so on. Small companies do not
have the required resources in-house to analyse new growth opportunities systematically. On the
contrary, most of the small companies we interviewed started with a basic insight. It is usually the
founder, CEO, or top manager who is committed to developing a new business idea. The process
started in several of our cases by identifying a trend or a need—often a latent need that the target
customer had not yet even expressed. Take the example of Devan Chemicals (see p 19). This small,
family-owned company was established in 1977, with Patrice Vandendaele bec oming the manager of
the company, which now employs 45 people. He was determined to profile the company as a highly
innovative firm in the textile chemicals industry with a strong focus on increasing textile functionality
16
and making textile chemicals more sustainable. Patrice’s strategic orientation appears to be very
simple, but it was a much more difficult task to turn it into a successful strategy that propelled the
company into an industry leader with a global presence. Today, Devan Chemicals is a technology
company that uses chemicals and processes to modify, protect, and enhance textile surfaces.
Technologies include active temperature regulation, repellency and release of stains, flame retardant
solutions, moisture management, and sensorial applications. The innovation lead over other (and
larger) competitors drives the company’s growth and profitability. The innovation lead is also a
dynamic target: competitors are imitating several of its innovations. Yet the company is achieving
success through an open innovation strategy as we will see in chapter 3. Sustainability was the other
key concept of Devan’s strategy. The company foresaw that the increas ed use of chemicals on textiles
harming human health and the environment would increase the need for sustainable solutions.
Sustainability is entrenched in each part of the company, even in its logo. Management integrates
sustainability into every company decision (Corporate Sustainability); the company creates products
that have a minimal impact on the environment (Product Sustainability); and it creates new concepts
and products that will make the final product more sustainable (Concept Sustainability). Thus, in the
case of Devan Chemicals, two interlinked keywords in which the company’s leaders firmly believe
became the cornerstone of a successful, long-term strategy to fight commoditization. The choice of the
keywords, however, was based on years of personal experience in the industry: Patrice Vandendaele
had known the industry for decades; therefore, his choice of this strategy was based on a genuine
understanding.
In other cases, similar keywords or basic business insights ignited a new strategy for the SME. Quilts
of Denmark (see p 65) is a Danish SME that produces quilts and pillows. It was founded by Søren
Løgstrup and Erik Schmidt in 2000. Each had more than 20 years of experience in the bedding
industry. The two founders intended to revolutionize the traditional and highly commoditized quilts and
pillows business in Europe. In the 1990s, the economic prospects for quilt and duvet manufacturers
were steadily worsening. Most European manufacturers were small, family-owned companies, and
retail businesses continued to consolidate. Market power was increasingly shifting in the direction of
the retailers. Retailers consolidated into larger groups with stronger purchasing power, however, and
focussed mainly on price competition to gain market share. As a result of price competition between
these large retailing groups, the average profitability in the quilt manufacturing industry was
decreasing rapidly.
Løgstrup and Schmidt started their business with the conviction that a healthy night’s sleep was a
growing need in Western societies and that customers would be willing to pay a premium for high-
quality sleep. Consequently, the two entrepreneurs defined their business as a “provider of healthy
sleep”, not as quilt producers focusing exclusively on the products they sell. Their wish to become a
provider of healthy sleep was the result of their experience, combined with a genuine knowledge of
trends that were developing both inside their own industry and in other industries that focus on the end
consumer, such as the burgeoning wellness industry. Despite their conviction that providing healthy
sleep was a useful way to discover a new business opportunity, both entrepreneurs had no idea when
sleep could be considered “healthy”. They therefore visited several renowned sleep institutes located
in Danish hospitals, including the Glostrup Hospital of the University of Copenhagen. These contacts
introduced the founders to the science of sleep and the clinical practice of sleep medic ine. They
discovered in clinical reviews that sleep problems and disorders were a major problem in modern
societies, and they learned how the quality of sleep affected people’s lives. For example, more than 70
million Americans did not sleep well, and this lack of sleep costs American society billions of dollars
annually. And, they learned that an estimated 56,000 car accidents in the United States occur
because the driver falls asleep behind the wheel. According to scientists, this trend is an outcome of
the growing impact of the Internet, television, and other distractions at night. Løgstrup and Schmidt
also discovered during their consultations with sleep specialists that many factors influence the quality
of sleep. Temperature variation, however, was one of the most important ones. Stabilizing temperature,
in turn, became the key objective of the TEMPRAKON, the first functional quilt QOD introduced in
17
2003. This product revolutionized the traditional quilt industry. “Providing a healthy sleep” should be
considered the value proposal that the company makes to its potential customers. QOD offers
customers a new meaning to the product of quilts. Quilts have always been considered a product that
keep people comfortably warm in bed. By their nature, however, they trap heat, resulting in
temperature variations that are usually too large to ensure healthy and comfortable sleep. Moreover,
the value proposition the company makes to potential buyers is not based on market research. Nor is
it a user-centred approach, because the customers were not able to envisage that the properties of a
functional quilt such as TEMPRAKON could actually benefit their ability to sleep well. Instead, the idea
of a functional quilt such as the TEMPRAKON is the result of a highly unconventional, cross-industry
learning process led by sleep experts. The QOD case illustrates that developing a successful business
model that ultimately changes the industry starts with nothing more than the conviction of a well -
informed entrepreneur. At the outset, QOD management had no idea whether the objective of
providing healthy sleep was a realistic target, nor did they understand how quilts could contribute to
this process. It took a stepwise approach of more than three years before the business model for a
functional quilt was developed in great detail. The new quilt was launched in 2003—just three years
after QOD was established. After it was introduced, however, it was an instant success. The QOD
case also illustrates how small companies can fight commoditization in their industry: the higher the
focus on price competition in an industry, the more rewarding it is for companies to differentiate their
product to deliver value to customers in a way they could not anticipate themselves .
Curana (see p 24) is another example that illustrates how developing a new business model is a
gradual process that can take years. It is, in fact, a never-ending process. Curana is a micro-company
(less than 20 employees) that is active in the bicycle accessory market. It is a third-generation, family-
owned business located in Roeselare, Belgium. Curana worked as an OEM of bicycle accessories
such as luggage carriers and mudguards, always responding to the customers’ requirements. Curana
competes in a highly competitive market and since the 1960s the market has experienced continuous
pressure to consolidate. Curana was one of the remaining players in the market in the early 1990s. At
that time, the market was still not internationalized, but it was increasingly difficult to make profits as
price competition intensified over the years. The competitive landscape changed drastically in the mid-
1990s when mountain bikes became fashionable, and soon, other new segments of sport bicycles
developed. By this time, however, the bike industry was internationalizing rapidly: mountain bikes were
produced on a global scale, and European bicycle manufacturers started sourcing internationally for
less expensive accessories. In particular, imports from Taiwan were growing at a tremendous speed.
Facing rapidly declining profits, Dirk Vens, CEO of Curana, decided to change the firm’s strategy
drastically. Instead of being an OEM supplying to bicycle manufacturers, he decided to adopt an ODM
(Original Design Manufacturer) strategy. In 1999, the company transitioned into a product-driven
company with a strong emphasis on design and innovation. The company was not interested in
copying or improving bicycle accessories that were already on the market, because success would still
be determined by cost effectiveness and price competition. Curana wanted to develop concepts that
were not only new to the firm, but also to the industry. Dirk Vens’ ambition was to create unique
products for each bicycle manufacturer. In this way, the company could set its own prices and avoid
price competition. This transition was easier said than done, however. How could they conceive and
design a mudguard for which bicycle manufacturers would pay a premium price? Curana had no in-
house design capabilities, making the ambition even more challenging.
16
The entire change in strategy was anchored into a product development project with several external
innovation partners. The effort finally resulted in the B”Lite mudguard in 2002.
Developing the B”Lite was a slow and agoniz ing process; several c rucial adjustments were necessary
during development. The company was convinced, for instance, that plastic mudguards had some
advantages compared to steel and aluminium mudguards. The latter required more manufacturing
processing steps and were thus more expensive when manufactured in countries with high-labour
costs. A designer working at one of the bicycle manufacturers became a critical link. His opinion was
18
that the product was not revolutionary enough and did not have the right high-tech look to shake up
the bicycle parts industry. The designer prodded Curana to look at the garden chairs industry. Here,
plastic chairs represented the low-end segments, whereas chairs that integrated metal and plastic
represented the top segment. This conversation encouraged Dirk Vens to think about a mudguard that
combined aluminium and plastic. Next, the company learned that combining metals and plastics would
lead to considerable technical problems unless the parts were glued together. As gluing was not a
commercially viable option, the company established a strategic partnership with a polymer extruder.
The technical challenges were enormous, but finally led to proprietary technology that protected
Curana and its partners from outright imitation. Further adjustments led to a product that was finally
highly valuable for bicycle manufacturers. When the B”lite was launched (see p 24), it was presented
as a mudguard with a clean, high-tech look that combined a shining aluminium strip with coloured
plastic. Furthermore, installing the mudguard was easy through the use of intelligent clicking systems.
In sum, the success of innovating SMEs starts with conceiving and developing a new business model.
Sometimes, the business model is straightforward, as we have seen in the case of Isobionics. This
represents an instance when the company is replacing existing product offerings with a new one at
considerably lower production costs. In the other cases, conceptualizing and articulating a business
model is a more complex process requiring months and years to get the details just right. We have
thus far examined several ways to develop a business model. Some companies, such as Devan
Chemicals, start with key concepts that act as fundamental guidelines for many years. These concepts
are very powerful i f they are implemented in a firm’s strategy systematically and consistently. Similarly,
QOD’s and Curana’s success is based on clearly defining what the company wanted to do —a provider
of healthy sleep in the case of QOD and a highly innovative ODM for bicycle accessories in the case
of Curana. All firms have in common that their efforts are focussed on creating value for a particular
target customer. They start with an explicit or intuitive idea of what customers might value. Business
model innovations start with articulating a customer value proposition.
17
During our interviews, all
managers underlined that creating value for customers is the first and most important element in
generating new business. That does not imply, however, that unique customer value propositions are
developed by questioning existing customers. In many cases, this would be a good recipe for
incremental changes, but not for game-changing and highly profitable business model innovations.
18
Next, business models cannot be anticipated fully in advance and articulating them may take time.
Innovative business models are sometimes hard to articulate because too many questions remain
unanswered. The needs of the target customer might not be explicit. Or, it might not be clear how
value can be created for the customer group. In other cases, substantial uncertainty exists about
which technologies are the most promising for delivering customer value; which partners the company
can rely on to develop and commercialize the new offering; and how the firm can assure that the new
business will be profitable. This does not mean, however, that SMEs should wait to innovate until they
have a full business plan. Game-changing business model innovations cannot be planned analytically
because many of the variables relevant to their success are unknown at the o utset. In contrast, SMEs
have to experiment to discover new business models. Moreover, experimentation is path-dependent;
that is, early experiments and choices shape the trajectory for to evolve the business mode further.
19
New opportunities will be discovered each time the company achieves a new step in realizing its
business model.
19
Figure 1: Case Devan
20
21
22
2.3. Innovate beyond products and services: the relevance of the experience
economy for innovating SMEs
New offerings can create value for customers in different ways. A company might increase the
functionality and reliability of a product; the company can offer more convenience to the customers; or
the company can reduce costs and thus the price of a product or service. In today’s service economy,
many SMEs wrap additional services around their products to increase customer value in exchange
for a premium price. Although selling additional services might be a viable strategy in many industries,
several of the successful SMEs we analysed preferred to offer genuine experiences to their customers
as a new source of value.
Pine and Gilmore
20
have analysed in detail how ‘experiences’ are a new economic offering.
Experiences are as distinct from services as services are from goods. Experiences have always been
around (in the entertainment business, for instance), but they have gone largely unex plored as a major
driver for strategic innovation in SMEs, in both manufacturing and services. As products and services
increasingly become commoditized, experiences have emerged as a next step in creating value for
customers. Commoditization makes it increasingly difficult for SMEs to operate profitably in
established markets where scale and scope economies become the dominant driver to gain and
sustain competitive advantages. As the next examples will show, some SMEs have grown profitably
by transforming existing products or services into experiences for the customer.
Curana is a great example that illustrates how commodities such as mudguards and other bike
accessories can be used to transform bicycle riding for the end consumers into an engaging
experience. Currently, many consumers consider bicycles part of their lifestyle. Mountain bikers,
racers, recreational bikers, and 65-and-older bikers, for example, all have their own bicycle style. Bike
accessories with a sleek design help shape the unique look of a bike considerably. More and more
consumers are buying bikes on the basis of conforming their self-image. A bike, a car, or even a
jogging outfit reflects who we are or how we want to perceive ourselves and how we want others to
perceive us. In the case of biking, the industry tends to integrate bike accessories and cycler
accessories (cycling glasses, cycling shoes, cycling helmets, etc.), emphasizing that the cyclist is
buying both bike and an out fit as part of his lifestyle. These products should re flect the customer’s self-
image.
Today, the tag “By Curana” is a brand, and consumers are applying increasing pressure on bicycle
manufacturers to integrate Curana accessories on their bikes. Curana’s brand only became a strategic
asset in the last few years, however. It is the outcome of a series of decisions Curana’s management
took. First, as described, Dirk Vens decided to design and manufacture the B”Lite, a mudguard with a
clean, high-tech look combining the shining aluminium strip with coloured plastic. Curana made the
B”Lite as an ODM for the Accell Group, one of its major customers. Although growth and profitability
were exceeding the expectations of the company, Curana actually quit the ODM strategy. Their
innovation strategy is 100% offensive, meaning that Curana develops new concepts, uses new
materials, and creates new accessories without waiting for a specific request from a customer. Curana
also operates using a “proactive” design process that starts with exploring social changes, fashion
trends, developments in technologies and materials, and so on in combination with identifying several
problems and needs bicycle users and value chain partners ’ experience. This proactive design
process guaranteed that Curana would always create extraordinary products that differed from existing
products on the market. This distinctive design process led to bike accessories that were original and
highly appreciated by bike manufacturers that were searching to differentiate their bikes. This, in turn,
gave the Curana products more visibility, and soon the company was rewarded with several design
and innovation awards. Curana could now use its brand to signal quality, originality, and authenticity to
23
further strengthen its market position. Consumers wanted to buy bikes with Curana accessories. They
wanted to buy the real product from the genuine maker. Even if competitors are copying some
accessories, the brand is a way to discern an authentic bike accessory from an imitator. Curana thus
migrated from an OEM role, producing accessories according to specifications and prices customers
set. Moving from an OEM to an ODM allowed Curana to set its own price and create value for its
customers producing products with a customized design. Being an ODM would not differentia te
Curana from other ODMs, however. Thus, Curana chose to switch to a proactive design strategy,
proposing its own ideas and prototypes to bicycle manufacturers. The innovative and unusual
concepts and designs made Curana a well-known brand. Today, most bicycle manufacturers in
Europe are lining up to integrate Curana products in their product mix. In this way, the power balance
changed dramatically for Curana. As an OEM 15 years ago, Curana had no market power; now it
determines not only its own destiny, but also the direction of the entire bicycle manufacturing industry.
24
Figure 2: Case Curana
25
26
27
We find a similar switch from product based thinking to experience based thinking in the case of PRoF.
PRoF (see p 59) is an acronym for Patient Room of the Future. It is a consortium of architects,
manufacturers, professional organizations, user groups, social representatives, and teaching
institutions that created a totally new concept for the patient hospital room: the Patient Room of the
Future. PRoF is a concept in which the patient is the focal point of attention: his experience during the
hospitalisation is the central concept around which the consortium works. The Patient Room of the
Future is the result of intensive research into the needs of the medical world and the patients
themselves. During hospitalisation, professionals in the medical world are confronted more and more
with specific questions from patients, visitors, and colleagues. Patients desire more privacy, autonomy,
and choice; visitors would like more opportunities to assist the patient and an infrastructure that allows
them to stay in the patient’s neighbourhood. Medical staff must care for more patients; patients stay for
shorter hospitalisation periods; and the drive is strong to increase the medical staff’s productivity.
PRoF is an all-inclusive concept that tries to provide answers to these questions by focussing on the
patient and his environment, with durability, functionality, usability, and a modern design. The concept
has been implemented in a growing number of European, national, and regional norms. In Chapter 4,
we analyse how PRoF is organized as an interesting open innovation initiative. PRoF-projects deserve
more attention here because they owe their attractiveness to approaching the hospitalisation from the
patients’ perspective. PRoF shifts attention from the physical infrastructure and quality of medical
equipment in the room to how patients experience the hospitalisation. Similarly, the range and quality
of individual services (nurses, doctors, cleaning services) is not the main qualifier; indeed, more
services can be quite bothersome for patients. Instead, ProF is a customer-centred approach using
the patient room as a stage to improve the patient’s hospitalisation experience drastically. It is a
formidable and largely untapped approach to increasing value for the customer and enabling medical
staff to deliver value by making their jobs more convenient using, for instance, smart and integrated
information systems.
DNA Interactif Fashion (see p 29) also illustrates how an SME can transform an industry, in this case
fashion, into a stage for new ways to experience shopping. Their innovation adds value to customers
and helps retailers reduce costs. In fashion, rent is the most important cost factor. The average shop
in Belgium is 150 m
2
and the average rent is 450 €/m2. Retailers can only stock 350-450 €/m2 in their
stores. In contrast, they can stock up to 3,000 to 4,000 € /m2 in a warehouse. Huub Fijen, CEO of DNA
Interactif Fashion, claims retailers can save 40 to 50% in costs by reducing their shop space if
customers could experience shopping and buy fashion in a novel way. Nor is shopping optimized from
a customer’s perspective. Although many women (and men) perceive shopping to be one of the most
valuable activities during their spare time, making choices remains difficult because of the enormous
range of brands and models. Finding the right item of clothing is sometimes a real ordeal. Moreover, a
Flemish study with more than 2,000 women showed that 50% of clothing purchased was not worn.
This is because once the clothing is at home, it does not fit or colours do not quite match. Finally,
customers cannot check whether the clothes they are buying in the shop really coordinate with those
they have at home.
DNA Interactif Fashion proposed a new business model for fashion shopping. It changes shopping for
fashion goods into a completely new experience for the customer. Based o n a combination of two
technologies (displays and three-dimensional scanning), the company wants to change both the
physical shop and the shopping experience. The shop does not need to stock any clothing or provide
mirrors and sales assistants. Instead, shopping starts with a body scan of the customer: the digital
scan of the full body is complete in less than a minute. After scanning, customers see themselves on
large screens as a virtual, three-dimensional model dressed in clothes from various collections that the
shop offers. The scan can be extended to customize hair, glasses, or accessories and so on.
Changing clothes is now a virtual process: more clothes can be “tried out” as the customer sees
28
herself walking on a catwalk. Customers can also be welcomed by a stylist with whom they discuss
their personal style, but the software also can make choices for the customer depending in the
skeleton, weight, age, and other factors. This virtual 'fitting' replaces the sometimes unpleasant or
awkward process of fitting clothes. While virtual shopping is one thing, trying on clothes is, of course,
still necessary to see the colours, feel the fabric, and evaluate the clothes the customers selected
before they purchase. This process is called ‘iStyling’. It creates new ways to change shopping and
the shopping experience in the fashion industry drastically. The final product is an integrated solution
from a strong technology application that combines visualization, 3D scanning, and content from
different fashion segments. Customers experience an additional advantage: purchases are stored in a
personal, virtual wardroom, which can be consulted any time. This makes combining clothes easy and
effective. Furthermore, retailers can adapt their promotions to each customer’s personal style.
This approach not only provides extensive capabilities for the buying process, but also in the after-
sales market. iStyling records the articles that have been purchased. The new approach can thus take
this into account for advice when making new acquisitions. Moreover, customers can see online at
home how they might look in a new collection. This innovation is all about experiencing fashion; about
a customer’s personal style and (self-)image. Fashion is no longer about the garments or about how
top models look in these outfits. Instead, it is about how a customer buys on the basis of conforming
her self-image. Stylists even guide their customers through a t ransforming or restyling experience,
subsequently changing, adapting, or upgrading prior dressing habits to professional standards
So, far we have focused on how small companies develop new business models and how this move
allows them to sidestep the commodity trap. We narrowed our attention in this chapter to the role of
the business concept and the potential of turning business models that are product and service
oriented into more profitable business models based that generate experiences for customers. The
role of open innovation is not in business model innovation is not discussed here. This is the subject of
chapter four in which the role of open innovation in new business development is analysed in detail.
29
Figure 3: Case DNA Interactif Fashion
30
31
2.4. Different ways SMEs can create value
Smaller firms face challenges when fast or unpredictable shifts in market demand occur. The rapid
change in the bicycle industry in the 1990s, for example, was threatening Curana’s competitive
position rapidly. Curana innovated its business model primarily in response t o these shifts in the
marketplace. In fact, Curana changed its business model and embraced an ODM model and later a
proactive design strategy as a competitive driver. This change in strategy created value for its
customers and was highly profitable for the company.
Changes on the demand side, however, are sometimes slow and steady. Think about the growing
awareness of companies to develop environmentally friendly or sustainable products or the increase in
prominence of healthcare and wellness in our lives. Devan Chem icals’ philosophy is to be an innovate
company in the textile chemicals industry by introducing chemicals that are less harmful to the
environment and have a positive health effect. Similarly, Philip’s Airfryer is a product in Philips’
ambitious kitchenware department. Airfryer's Rapid Air technology enables consumers to fry crispy
fries that contain up to 80% less fat than a conventional fryer. The Airfryer (see p 86) is a new way to
fry a variety of fried foods, snacks, chicken, and other meats, all in an easier and healthier way. Philips
is capitalizing with this product on the identifiable trend that consumers increasingly value healthy food
without compromising the taste. Philips did not develop the Airfryer’s technology, however, but instead
engaged an independent engineer, as we will discuss in chapter 5. Finally, the founders of Quilts of
Denmark based their strategy on the fundamental belief that consumers perceive health and healthy
sleep as becoming increasingly important.
Changes in the markets and consumer behavior are thus important to identify entrepreneurial
opportunities for small companies. Likewise, the emergence of new technologies and disruptive
technological developments offer similar opportunities for small firms. Many venture capital-backed
high-tech ventures have been established to explore business opportunities that can be exploited
based on a new applications of technologies. Isobionics is one of those start -ups that have the
potential to change competitive dynamics in a traditional industry such as the flavour and fragrances
market. The biotechnological processes to produce these substances at a much lower cost than
traditional production techniques will ignite competitive reactions, and the market might look quite
differently within a decade. It is interesting to note that small ventures such as Isobionics need not
have all the required technology in-house. Isobionics licensed the technology from DSM, a large
Dutch-based chemical company and developed its first flavours (Biovalencene
TM
) in close cooperation
with DSM researchers. Devan Chemicals also chose to be technological leader in the textile chemical
industry. It has always been ahead of its time, starting with flame retardant technology and
progressing to advanced technologies such as natural allergen control technology and antim icrobial
technology. In this case, most technologies are co-developed with knowledge partners such as
universities, research labs, and lead-customers. New technologies thus offer opportunities for small
firms even in the so-called low-tech industry such as textiles, furniture, bicycles, food, and so on.
Science or technology driven strategies are fruitful for small firms under several conditions. First, small
firms profit from pursuing markets that are too small (at least initially) to interest large companies.
Second, technological leadership erodes over time when imitators bring similar but less expensive
products to the market. Technological leadership is thus a moving target that requires the small firm to
migrate from one technological opportunity to another. Third, when new technological developments
drive competition, small firms can prosper only when they collaborate with a range of knowledge
partners: they don’t have the required in-house technology and financial resources to develop the
technology on their own. Small firms, however, also face considerable challenges when sourcing
external technology, because they often lack the capabilities to identify, transfer, and absorb external
ideas and technologies effectively into their firms. They must employ personnel with the required
scientific background to understand, absorb, and exploit the scientific discoveries and technologies
developed at universities, research labs, or large companies. Finally, small firms must make choices
32
about the way they will profit from their technology. Sometimes it is more interesting to license or sell
the technology; in other cases, it will be more interesting to sell products that incorporate the
technology. Which option to choose depends on the strength of the intellectual property system and
the role the complementary assets play in a particular industry.
21
Shifts in government policies targeted at the business environment are another important driver of
business model innovations in SMEs. Sometimes, new regulations may increase fixed costs of doing
business, which drives out players that are too small to amortize the costs. In other cases, regulations
may open new opportunities for small business, endangering the position of large established firms.
Examples include the production of sustainable electricity or new types of media. The mercury
barometer industry in Europe is an interesting case from this point of view. In 1990, Paul Dingens
started a glass works company that produced its own line of glass instruments. This Belgian company
grew into one of the largest craft producers in Europe, and by the mid -1990s Dingens (see p 42) had a
strong position in the top-segment of this market with a uniquely crafted line of fine mercury
barometers. Sales of the mercury barometer halted suddenly when German EU Commissioner
Gunther Verheugen banned the use of mercury for non -professional applications. Many European
producers of mercury barometers suspended sales and most went out of business because there was
no compensation to these companies.
Dingens Barometers and Clocks, however, stayed in business and explored the technical possibilit ies
to produce a new barometer for the high-end segment. Facing the risk of bankruptcy, reinventing the
barometer was the only way out. With the help of a few innovation partners and subsidies from IWT
(the Agency for Innovation by Science and Technology in Flanders) the open innovation journey
started. Dingens wanted to collaborate with the University of Hasselt and knowledge partner Sirris to
develop a completely new instrument The new barometer should have the same advantages of the
mercury barometer (accurate, legible, durable, and decorative), but without using mercury. Moreover,
the new product had not only to be ecologically friendly, but also easy to use. Dingens and its partners
searched for a combination of knowledge from different industries, including aerospace and food,
among others. They experimented with techniques, some already used for decades in aviation
navigation, that used high vacuum metal cells that respond precisely to pressure differences to
indicate the airplane’s height. Cell expans ion is measured to only thousandths of a millimetre, and a
combination of eight cells delivered an exact measurement of the pressure. To convert these minimal
pressure differences into a convenient tool for recording weather data, the metal cells were brought
into contact with a liquid that reacts to these small differences accurately and thereby allows the scale
to expand to 50 cm in length. This makes it not only highly accurate, but also easy to read for both
professional and ordinary users. The liquid is also used in aviation and is especially designed so that
the temperature would not affect the barometer’s reading. The membranes find their origin in the food
industry, in fact, where they are used to filter nutrients. In short, a combination of existing technologies
used in different industries led to a revolution in the barometer business after the EU-banned mercury
barometers. Dingens called its innovation the Innovacelli (The Innovative Torricelli barometer). The
innovation is presented in the case box (see p 42). In the next chapter, we will illustrate that the
Innovacelli also represents a technology that can be used for new, unexpected applications.
Changes in the environment are thus an important reason small companies experiment with new
business models to revamp or grow their business. However, we must also look at value drivers to
explain successful business model innovations in SMEs. Small firms can benefit from having several
advantages compared to large companies depending on the activities that drive profits in different
industries.
We found that SMEs can have a considerable advantage because they can react quickly to changes
in the market, changes in customers’ needs, and in offering customized products and services to
clients (particularly in business-to-business industries). Segers & Balcaen (see p 35) is a small Belgian
plastics packaging company that continuously identifies new packaging needs among its customers.
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For many other companies, Segers is a preferred supplier because they continuously innovate in order
to offer new packaging solutions. In several cases, Segers has created customized packaging
according to specific customer needs. Larger competitors are not interested in this type of customer
intimacy because customized solutions equate to small production runs. And, such customization
takes too much management and engineering time to develop solutions.
New technologies also provide opportunities for small companies. New technologies often find their
first applications at the edge of markets or in niche markets, not amidst the mainstream.
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Mainstream
customers will only buy a technology product when the new technology has been proven, complexity
has been reduced, and the convenience level elevated. Innovations start small and offer great
opportunities for SMEs to pursue embryonic markets that are too small to attract large firms. As we will
see in the next chapters, small firms no longer develop technologies themselves in the open
innovation landscape; therefore, developing technology based business opportunities should no
longer be limited to university and corporate spin-offs. Start-ups can use their organizational agility,
application know-how, or market intelligence to commercialize technologies that they license from
universities or larger, technology-savvy companies. Isobionics illustrates this point. The company took
a technology to market that had been abandoned at DSM at a speed that surprised both technology
providers and investors.
Small companies also have a greater ability to specialize than large companies that are serving clients
in a particular industry or branch. Focusing on a particular type of application makes smaller
companies champions in linking market needs with what customers need from technology that is
available from different types of knowledge partners. Small firms are successful as innovation
champions because they know how to bundle the right expertise of different technology agencies to
solve a problem for their customers. Their relational capital is crucial in explaining their success as
innovators. Devan Chemicals, Quilts of Denmark, and Curana are examples of how a small firm can
be successful deploying this strategy.
Some small firms sidestep commoditization by turning products or services into experiences. Jan
Kriekels, CTO of Jaga (see p 47), expressed it this way: “Jaga products are not only heating your
house, but also your soul”. People buy Jaga heaters because they care about the environment or
because they want a sleekly designed radiator as an eye catcher in their home or business lounge.
Purchasing a radiator is about values, about who you are, and about customers’ self -image. Similarly,
the founders of Quilts of Denmark intended to be “providers of a healthy sleep”, not quilts-makers.
And, DNA Interactif Fashion completely changed the shopping experience. Their product s change the
activity of shopping for fashion into a styling experience. The experience eventually transforms the
customer into a restyled person using personalized advice from a professional.
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Key Learning points
Analyzing open innovation in SMEs in traditional industries starts with conceiving and
developing a new business model.(A business model defines the way a company delivers
value for a specific customer group at a profit). The value of open innovation activities in
SMEs can only be estimated correctly within the context of their broader strategic objectives.
New strategic objectives of a company should be analyzed via a business model innovation
framework.
All firms have in common that their efforts are focused on creating value for a particular target
customer. They start with an explicit or intuitive idea of what customers might value. Business
model innovations start with articulating a customer value proposition.
Creating customer value through game-changing and highly profitable business models will
usually not be developed by questioning existing customers.
Sometimes, the business model is straightforward. In the other cases, conceptualizing and
articulating a business model is a more complex process. It may take months and even years
to clearly articulate the customer value of an idea. Innovative business models are sometimes
hard to articulate because the needs of the target customer might not be explicit, uncertainty
might exist about which technologies to use and which partners to team up with.
However, SMEs should wait to innovate until they have a full business plan. Game-changing
business model innovations cannot be planned analytically because many of the variables
relevant to their success are unknown at the outset. In contrast, SMEs have to experiment to
discover new business models. It is a discovery driven process.
Most of the SMEs use business model innovation to fight commoditization of their products.
They can increase functionality or reliability of the products, they can create more convenient
products for the customers. SMEs may also wrap additional services around their product or
offer genuine experiences to the customers.
Turning businesses under the threat of commoditization into genuine experiences for
customers is a difficult target for SMEs but it is one of the most profitable strategies in the long
term and a way to gain more power in the industry.
Drivers for change may be quite diverse. We identified the following drivers:
o New substitutes and new players in the market – sharp increase in competition
o Public policies changing the market conditions forcing SMEs to overhaul their
strategy.
o Slow, steady changes in demand: Growing concerns for sustainability and health
impact are long term trends that offer great business opportunities for innovative
SMEs.
o New technologies who have the potential to disrupt incumbents in an industry are an
interesting business driver for high-tech start-ups. Their technology should not
necessarily be developed in-house (chapter 4).
SMEs may have some advantages compared to large companies:
o SMEs are more agile than large companies. If speed to market plays a role, SMEs
can outcompete large companies.
o New technologies often find their first applications at the edge of markets or niche
markets, not amidst mainstream markets. Innovations start small and therefor offer
opportunities for SMEs to pursue embryonic markets that are too small to attract large
companies.
o SMEs have greater capability to specialize than large firms to offer customized service
to customers.
o Small companies may offer completely new experiences for customers. These
radically new ways of offering value for customers takes time to develop and there are
too many unknowns at the outset to guarantee a market big enough to attract big
companies.
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Figure 4: Case Segers & Balcaen
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3 A dynamic view on business model innovation
Business model innovation should not only be analyzed cross -sectionally, but also dynamically
because they develop and change over time. In this chapter, we analyze some aspects of business
model innovation in SMEs. First, we look at the possibility of changing business models. Change may
not occur just once, but several times, moving stepwise toward a business model that creates more
interesting value propositions and results in higher profitability. Second, we examine the process of
discovering new applications after a small firm has introduced a new technology to solve a problem in
its existing product markets. Next, we examine the reasons the SMEs we interviewed do not diversify
into new businesses, even though they have the technological expertise to do so. We pay special
attention to the role of customers and innovation partners in this process. Finally, several SMEs have
built a corporate reputation or brand as part of their strategy as a way to fight commoditization. Smal l
firms typically lack the financial resources to build a brand, yet many we interviewed had pursued
unconventional and less expensive options that provide an interesting alternative.
Developing a dynamic view on business model innovation is also important to understand the
dynamics in the open innovation networks of the companies we examined. These open innovation
aspects will be described in detail in the next chapter.
3.1. Stepwise discovery of new business models
In the previous chapter, we described how Curana has changed its strategy from an OEM model to a
more profitable ODM model. Most SME managers would likely stick to the new ODM strategy, but Dirk
Vens of Curana did not. Instead, he changed his strategy three times in a single decade (see p 38).
Why did he change the business model several times? Some managers continuously probe ne w
business models, with each new model building on the strength of its predecessor. Switching to a new
business model creates opportunities to change it again for a second or a third time. It is a path-
dependent process in that opportunities to change the business model into a more profitable model
can only be detected after the previous business model has materialized fully. SMEs thus change their
business model in a stepwise way.
To illustrate this concept, we take the example of Curana and use a scheme suggested by Dirk Vens
(see figure 5, p 38). The scheme shows his company’s business model innovations between 1999 and
2010. Curana, a small, family-owned bicycle accessories manufacturer started as a typical OEM: it
produced steel mudguards and other accessories according to specs from bike manufacturers in
Belgium and surrounding countries. The customers (manufacturers) determined the prices, and the
company could not add value because the product was easy for other bike accessory manufacturers
to imitate, often at the same price. The competitive position of these OEMs worsened with the
increasing globalization in the late 1990s. Market power was shifting in the direction of the bicycle
manufacturers, which is why Dirk Vens chose to change his company’s business model.
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Figure 5: Business model innovation at Curana
The transformation from an OEM to an ODM model was made possible through a new product
development project, which resulted in the B”lite mudguard.
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At that time, Curana only knew the
bicycle market and how to produce steel products. The B”lite resulted from an intensive collaboration
between Curana, Pilipili (the design office), Anziplast (the polymer extruder), and Accell Group (a
major Curana customer). Accell took the commercial risk to buy the B”lite at a predetermined price if
Curana and its partners succeeded in producing the product before a particular de adline. The B”Lite
enabled Curana to change its business model from an OEM model to an ODM model. In an ODM
model, it is the design process that differentiates the product and prices. With an ODM model, control
of the product and price reverted to Curana based on the premium customers want to pay for a unique
and exclusive design. The B”Lite was Curana’s first major success. The company’s turnover
quadrupled in the six years after the B”Lite was introduced. B”Lite’s success urged management to
introduce other mudguards and other bike accessories with a high-tech look. Customers started to
realize that Curana was becoming an important partner for their own success. Over the years, Curana
has become a strategic development partner for all leading European bicycle manufacturers.
Most SME-managers would be inclined to stick to this new business model because avoiding the
commodity trap and price competition are their main concerns. Once Curana was recognized as an
ODM, however, it fine-tuned a new strategic direction. Design and innovation became core activities to
deliver unique products and gain market share. In 2006, the company took another bold move and
changed its business model again. It established an internal design office because design had
become the heart of the company. Curana gradually moved toward what management labeled as
original strategic management (OSM). To develop new ideas continuously, Curana no longer waited
for requests or orders from clients, aiming instead for a pro-active innovation strategy. At this stage,
design at Curana was managed in a cyclical way through four consecutive steps . Exploration was the
first step. The company continuously explored social changes, fashion trends, and developments in
technologies and materials, but it also studied the problems and needs of bicycle users and value
chain partners. To support these explorations, Curana had to understand how to manage design and
innovation. It thus participated in different networks, such as a learning innovation network, design
networks, research programs, and so on. Design was the second step. Once an idea was spotted and
considered valuable, the company developed simple, handmade models of the product. From this
process, Curana learned significant lessons for the next stages of development. The best ideas were
fine-tuned during a concept and styling stage. Next in the system design stage, the concept was
analyzed from an assembly perspective. During the concept workout, styling, and system design,
Curana was in touch constantly with production partners, knowledge and design centers, mold makers,
and material experts. The third step is promotion. In this step, Curana organized information sessions
to promote its new ideas among potential customers. In this way, the company r eceived valuable
feedback from potential customers. Realization is the fourth step. For Curana, this step started with
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developing a high-end, three-dimensional model of the concept in collaboration with an (external)
engineering partner. After both virtual and physical verifications, production was prepared in
collaboration with external production partners, mold makers, and material experts.
Using the so-called Original Strategic Management (OSM) model, Curana and its innovation partners
started from a vision based on new opportunities derived from global trends, new materials and
technology, and design developments. It is a vision -driven approach where direct interaction with
potential customers is delayed until a later stage in the process. Customers are still important, but they
are not driving the company’s innovation strategy. Through this strategy, Curana created bike
accessories that were unique to the industry. To feed this strategy, Curana collaborated progressively
with design communities and innovation centers. Its management and designers were guest lecturing
about their experiences with design, open innovation, and intellectual property management. Within
just a few years, Curana emerged as the most creative firm in the industry, and the company became
indispensable for European bicycle makers. The OSM strategy gave the company more degrees of
freedom to operate—in that it was no longer limited to customer-initiated projects—and new ways to
further differentiate its products from competing offerings on the market.
In 2008, the company switched to an Original Brand Management (OBM) strategy. Curana was
recognized in the industry as a trendsetter, which triggered the company to build a brand -based
strategy. The company’s innovative nature was celeb rated as it won several prestigious innovation
and design awards. End-users started to really know Curana’s bike accessories, and touching the
heart of the end-customer became increasingly important. The company now emphasized bicycling as
a lifestyle, in which bicycles and accessories were crucial to shaping the experience. Authenticity in
delivering that experience was also important. The customer wanted the leading design brand, not an
inexpensive imitation. For this purpose, the label “ByC”—representing the phrase “By Curana” and
pronounced as “bike”—was developed to establish a direct link with the end-consumer and create pull-
trough demand.
Three strategic changes in a single decade may appear to be too much turbulence, but it is a logical
consequence of the firm’s discovery driven growth. Dirk Vens had no grand design in 1999 for the
company’s strategy in the coming decade. Too many variables were relevant for Curana’s success
which were unknown at the outset. Dirk Vens was searching for a new business model that would
bring growth and profitability. He started with one product development project that resulted in the
successful launch of the B”Lite and the start of the ODM business model. The B”lite, however, was not
invented in a straightforward or linear way. The company and its innovation partners continuously
probed new solutions; they were experimenting with different options because too much uncertainty
existed to plan analytically a way to move forward.
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Experimenting and redirecting projects are
essential in discovery driven growth.
New opportunities to create and capture value are discovered step -by-step, and each previous step is
necessary to move to the next. Let’s look again at the four business models in figure 5 (p.38). Once
Curana had adopted the ODM model, it created strong design skills and a network of innovation
partners that were indispensable in designing, developing, and producing new products. Only at that
point did the company realize that it could increase the uniqueness of its designs (and the value for
customers) further by switching to a proactive innovation strategy. This change in strategy gave the
company more degrees of freedom to act (customers were no longer taking the initiative) and resulted
in higher profitability as Curana developed its own style and design. At this point in Curana’s strategy
trajectory, it became difficult for competing firms to duplicate the strategy because of Cura na’s growing
reputation. Finally, when the company switched to an OBM strategy, it capitalized on its reputation and
newly created brand. Curana positioned its products as the authentic product versus possible
imitations by others. The OBM model could only be developed after the OSM model; Curana’s
products would never be novel and authentic if the company did not proactively decide to design
bicycle parts. Because of this change, the company was recognized in the industry as a trendsetter
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which, in turn, triggered a brand-based strategy. These consecutive steps propelled the company into
a leading position in the bike accessory market. Each change in strategy strengthened Curana’s
unique offerings, which became more challenging to imitate. By transitioning from an OEM to a leading
company setting industry standards, Curana gained more freedom to decide direction and more
market power. In contrast, if the company had remained with the ODM business model, several
competitors might already be imitating Curana’s strategy.
Curana’s successive business model changes also offered it a unique position in the market. Curana
develops new concepts and designs, but sells them as tangible products. Together, Curana and its
network of partners invent, design, develop, patent and manufacture bike accessories. Curana is not
another design office; it is not a polymer extruder or a classic manufacturer of bike accessories. The
company created its own market space by bringing together these competences in its innovation
network and by incorporating these skills into completely new and stylish bike accessories. Curana’s
market position is unique: upstream players in the bicycle industry cannot copy the strategy because
they can only offer part of the solutions that Curana offers. Likewise, bicycle manufacturers cannot
drive the coordination among upstream players in the same way Curana drives the coordination
among partners in the innovation network. In other words, innovation networks are powerful tools to
differentiate a firm’s products from competing products. Imitation is almost impossible unless a
company establishes its own innovation network.
3.2. The process of discovering new applications
Several firms we interviewed were looking for a solution to solve a problem in their existing markets.
When existing product markets come under pressure, a firm t ries first to fix the problems by
introducing new technology. After the company succeeds in fixing the problems in its existing market,
it might detect new applications for the new technology. Discovering new applications, however, is a
slow process that emerges, most of the time unintended, after the new technology is established.
Take, for example, Dingens Barometers & Clocks. In 2009, Dingens launched the Innovacelli
barometer, wan innovative barometer without mercury that was developed in collaboration with several
innovation partners. This new barometer was developed after the European Commission banned
mercury barometers. The Innovacelli uses vacuum metal containers that react to the changing air
pressure. A combination of eight vacuum boxes produces an extremely accurate measurement of
even the slightest change in air pressure. These movements are passed on to a liquid in a glass
capillary tube, which in turn display a highly accurate pressure. Because the metal vacuum pressure
boxes accurately measure even the slightest change in pressure, this new product was a perfect
replacement for mercury barometers, which have been the most accurate barometers for centuries.
Mercury barometers represented 80% of Dingens’ turnover.
The new technology, however, offered several other technical advantages that were slowly translated
into new business opportunities. First, mercury barometers have a minimum length of 90 cm to be
effective, but the height of the Innovacelli could be reduced to a minimum of 40 cm. This had
unexpected consequences, because the barometer could now be made stable enough to stand freely
on a table and to withstand earthquakes. This was particularly important for the Jap anese market,
which Paul Dingens discovered unintentionally during an economic mission in Japan. He learned that
the barometer’s small size was also interesting in markets where houses are small and traditional
barometers were too large to be a decorative instrument in the house.
Second, Dingens had always been selling in the business-to-consumer (B2C) markets through
retailers. Paul Dingens knew that mercury barometers had long been banned in the United States, and
that in professional applications, mechanical barometers were used instead. He discovered through
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informal talks with his agent in the US, however, that many professional users did not trust the
barometers they used. Applications for airports, blood testing, treating lung patients, tuning linear
accelerators in cancer treatment, and tuning engines to name a few applications require real air
pressure to be measured very accurately. Air pressure changes with the altitude and mechanical
barometers are not precise enough when adapting for the altitude.
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Several hospitals and even
NASCAR
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contacted Paul to develop an Innovacelli that was easy to adapt to the location’s height.
He made a simple system representing a variable scale so that each pressure zone can be achieved,
even to very low pressures at extreme altitudes.
Paul Dingens originally expected to sell 1,000 to 2,000 Innovacellis annually in the B2C market. Now,
he calculated that there were 5,900 hospitals in the US that are specialized in radiation, lung diseases,
and blood gas analysis. If each hospital needed two to five barometers, the B2B market was several
times larger than the B2C market. The B2B market was also a more attractive market because
Dingens could sell directly to the end customer and would no longer deal with margin-eating dealers
and importers.
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Figure 6: Case Innovacelli
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44
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The AirFryer (see p 86) is another example how new applications emerge gradually. The Philips
AirFryer was originally developed as a tool to fry French fries and other food Europeans fry with a
deep fat fryer. The Airfryer was seen as an alternative to create fries that were much healthier than
frying in regular fryers. It was positioned as a top-segment product in the frying tools market, priced at
199 €. Philips soon realized, however, that the appliance’s new Rapid Air Technology —the device
uses a grill and a fan to blast very hot air around food at high speeds—required new handling. Philips
spent significant energy educating customers about how to make the fries tasty and crispy in an
Airfryer; essentially, customers had to learn to fry again because hot air frying differs from frying in
regular fryers. Cooking customs had to adapt considerably. With the Airfryer, a batch of handmade
chips needs just half a spoonful of oil and takes more than 12 minutes to cook. Oven-ready French
fries can be cooked to a crisp in nine minutes. More important, however, is that rapidly rotating hot air
technology can produce a brown and crispy finish in everything from chicken legs to scampi. Steak,
hamburgers, chicken breast, and frozen chicken nuggets are only a few examples of what can be fried.
Those with a sweet tooth will be happy to learn that the Airfryer can bake a cake in 25 minutes.
The wide variety of meals that can be fried with the Airfryer (and competing devices) will most likely
change frying habits and cooking in general in the next decade. With Philips communicating with
customers via its My Kitchen Web site, different customers are already experimenting with new
ingredients, meals, and so on. In addition, Philips was collaborating with large snack companies such
as Mora to combine efforts to promote food snacks and the Airfryer, explaining to customers how they
could optimize the device for several frozen snacks.
Using the fryer’s food separator accessory, users can fry several foods at once without mixing their
flavors—no one wants their apple fritters tasting like halibut or chicken nuggets smelling like scrimps.
The AirFryer also has an air filter to keep the smells under control so that the house does not smell
like a chip shop. Tasty and healthy fried food is, of course, the major sales argument, but these
additional features are also interesting. The food separator allows customers to fry an entire me al and
can inspire snack producers to develop different combinations with the same frying time as a ready -to-
eat meal.
In summary, Philips developed a device to fry tasty but healthier chips. Because the technology was
quite different from deep fat frying, it also created new options to change recipes and frying habits.
These options, however, were not considered at the outset. The Airfryer was positioned as a high -end
product and as a possible alternative for regular fryers. The new possibilities the Air fryer and its Rapid
Air Technology present only emerged after customers started to use the device and when other
players in the market, such as snack producers, envisioned new market opportunities. The Airfryer has
now been on the market one year, which is far too short to explore all the possible options and
applications. It will be interesting to follow up in the next five to 10 years on the ecosystem that is
developing around the AirFryer or similar frying devices. New applications for new technologies are
detected only slowly. It is a gradual process that is difficult to discover when a product that
incorporates a new technology is launched.
3.3. Diversify or not?
It is remarkable that the firms we interviewed did not diversify over time into new businesses that were
not or only weakly related to their core business. Each firm stayed focused on its product markets and
customers. The most interesting example in this respect is Curana. Although the company changed
significantly in the last decade, it has always been focusing on providing solutions for bike
manufacturers. Similarly, Jaga is still a radiator factory after decades of changes. Quilts of Denmark
46
stayed in the quilts and pillows market. The innovation and design capabilities these companies built
over time gave them definite opportunities to diversify into other markets. Curana, for instance, was
invited to design lighting armatures. Technically, this was perfectly possible, but two reasons emerged
as to why a small, innovative company should stick to its core products. First, new product markets
have their own specific challenges. Lighting, for instance, is highly regulated on security issues, and a
company such as Curana has no idea how to cope with these challenges. Second, the company’s
reputation is related to its own ecosystem, including its customers. Outside that open innovation
network, the company cannot rely on its reputation and it has to start from scratch to build its network
of partners and customers.
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Open innovation networks thus enable a company to deliver value in
completely new ways to its customers. They also, however, keep the company tied to the existing
innovation partners and customers. In a phrase, innovation networks enable, but they also bind.
Devan also shows a similar pattern of moving from one product category to another. The company has
stayed highly focused on the textiles chemicals industry. It still supplies the same type of clients as it
did 20 years ago. Indeed, the type of products changed, but not the clients. The firm moved from
relatively easy chemical applications in the textile industry to very advanced products. Probiotex, for
instance, applied microcapsules containing suitable non -pathogenic bacterial spores that, when
released by breaking the microcapsules, colonize the surfaces of treated textiles. The bacterial
colonies consume unwanted matter (dirt, soil, dust mite excrement) on the surface of the treated
material. This improves hygiene and reduces the incidence of allergic reactions. Research and
development over the years has resulted in using fewer chemicals in this industry. And, the new
products are eco-friendly and some provide a more hygienic or healthier living environment. The race
into ever more complex applications of chemicals coincided with a continued focus on the same type
of customers and applications. Furthermore, the innovation partners were involved in long-term
contracts and formed a stable network of trusted partners that had known one another for years or
decades. This improved the effectiveness of their collaboration over time.
PRoF is the only example that initially seems to escape this logic. PRoF is a customer-centered
consortium and should not be confused with different ecosystems in which partners work together to
deliver a product or a service to a particular customer group. PRoF delivers a new way of thinking
about patient hospital rooms, personalized residences, or healthcare. The PRoF business model
brings together several companies with complementary competencies to develop a new idea or
concept for a particular end consumer (patient or the elderly). PRoF was successful in transposing the
concept from a patient room, to a personalized residence, and finally a place to care for elderly
persons. Here again, however, several aspects remain unchanged over time, including the focus on a
particular customer group and the combination of specific partners in the consortium (same leading
companies). Moreover, the partners get much more exposure through the PRoF-consortium than if
they work separately or within a traditional industry approach.
In all these examples, we see that that the companies do not diversify. They stick to their value chain
partners or customers. In several cases, the innovation network is one of the factors that limit the
options to change over time. The innovation network is an enabling factor in generating new products
or services, but it also limits the number of options for the company to change and diversity.
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Figure 7: Case Jaga
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3.4. Building and exploiting reputation and brand
Several of the companies we interviewed were building a reputation or brand. Usually this effort is part
of the strategy to differentiate products or changing from a product or production-oriented strategy into
an experience-based strategy. Building and branding a corporate reputation is a logical consequence
of this change. Several small companies we examined were building a corporate reputation around
authentic ideas, values, or experiences. Building a credible reputation can be very expensive, and
SMEs usually do not have the money to make this investment. Less expensive alternatives exist,
however, that rely on the reputation of external organizations and that make reputation building
financially feasible for SMEs. First, SMEs can try to get labels of di fferent official organizations. These
can be all types of organizations certifying that products meet requirements or standards concerning
health, technical quality, environmental norms, safety norms, and so on. Second, they can try to build
a reputation in a credible way by winning awards: Quilts of Denmark, Jaga, and Curana are three
companies that used different types of awards granted by prestigious organizations to build their
image. These awards boost the visibility and reputation of the small company . Finally, articles in
magazines, short interviews that are broadcasted or put online, and conference talks are also
instrumental for increasing the company’s reputation.
Take, for instance, Quilts of Denmark (see p 65), which developed a functional quilt with the product
line branded TEMPRAKON. After consulting with an examination board of sleep experts, QOD
decided to produce a functional quilt that would reduce the temperature variation under the quilt to
provide a healthy sleep. The company finally found a promising technology that was developed
originally for NASA in 1988 by Triangle Research and Development to produce astronauts’ suits and
gloves. Subsequently, the Space Foundation recognised TEMPRAKON bedding products as a
Certified Space Technology. The use of this label on the quilts was a guarantee that QOD could
differentiate its TEMPRAKON line of products from potential imitators. A label from an official institute
such as the Space Foundation builds a company’s reputation in a highly credible way. Since the
founding of the company in 2000, QOD had also received several innovation awards from the Danish
government and the Tuborg Foundation, among others. Furthermore, QOD’s products were also
approved and tested by Oeko-Tex Standard 100 for chemicals and dyestuffs; Astma-Allergi Forbundet
(the Danish Asthma & Allergy Association) for allergies; NOMITE for dust mite allergy; and
Downafresh for European Standard hygiene requirements. Finally, Hans -Erik Schmidt, one of the
founders, was frequently asked to speak at conferences to explain the success of the TEMPRAKON.
Curana exemplifies another way a small company can build a strong reputation in less t han a decade.
The company had won several design and innovation awards; for example, it received the prestigious
Design Management Europe Award in 2008. In the same year, the company also won the IF
Packaging Award for packaging its D-Vide product and received two IF Eurobike awards for a new
dress guard and the C-Lite mudguard and chain fender. In 2009, it won another IF Eurobike Award
with Fload, a lightweight luggage rack with a built -in rear light. Finally, in 2010, it won the prestigious
Henry Van de Velde Award. Besides awards, Curana became well known as a result of publications
both within and beyond the bicycle industry. Examples include newsletters from universities and
knowledge centers and publications of Design Vlaanderen, among others. Just as in the case of QOD ,
Dirk Vens, CEO of Curana, was a highly sought -after speaker for seminars and conferences to
address design, entrepreneurship, and open innovation. All these activities provided the company with
more international visibility and a reliable reputation as top design company.
Jaga is another (and a more extreme) example that illustrates how corporate reputation can be built.
First, Jaga cooperated continuously with several architects, designers, and artists such as Arne
Quinze, Joris Laarman, and many others. This intense interchange with creative people resulted in a
flow of refreshing ideas for the company. Next, Jaga won numerous awards for different products. Its
Playradiator (see p 47)—a colorful radiator for childrens’ rooms—for instance, won the Henri Van de
Velde award in 2011. The new St. Bartholomew’s School in Newbury uses Jaga LST radiators, which
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incorporate Low H2O heat exchangers. This school won the Architectural category in the prestigious
Green Apple Awards in 2011. Furthermore, Jaga was involved in several events such as the Burning
Man event in Black Rock Desert, Nevada. Jaga’s project, ‘The Belgian Waffle’, led by Jan Kriekels,
won the ‘best art installation’ award in 2006. Finally, the company also sponsored specific sports such
as yachting, Olympic class sailing, and historic motorbikes. All of these efforts and awards contribute
to the idea that the companies can boost creativity, craftsmanship, and improve the sustainability of
their products.
Jaga’s success is linked closely to Jan Kriekels success. As Jaga’s owner, Jan organized an
increasing number of highly innovative projects. He became an icon of c reativity with an international
reputation. As a result, he was invited as a guest speaker at several conferences for his controversial
ideas about creativity and the role entrepreneurs play in the business community. Furthermore, he
was appointed as a jury member of several international innovation and management organizations.
For instance, he was appointed as jury member of the Design Management Europe award, which is
granted to European companies that use design to create added value for their customers and know
how to commercialize design in products. When a manager becomes an icon of creativity and
innovation, it becomes an additional asset in for developing new business opportunities. Today, Jan
Kriekels has a worldwide reputation as a thinker and evangelist of the cradle-to-cradle philosophy. His
extensive personal network and his ideas combined with down -to-earth projects such as those in
found in “Open Greenforce”. This organization analyzes the investments required for a building to
reduce energy consumption to a minimum. Combining people with strong ideas and reputation with
green technology projects is an interesting recipe for successful new ventures.
Jaga is certainly an extreme example of how a company can build a reputation over time. It als o
shows, however, how powerful an innovative culture in a company can be. In 2010, the company was
losing money due to the rapidly increasing price of raw materials, particularly copper. Most companies
would downscale innovation and creativity experiments. In contrast, Jan Kriekels sent two top
managers home to restructure the firm into a company with a flat organizational structure. The idea
was that 25 small profit centers could work with a relative autonomy to increase creativity and
customer orientation. This organizational change was implemented in mid -2011, meaning it has just
recently been implemented. It is thus too early to evaluate its effects on the company’s bottom line.
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Key learning points
Successful SMEs do not remain with one business model forever. They are continuously
probing new business models. Each new business model builds on the strength of the
previous business model and improves its value proposition and profitability . This constitutes a
path-dependent process because new opportunities to transform the business model into
being more profitable can only be detected after the previous business model has materialized
fully. In business model innovation, too much uncertainty exists to plan analytically a way to
move forward. Indeed, SMEs change their business model in a stepwise way.
Business model innovations are designed to create more value and generate more profits,
and increasing profitability can be the result of several changes. We have emphasized
innovating SMEs can increase profitability by increasing the number of control points and
creating a unique offering. In the case of Curana, the company gained control points to
differentiate itself from the competition. In addition, its accessories were unique, incorporated
great designs, and combined new materials in a way no other single producer could copy.
If a company faces serious problems in its existing markets, it will look for a (technological)
solution to solve the problems. Discovering new applications for the new technology is a slow
process that emerges, most often unintended, after the new technology has existed for a
while.
In contrast, small, innovative companies do not diversify. They stick to their markets,
customers, and partners.
Open innovation networks enable a company to deliver value in a completely new ways to its
customers, but they also keep the company tied to the existing innovation partners and
customers. Innovation networks enable, but they also bind.
Small companies must use relatively inexpensive but credible ways to develop a reputation or
brand. Examples include certi ficates, awards, lectures at conferences, press coverage, and
other inexpensive means.
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4 How SMEs build new business models through open
innovation?
In the previous chapters, we explored how small firms can boost their competiveness in the long run
by changing their business model. So far, we have not been emphasizing the role of the innovation
partners in enabling or supporting these changes. In this chapter, we examine how SMEs integrate
open innovation as they develop new business models. We have already explained why the business
model approach is useful in the context of SMEs that want to improve their competitive position
28
.
Business models also play a central role in open innovation as the continuous sourcing from and
collaboration with partners can add value for the focal organization
29
. The business model literature,
however, has been marginalizing partnerships to outsourcing or acquiring particular activities or assets.
A major shortcoming in the existing literature, therefore, is to analyze how open innovation and
collaboration with external partners can add value to the business model of SMEs.
A business model describes how an SME creates value for a particular customer group and how it
captures a portion of that value. Open innovation uses the division of innovation labor to both create
and capture value. We will look first at how the companies we interviewed jointly create value with
their innovation partners. Next, we examine how collaborating with these partners also empowers an
SME to capture greater value by using the partner’s key assets, resources, or positions. Third, we
focus on the management of an SME’s network of innovation partners; creating and capturing value
never materializes automatically. Values only materialize if a focal SME (or nucleus of SMEs) takes a
lead in organizing and managing the innovation network. Finally, we also pay more attention to
particular problems such as depending on IP-deals with partners that operate as technology suppliers.
4.1. Benefiting from open innovation: value creation
All SMEs we profile in this report generate value jointly with their innovation partners. SMEs have good
reasons to reach out to different partners to develop and commercialize new business ideas. While the
open innovation literature has focused mainly on large companies that open up their internal R&D
labs, small firms are by default open in their search for innovations and new business opportunities.
This is because they do not have the competencies and financial means to develop technologies
internally. Innovation in SMEs is hampered by lack of financial resources, scant opportunities to recruit
specialized workers, and small innovation port folios such that risks associated with innovation cannot
be spread. SMEs must rely on their innovation networks to find missing innovation resources. Today,
open innovation activities are more important than ever because of the increase in technological
complexity and the shortening of product life cycles.
Characteristic barriers to innovation in SMEs are financial constraints, competitors who are rapidly
copying the innovation, lack of protecting intellectual property, absence of complementary assets such
as production facilities and access to distribution channels, poorly developed design and
manufacturing skills, and insufficiently developed technological and managerial skills to commercialize
a product professionally
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. Consequently, it is not surprising that small companies are practicing open
innovation in one way or another. The main question, however, is how they can create value and
capture value in this way. In this chapter, we examine how an innovating SME, together with its
innovation partners, creates value for a target customer group.
Business model innovation starts with discovering or recognizing new forms of value creation for a
particular customer group. Companies create different “value drivers”; that is, sources to create value
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and referring to any factor that enhances the total value created by a change in the business model.
Examples—as we have seen in Chapter 2—are reducing costs for customers (e.g., Isobionics),
increasing time efficiency, solving problems (e.g., DNA Interactif Fashion), increasing the
attractiveness of the customers’ products or services (e.g., Curana), and providing new functionalities
and increasing emotional value (e.g., Quilts of Denmark, Curana, and Jaga). In each of these cases,
the focal SME needed strong partnerships with other organizations to develop the new product or
service. Limited by financial constraints or lack of technical competencies, the companies we
interviewed had to team up with partners with complementary skills.
The partners with which the focal SME will partner is determined largely by the existing technology
base of the SME and the skills required to develop and commercialize the new product or services.
Most SMEs we studied rely heavily on value chain partners and a few additional knowledge partners
such as universities, research labs, and knowledge intermediaries. This strong reliance on value chain
partners is partially due to the fact that most companies are active in low- and medium-tech industries.
In these industries, innovations are usually the outcome of recognizing new market opportunities, with
technology push innovations playing only a minor role. Each firm we examined started its open
innovation adventure with a new concept about how to serve customers better. In some cases,
customers identified a problem themselves; in other cases, the entrepreneur devised a new concept.
More radical innovations require more new partners to be introduced into the network. In the case of
Segers & Balcaen (see p 35), the company followed the same innovation pattern of offering
customized solutions for each customer with particular packaging problems. In this case, only the
customer changed. In contrast, DNA Interactif Fashion (see p 29) was conceiving a complete
turnaround in the purchasing experience of fashion goods and, as a consequence, also in shop
design. It had to team up with different parties to develop the two basic technologies (displays and 3D
scanning) to make virtual shopping possible. In addition to the many technology providers, DNA
Interactif Fashion also had to team up with fashion retailers and other organizations in the fashion
industry. Because the final product was a completely integrated solution based on integrating
visualization, 3D scanning, and content (clothing, hairstyles, eyeglass frames, accessories, etc.) from
the different segments, DNA Interactif Fashion was collaborating with a dense network of strategic
partners to establish this new virtual shopping and “fitting” experience. The innovation replaced the
sometimes unpleasant or awkward process of fitting and viewing clothing in reality. Many of these
partners have never worked within the fashion industry, making collaboration not straightforward.
In a similar vein, Quilts of Denmark (see p 65) changed the quilts industry such that the company can
no longer be compared with traditional quilt manufacturers. Quilts of Denmark defined itself as a
provider of a healthy sleep by developing the first functional quilt based on Phase Changing Material
(PCM) technology. It combined valuable insights from sleep experts with the PCM technology, which
has the required characteristics to improve sleep. Starting with the simple conviction that providing a
healthy sleep was a useful way to discover new business opportunities, the company’s entrepreneurs
(both of whom had 20 years of experience in the quilts and pillows industry) had no idea what “healthy
sleep” meant. Therefore, they visited several renowned sleep institutes located in Danish hospitals
such as the Glostrup Hospital of the University of Copenhagen. After setting up an examination board
with these sleep specialists and physiotherapists, they discovered in clinical reviews that sleep
problems and disorders were a major problem in modern societies . They also learned how the quality
of sleep affected people’s lives. The examination board concluded that the company should focus on
how the temperature under the quilt varied, which is one of the major factors that determines the
quality of sleep. Once the target was set to reduce the temperature variation to the comfort zone focus,
the project changed into a search for the right technology. Ultimately, the company found phase-
change technology that had been originally developed for NASA in 1988 by Triangle Research and
Development (TRDC). Hans-Erik Schmidt, one of the founders, contacted NASA, and the space
organization connected him with Outlast Technologies, an accredited licensee for this technology .
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QOD had to solve two technical issues. First, the material Outlast used was hard and, therefore, not
suitable for use in quilts and pillows. The challenge was to find a way to introduce the phase-change
material into quilts and pillows without reducing the flexibility and fluffiness of a quilt. Outlast and QOD
worked out a solution in which the PCM was encapsulated in very small microcapsules. These
microcapsules were filled with a special type of wax that absorbed and released heat. A piece of fabric
that could be manufactured into a quilt could contain millions of microencapsulated phase-change
microcapsules. Microcapsules could be applied either on top of fabrics or infused into the fibers during
the manufacturing process. Because Outlast was the engineering partner in this venture, its technical
competencies were crucial in developing the microcapsules. Second, QOD had to develop the right
mixture of microcapsules. The optimal environmental temperature around the body is about 28 to 30
degrees Celsius when a person is sleeping. The rate of cooling/heating and the final temperature
could be obtained through a mixture of microcapsules. The wax in different capsules could melt at
different temperatures depending on its chemical composition. QOD used the knowledge of its medical
contacts to develop the mixture of microcapsules that delivered the optimal temperature and cooled off
or heated up slowly enough to ensure a comfortable sleep. QOD experimented with different mixtures,
and samples were controlled and tested with the help of medical experts. QOD’s first functional quilt—
branded as Temprakon—was the result of linking PCM technology with insights about sleep comfort
from the medical world. By reaching out to partners that had never been in contact with the bedding
industry, QOD could launch a product that changed the quilts market considerably.
Open innovation was also key in establishing Curana’s commercial success. Without the collaboration
of external partners, Curana could not have accomplished or even started its strategic turnaround in
1999. It started with the search for new concepts and opening the production system, but was rapidly
expanded to cooperative networks. Subsequently, each partner contributed in a specific way to the
success of the innovative drive in the industry. To develop and produce the B”Lite—Curana’s first
mudguard with a sleek design—the company was collaborating only with Pilipili and Anziplast. Even at
this stage, however, Curana called in the technical expertise of VKC. Later on, Curana established
strong bonds with suppliers, the designer community, knowledge centers, and customers.
Working with external partners over the length of the value chain (from design to production and sales)
leveraged the business to new opportunities that could not have been seized without collaboration.
Open innovation was a direct consequence of Curana’s strategy: By offering new concepts proactively
to the market, it had to be the vanguard for developing new products and using new materials and
technologies. Accordingly, Curana was developing concepts that the company could not produce
itself, and it was looking for partners for expertise it did not have in-house. The advantages of open
innovation were obvious; together, partners had more knowledge and expertise; they could produce
results more quickly; and they could develop highly innovative products as they built upon one
another’s specialized expertise. Through partnerships, Curana could grow faster in a cost-efficient
way. Moreover, Curana’s network gave it access to an extensive pool of knowledge and expertise,
which it could transform into extraordinary solutions for its customers. The network was a powerful tool
in speeding up the innovation process and in combining novel designs with new materials. In this
respect, Curana’s innovation network is a nice example of how collaboration with innovation partners
defines the competitive strength of a small firm and how the network becomes the locus of
innovation
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.
Jaga illustrates still another way to create value through open innovation. The company originally set
up very simple initiatives to boost the company’s innovative nature. In their simplest form, the Jaga
Experience Labs form a test facility consisting of two separate houses that could simulate every
weather condition and calculate heating time and costs. The lab was open for scientists to conduct
simulations for personal research. By opening up to the scientific world, Jaga connected to scientists,
obtained an early view on new and promising technologies, and in this way stayed ahead of the
competition. In this way, Jaga got in touch with promising technologies to develop low CO2 emission
radiators, Jaga’s so-called Energy Savers. The collaboration with scientists around the world also
57
resulted in more cooperation with construction firms worldwide. Moreover, potential clients such as
construction companies and installers of heating systems could also test and compare Jaga radiators
with competing products on the markets. Because Jaga had years of experience in the business of
radiators with low use of HO2 and low emissions of CO2 as a result, most experiments favored Jaga
products.
Jaga also explored initiatives to spur the creativity of employees and external partners by setting up
Jaga Product Days in 2007 (see p 47). Jaga personnel and suppliers were encouraged to present
their own ideas for future Jaga products. No a priori limitations indicated that the design had to be a
radiator, but the submissions had to present new ideas about general heating solutions. Entrants had
only six weeks to invent, create, and present a product prototype or product idea on a flyer. In an
official contest, in which professional and non-professional designers were divided into two groups,
product ideas were evaluated and awarded. For the non-professionals, extra technical resources and
guidance were provided. Although this event was organized on short notice, 119 ideas were submitted
of which 49 came from non-professional designers. Multiple juries evaluated products: Every export
country had several representatives at the Product Days that graded the products on selling potential
in their country. The R&D department graded the products with a focus on design, technology , and
inventiveness. Management focused on the general selling potential that a product would have in the
(near) future and on the production possibilities.
One of the popular findings of the Product Days was a simple but valuable improvement on an already
existing radiator. The Strada radiator had a panel on top of the radiator that users sometimes had to
remove to clean the battery or replace the oxygen filter. To remove this panel, most people at home
used a screwdriver, which would often damage the varnish. Based on an idea from Product Days, a
small pop-up device was now installed to remove the panel easily without using tools. The device was
hardly visible when tucked in, but became a handle device when popped out. Another noteworthy
project was called “Play”, which had the concept of a child-friendly radiator. With colorful and
removable parts, the radiator could be changed in design. It also was user -friendly by concealing hot
parts so children would not burn themselves if they were playing with it.
Jaga already had plans for expanding the Product Days in 2009, where universities would be invited to
participate in the product days with their own ideas. They would also have access to factory resources
and would be assigned dedicated engineers that could help build a prototype. In this way, the Product
Days would have a more open character, but still be focused on future radiator product design. The
Product Days is a tournament and great tool to unleash creativity in a company at a very low cost . It is
a simple idea that can be organized in every company. It is, however, only useful when individual
creativity is decisive for the competiveness of the product or business. It is related to crowd sourcing
or contests that have been organized by companies such as Netflix
32
. The expanded version of the
Product Days did however not materialize till today.
PRoF members (Patient Room of the Future) (see p 59) jointly created value for customers in yet
another way. From this point of view, PRoF is an interesting initiative because the consortium was not
set up to produce and sell a product or service. PRoF envisions bringing in innovative ideas regarding
how a patient room could look like in the future. It is a customer centric consortium that starts from the
patients’ experience. We all know from our personal experience that we do not associate hospitals
with a home-like feeling. It is important to understand the difference with the other innovation networks
we described earlier: These are typical ecosystems to develop and commercialize innovative products
or services for specific customers
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. PRoF is different: It starts from the patient’s room as customer-
centric concept and analyzes it via a set of keywords regarding how the overall conc ept of a patient
room should be changed to deliver value for the different stakeholders involved. Stakeholders are, in
this case, the patient, nurses, doctors, family of the patient, and so on. PRoF was structured in such a
way that it could progress with the new concept for a patient room and stay in tune with the
stakeholders. PRoF includes both a small and a large consortium. The small one consists of a well -
58
selected group of architects, interior decorators, and several manufacturers of beds, nurse call
systems, lighting, etc. These producers all make specific products or deliver services that were
necessary to develop a new concept of the patient room. This group had commercial interests, and
they invested money in the project. In contrast, the large consortium included usability groups such as
nurses, hospital management, and so on. The small consortium started with a set of 20 keywords they
received from the first meeting of the larger consortium. Keywords came from people who had
experience, such as nurses, for example, who complained that they only could do real nursing work
during 50% of their working time. The remainder was absorbed by administration and other tasks. The
small consortium took this feedback as an input to set up an IT-system where nurses have more time
for real nursing and make patients less dependent on nurses using intelligent monitoring and
communication systems. The small consortium used the keywords to develop a new concept of the
patient room that was subsequently translated into several products and systems to realize the
concept. The concept was checked and monitored regularly in meetings with the large consortium.
Companies learned from the usability groups’ feedback and adapted products accordingly.
Constructing the new patient room was accomplished after a year, and it was presented to the
healthcare community on July 1, 2010. The manufacturers in the small consortium create value for
patients and usability groups in a way that they could not achieve as single producers. The hospital
market is a contract market and is highly regulated, with almost no room for innovation. All
manufacturers thus faced the same problem. The PRoF consortium allowed them to set aside the
regulations and think in an innovative way about a patient room that could add significant value to all
the stakeholders involved. All product and services innovations were aligned with and integrated in the
new patient room concept, which in turn was derived from the keywords that summarized the major
challenges for the people that have experience with patients and patient rooms. Integrating different
products and services into a new patient room concept also implied that their value for the usability
groups was several times higher than when these products were sold as separate goods or
instruments.
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Figure 8: Case PRoF
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4.2. Capturing value in open innovation
Firms involved in open innovation activities not only have to create value for a customer group in a
unique way, but they should also appropriate part of that value to be profitable. Open innovation
allows companies to implement business models that generate more profits. We provide illustrations
from the SMEs we have analyzed.
Some companies make money by staying ahead of the market as a truly innovative company. For
example, Devan Chemicals established technology partnerships to develop textile chemicals with new
functionalities. This small firm develops only chemicals that are new to the world and sells them at a
high premium price. Protected by patents and in -depth knowledge about textiles due to its innovation
partnerships with leading companies in the textile industry, Devan can profit from these innovative
products for several years before competitors start to invade the market with inexpensive imitations.
The company deliberately stops selling products once competitors begin to take away too much
market share and price cuts significantly erode the profit margin. It is important to emphasize that the
strategic partnerships of Devan Chemicals with technology institutes on the one hand and with lead
customers on the other hand is essential for understanding how the company can continue to make
profits in this way. Close collaboration with technology partners with leading-edge competences and
detailed knowledge of the challenges of textile producers are key factors that explain why Devan
Chemicals could stay ahead of competitors for decades now.
Other companies make money using open innovation to move from commodity products to highly
differentiated products. Companies such as Jaga, Curana, and Quilts of Denmark go a step further in
this ambition to capture more value by recognizing that experiences are a distinct economic offering
with a high potential to charge premium prices. The founders of Quilts of Denmark started their
business in 2000 with the firm conviction that it is possible to sell quilts at a premium price if they could
offer customers the experience of a healthy sleep by adding new functionalities . They started with the
observation that many people do not sleep well and that providing the experience of a “healthy sleep”
could be an attractive sales argument. Similarly, Jaga is not selling radiators, but values. Eco-
radiators appeal to some customers because they reduce the carbon-footprint of heating houses and
buildings. Design radiators can be sold at a higher premium price because some customers value a
nicely designed radiator such as the Heatwave (see figure 6). This radiator is developed by an artist,
Joris Laarman, and Jaga. The result is an expressive design with a maximum amount of surface to
release heat.
Finally, Curana captures value by developing radically new concepts in the bike accessory market.
Today, the company develops new bike and biker accessories to turn biking into a unique lifestyle
experience. In this way, products express who a person is or wants to be. Jaga, Curana, and Quilts of
Denmark successfully sidestepped the commodity trap and now capture more value by focusing on
how they can offer highly differentiated products and unique experiences to the consumer. Imitation is
difficult because customers make a clear distinction between companies that offer the authentic
experience and those that are copying it 34. This also explains why these companies are investing
significant energy in building a reputation and a company brand.
The same companies have yet other ways to capture value. The success of Quilts of Denmark’s first
functional quilt, branded TEMPRAKON, was the result of years of close cooperation between sleep
specialists and physiotherapists, on the one hand, and Outlast , which was responsible for developing
the PCM microcapsules. The fact that developing a functional quilt required a combination of different
types of knowledge from very diverse scientific disciplines offers Quilt of Denmark a strong control
point: The right mix of microcapsules that provide a healthy sleep is a t rade secret. Although the PCM
technology was developed by Outlast and the production of microcapsules was outsourced
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completely, Quilts of Denmark extracts a significant share of the value by prod ucing and selling
TempraKON.
Curana has a similar but more sophisticated way of making money. It has been migrating from an
OEM to a unique position in the market, as we mentioned in Chapter 3. Curana develops new
concepts and designs but sells them as tangible products. Curana invents, designs, develops, and
manufactures bike accessories. It is no longer an OEM or an ODM; it is not a design office, not a
polymer extruder. In this way, the company has created a unique position that cannot be copied by
others unless they set up and manage their own innovation network. In short, Curana created its own
market space by changing the relationship between bike accessories supplier and bicycle
manufacturer fundamentally.
How do the manufacturers profit from participating in PRoF? First, they gain direct access to potential
customers—although they are not in a sales mode in PRoF —and receive valuable information about
the needs of nurses and hospital management. Second, the consortium is an initiative that allows
them to develop a concept of a radically new patient room in a way that could not be realized if they
were acting as single companies. There is synergy among the different, complementary partners in
PRoF; indeed, a positive energy is spawned by the speed of action that is typical for the PRoF
consortium and the combination of skills that triggers partners to develop extraordinary solutions.
Third, the consortium gives manufacturers much greater visibility in the healthcare community. The
Patient Room of the Future has been presented to most Belgian hospitals since its official launch in
July 2010. In addition, a showroom presents the brand new idea of a patient room to potential
customers. Visiting the showroom has the additional advantage that potential customers can invite
different manufacturers at the same time. In the patient room, products were combined into broader
solutions. It is thus necessary to look at the function or role of each product in the context of the room.
Finally, PRoF had an impact on the producers’ top line. There were two approaches. First, the global
approach sold the PRoF room as a complete concept offered jointly by all producers. Second,
members profited from increased sales of individual products or clusters of products. PRoF invited
engineering offices and architect offices to diffuse the idea of the Patient Room of the Future among
decision makers in building hospitals.
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Figure 9: Case Quilts of Denmark
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4.3. Managing innovation partners and the innovation network
Small companies can benefit in different ways from open innovation. In many cases, the benefits are
obvious, but they never come automatically. Managing relationships with individual partners and
organizing the overall network of innovation partners is critical for success. In this section, we present
10 rules to manage open innovation networks successfully.
1. Open innovation relations can only be successful if the innovating company is selecting the right
partners. This choice is crucial. Dirk Vens of Curana formulates it as follows: “Managing open
innovation requires you have to choose the right partners, because once you start cooperating you
have to stick to them. You have to share the good and the bad times, you cannot run away when
problems pop up. Therefore, you also have to be able to rely on strong partners that are true
believers. A strong partnership is especially important when problems pop up—and they always
do.” Open innovation is an attitude. It is about sharing risks, investing time and money together in
new concepts. A company that engages in open innovation, therefore, has to choose partners that
want to innovate proactively and share knowledge and information. The attitude toward
collaboration, risk taking, and commitment should be the same among partners. It is therefore not
surprising that collaboration with innovation partners is built on trust and strong personal
relationships with managers. Strong personal relationships among key persons in partn ering
companies always emerge as a key success factor. At the same time, this is a weakness of open
innovation in SMEs. If your partner leaves the company or secures another position, the joint
project may stop or erode. When an innovation champion is no longer a partnering company, the
whole innovation project comes to a stop. It turns out that the small innovating firm has to look for
a new partner and start all over again. To avoid these setbacks, it is important to screen potential
partners carefully and “court” good candidates to know them better.
2. A network of innovating companies also requires the company that took the initiative to develop
new product(s) jointly, (i.e., the central firm) should organize and manage the innovation network .
This implies that the central company must perform several activities to manage the network
actively. An important rule in managing networks is that the central firm must ensure that all
partners are better off joining and staying in the network compared to discont inuing the
cooperation and leaving the network . This, in turn, requires several actions from the central firm.
First, it should support firms that get in trouble during the cooperation. In an innovation network,
partners must care about each other; in market transactions companies do not care about each
other. In contrast, in open innovation, a problem for your partner is also a problem for your
company. Partners must share the problems and look jointly for solutions, including finding the
partners in the network that could solve the problem. Dirk Vens of Curana recalls: “One of our
innovation partners would produce at a considerable loss if we stuck to the price that was agreed
upon. We decided that the partner would increase his price and that Curana would try to pass part
of the price increase to its customers.” In an innovation network, partners are interconnected and
Curana’s health greatly depends on the health of the whole network. Helping out network partners
is an act of enlightened self-interest.
3. Innovation networks need to be activated continuously. Inactivity is deadly for the strength of the
network and partner commitment. A large consortium such as PROF can easily degrade into a
useless talking shop if new ideas and concepts are not introduced each time the consortium
gathered. Jan Van Hecke, instigator of PROF, was responsible personally for the pace of action in
the consortium. He first defined the end date for a particular project such as the Patient Room of
the Future and then went back to fix dates where particular deadlines had to be met. This phasing
of the project was very important because it guaranteed that progress was made between two
subsequent meetings. This, in turn, was an enormous stimulus for the partners: Progress was
made, and prior to each time they gathered, partners had been working on different parts of the
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projects, making meetings both challenging and exciting. The sense of urgency and the
continuous progress are strong motivators in open innovation networks. In the cas e of PROF, the
result was that 90% of the partners confirmed that they would attend after the first notification of a
meeting. Curana had a similar experience. Dirk Vens mentioned “The strength of our collaboration
with external designers is that we constantly challenge each other, and that we’re always
exchanging information on things that are happening in society.” Adriaan Debruyne (now director
of Saflot Creative Consultants) added: “Our antennas are open to society and technologies, and
we record a lot. When we bring this to our collaboration, it creates sparks. If, at that particular
moment, we’re in a brainstorming session, it can rapidly result in concrete, but also very
demanding ideas.” In searching for the characteristics of a healthy sleep, the fo unders of Quilts of
Denmark reached out to sleep specialists and physiotherapists in specialized clinics. These
people were very enthusiastic in collaborating with the founders in the examination board of QOD.
Cross-disciplinary and cross-industry communication around specific projects released energy and
creativity among the partners involved. This approach is still a rarely used technique among
SMEs, however, to spark the search for new, innovative products and concepts.
4. Managing innovation networks also entails that the central firm disciplines partners that do not
play according to the rules and values that are common among the partners. Companies that do
not stick to the rules cannot remain in the network. Take, for ins tance, the example in which a
company grants exclusive designs or products to its customers. In this case, the innovation
partners must abide by the exclusivity rules and cannot simultaneously develop their own designs
independently of the innovation network. If they do, the central firm certainly has to discontinue the
collaboration with disloyal innovation members. Disciplining disloyal partners only works under
certain circumstances. First, a strong leader must operate in the network, which is usually
executed by the company that initiated and drives the network. Second, disciplining or excluding
partners only works if the innovation network is instrumental in creating a competitive advantage
for the companies involved. In the case of Curana and Quilts of Denmark, the innovation network
enabled the companies to develop new and more innovative solutions faster than competitors.
Excluding a company from the network means that it will be insulated from a continuous flow of
creativity and innovation. Finally, disciplining members is not always the right solution if centrifugal
forces in the network are too strong. Curana, for instance, experienced serious pressure to adapt
its business model in 2011 when it was exploring the potential of a new, revolutionary patented
magnetic mounting system that it could integrate with its bike accessories. It obtained exclusive
licensing for this technology in the bicycle industry, but the licensor wanted to renegotiate the deal.
Mounting systems have strong network effects and integrating them into Curana’s products was
limiting the revenue potential for the licensor. Curana was considering, therefore how to change its
business model to benefit from this promising technology in a different way.
5. Open innovation also means openness in communication and in reporting among the innovation
partners. Partners have to trust each other to charge a reasonable price for the products or
services they offer to innovation partners in the network. Because partners in such an innovation
network work in a mutually exclusive way, innovation networks can work only when there is a
network-wide understanding among partners that upstream partners cannot misuse this exclusivity
to earn monopoly rents when they sell co-developed products to the downstream partner. It is
possible to draw contracts for large innovation partnerships (it is standard in large companies to
do so), but the costs to do so are too expensive for small firms. Exclusive innovation partnerships,
therefore, are based on trust among partners. In rare cases, companies will compare prices with
third parties outside the network to verify whether the partners are fairly pricing their products.
Moreover, partners should try to ensure that each partner can make a living based on the val ue
created by the collaborative innovation. Some of the networks work with open books to ensure
that all partners involved use fair overhead costs and price structures and to guarantee that all
partners are better off when they become part of the innovation network. Open innovation is not
only about sharing costs and risks, but also about sharing profits equitably.
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6. Developing an open innovation network also requires that partners manage the balance between
internal management of the company and external management of the network . Some of Curana’s
employees, for instance, did not understand why management was preoccupied with managing
the network of partners while internal management problems also had to be solved. It is often
difficult to explain in the own company that an innovation network with external partners is
improving the company’s competitiveness and is a source of revenue growth. Therefore, it is
necessary to communicate the nature and terms of the open innovation strategy extensively within
the company.
7. Collaborative innovation is easier with partners of similar size and ambitions . We will see in
Chapter 5 how small firms can collaborate effectively with large companies in developing or
commercializing new products. Working with large firms, however, is not easy. Small firms are not
eager to open up because they fear that large firms will steal technology. Moreover, large
companies, compared to the decision making process in small companies, are very slow and
inflexible. It is easier for small firms to work together because they have similar decision-making
processes, similar financial restrictions to invest in R&D, a similar approach to go to market with
new products, and so on. Small innovation partners, however, also have to be equally ambitio us.
When a joint innovation project is successful, innovation partners must be ambitious enough and
envision similar growth strategies to continue the full functioning and growth of the innovation
network. Serious frictions among partners concerning their ambition to growth together in the long
term open opportunities for competing companies to take market share.
8. Cost control is another important management issue related to open innovation. When innovation
is restricted to one company, it was fairly easy to control costs. Innovation costs are harder to
control, however, when companies innovate jointly in an innovation network. In open innovation,
different partners work on different parts of the project and send invoices for their research,
prototypes, tests, and services to the central firms. Each partner is preoccupied with his own part
of the new concept, whereas the central firm must keep an eye on the overall picture. Keeping
costs under control is essential, and the central firm has to discuss with i ts innovation partners
how to set priorities and keep costs under control.
9. Carefully documenting and registering every innovation project are crucial tasks for the central firm
in open innovation networks. Over the years, the central company has to learn about the
competencies of each partner. When the array of partners with different competencies rapidly
expands, knowledge about the network becomes a major asset. When partners hit a major
problem, the central firm should be able to tell them who to call to solve the problem. Thus,
“knowing who knows what” is as important as the individual expertise of the partners. Detailed
knowledge about each partners’ specialization in an extensive innovation network enables the
central firm to solve tough technical and commercial problems smoothly. Activating partners swiftly
in the network enables the central firm to bring together a multitude of competencies to surprise
the market with refreshing ideas and products.
10. Manage tensions and problems in the network proactively. At the start, collaboration is exciting,
but tensions inevitably emerge over time. Problems or failures put the relationship under pressure,
and it is important at that point to be diplomatic and communicate openly with your partners about
problems. Some companies have evaluation meetings with their main innovation partners to talk
about anything bothering them. These meetings should be organized when difficulties among
partners have not yet grown into insurmountable problems. Tackling problems early in an open
conversation help innovation partners keep the joint innovation projects on track.
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4.4. Managing intellectual property in open innovation
Collaboration also has implications for firms’ intellectual property (IP) strategy. Co -developed
knowledge can be protected through patents, trade secrets, or trademarks, but open innovation makes
IP issues more complex. Intellectual property rights are usually owned contractually by the innovating
firm in the case inventors are companies doing contract research, external designers, or employees.
Several firms we interviewed chose not to co-patent an invention that was co-developed with their
innovation partners. They chose to make clear agreements upfront about who owns the patent and
how innovation partners can use the technology through specific licensing agreements. Co-patenting
is also too complex in case a patent is infringed by another company. Who is going to court in this
case and who is paying for the litigation costs?
The Quilts of Denmark case shows that the use of IP in collaborative initiatives can raise substantial
problems for a small firm. Even when solid arrangements are negotiated up front, small firms may face
tough situations. Outlast and QOD had a broad agreement on the use of the co-developed PCM
technology for quilts and pillows. Outlast worked on the phase-change materials, which is their field of
expertise. To get the desired effect of PCMs in quilts and pillows, however, is QOD’s expertise. Both
partners have different skills and are complementary in the development process. The agreement
stipulated that QOD could license the PCM technology exclusively for quilt and pillow applications on a
worldwide scale. In addition, the partners signed an agreement entitling QOD to sole IP rights for its
most important markets (such as Scandinavia) and in countries that they have specified jointly. In
other markets, Outlast could sublicense the technology to other quilt manufacturers after consulting
and agreeing with QOD. If QOD would not agree to grant a sublicense, it had to counteroffer with a
credible plan to introduce TEMPRAKON to that market. Finally, QOD had the right to protect the
technologies they developed in applying the PCM -technology to products in their business. QOD
successfully applied for some patents related to using the technology in quilts and pillows. This way,
most quilt producers interested in licensing the PCM technology from Outlast also had to license
additional, application-specific IP from QOD. Outlast, in turn, had the freedom to license the PCM
technology to manufacturers of other applications such as jackets, underwear, shoes, and so on.
Although this is a straightforward way to deal with a co-developed technology, QOD faced some
significant problems in the first years after successfully launch the TEMPRAKON. QOD was a tiny
company in 2003, and scaling up the production of TEMPRAKON quickly enough to meet the
worldwide demand was a major challenge. However, to hold on to sole IP rights, QOD had to reach
the revenue milestones established in the contract with Outlast. To reach these targets given limited
production capacity and to generate some cash for the rapidly growing start -up, QOD and Outlast
Technologies agreed to sublicense the technology. These sublicenses were granted to producers in
countries in which QOD was not present or in which the company was not interested. QOD also
profited from the royalties each time Outlast Technologies sublicensed the technology. Although these
sublicenses were limited in time and restricted to well-defined products and geographical areas, QOD
realized over time that a substantial number of sub-licensees could also work in a counterproductive
way. Control over the quality of the product and its positioning in the market was limited, and prices
dropped too rapidly because of the poor pricing strategy that some licensees deployed.
This example shows that small firms must be careful with licensing agreements. Outlast Technologies
wants to maximize revenues from this new technology by extending the number of applications and by
(sub)licensing the technology worldwide. In this way, Outlast Technologies circumvented the problem
of QOD’s limited production capability and geographical scope. The increasing number of sub -
licensees became a problem for QOD, however, as they undermined the quality of the product and the
branding of TempraKON. Yet if partners trust each other and continue to work in a cooperative way,
these problems can be solved. QOD’s financial strength and production capacity were growing rapidly,
and after a few years, its capacity was large enough to sell TempraKON products worldwide. QOD
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and Outlast Technologies launched a new generation TempraKON in the autumn of 2010. The
partners re-negotiated previous sublicenses and price settings with licensees in several countries and
pushed previous licensees out of the market in countries where QOD wanted to sell products itself.
In summary, small companies who depend on external IP may face significant problems in dealing
with licensing agreement requirements. Companies can find solutions for these problems when both
partners continue to trust each other and stay focused on the joint value they create.
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Key Learning Points
Open innovation as an integral part of business model innovations
In the past, the open innovation literature has focused too much on the direct benefits of open
innovation in large companies. Large firms deliberately introduce open innovation practices and look
for the direct benefits vis-à-vis the closed innovation situation. Applying these benefits (e.g., sharing
costs, sharing risks, faster product introduction, etc.) to small firms in low - and medium-tech industries
does not make sense. Small firms are not interested in open innovation as such. Rather, they focus on
major changes in their business model to seize new business opportunities and to boost profitability.
Lack of internal competencies then forces them to look for innovation partners. Open innovation
cannot be considered in isolation from the broad strategic objectives in small firms. Additionally, the
benefits of open innovation-based business model changes differ from the classic open innovation
benefits identified for large firms.
Creating value
Small firms are by default open in seizing new business opportunities because they do not have the
necessary competencies and financial means to develop new businesses internally. Innovation in
SMEs is hampered by lack of financial resources, scant opportunities to recruit specialized workers,
poor understanding of advanced technology, and so on. Small firms, therefore, must rely on innovation
partners to realize major business model changes. Open innovation is a direct consequence of a small
firm’s ambition to change its business model.
A business model describes how a firm creates value for a particular customer group and how it
captures a portion of that value. We examined a range of possibilities how small firms jointly create
value with their innovation partners. Below is the summary of our findings.
With which small firms a company innovates is largely determined by the new business model the
central firm wants to implement. Similarly, the number of partners required and the sequence of
collaborating with partners are defined by the business model.
Most of the small firms that collaborate intensively do so with value chain partners and less with
technology partners. Small firms in low- and medium-tech industries start cooperating with
partners when they discover new business opportunities, usually based on market or customer
insights. Developing technology can be very important in realizing the business model, but it is
always a supporting activity.
More radical business model changes combine knowledge from unrelated fields. Companies pull
in expertise from industries and fields that have never been related previously to the current
industry to which the small firm belongs. Quilts of Denmark is an excellent example.
The complexity of the open innovation network depends on the target customer’s position vis -à-vis
the innovating SME. If direct customers are the target customer, then the innovation network will
most likely be small and easy to manage. If the target customer is the end-consumer (assuming
that the innovating firm is an upstream company), then the innovation network involves at least all
downstream partners of which many may not experience a direct benefit from joining the network.
In this case, it is more difficult to create value for the target customer by setting up an innovation
network. Success depends largely on the quality of the network management (see below).
Creating joint value with partners implies that a company organizes itself internally to learn from its
partners. In many cases, this can be done using simple and inexpensive tools such as Jaga’s
Experience Labs or Products Days.
Value drivers underlying the joint value creation can be quite diverse. Such diversity extends from
simple cost or time reductions for the target customer, to new or improved functionalities for his
products or offering new and valuable experiences to the target costumer. In each industry, value
drivers can be different and they can change over time.
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Capturing value
Good business models also guarantee profitability. The SMEs we interviewed work together with
different innovation partners to create, but also to appropriate more value. We find that small firms who
innovate together with partners significantly increase profitability. There are many ways open
innovation helps in executing business models with higher profitability. We enumerate a few
possibilities:
Taking a dynamic lead in applying technologies to a particular product market .
Moving away from commodity-like products and offer highly differentiated products (or
experiences) that combine the expertise of several partners, thus changing the relationship with
customers profoundly.
The combination of different fields of expertise to develop a new offering can lead to attractive
profits as long as the company can protect (or hide) a specific part of the total solution from its
partners and potential imitators. In this way, increasing profits is the result of building control
points for the innovating firm.
Profitability through open innovation can be built in consecutive steps as we have seen in Chapter
3. Curana has changed its business model three times and with each step it could increase its
profitability.
The PRoF example shows that firms can explore new business opportunities taking a significant
detour of so-called customer-centric consortia. The PRoF consortium is not directly sales driven,
but when the partners can illustrate the joint value for the customer, they should be able to extract
more value from the venture.
The most important take-away is that value cannot be extracted from the collaboration to the detriment
of the partners. Every partner involved in the network should be better off than before joining the
network. If partners do not feel comfortable, the joint value will not be maximized. Therefore, it is better
to have a smaller share of a much bigger pie than a large share of a small pie.
Managing open innovation partners and networks
There are several rules to apply when a company wants to manage the relationships with its
innovation partners or an entire innovation network. We summarize them into 10 rules:
1. Select the right partners carefully. This choice is crucial because collaborative innovation implies
you are “in” for a long time. Once you start cooperating, you have to stick to your partners. You
have to share the good and the bad times; you cannot run away when problems arise. Choosing
the right partners is winning half the game.
2. Innovation networks do not organize themselves. Clear leadership is needed to organize and
manage the innovation network . The basic rule in managing innovation networks is that each
partner should be better off in joining and staying in the network compared to leaving the network.
That implies that some partners may have to be compensated for losses, investments, or risks
they take.
3. Innovation networks need to be activated continuously. Inactivity is deadly for the network strength
and partner commitment. Phasing of the project is very important because it guarantees that
progress is made at a pace that encourages and stimulates partners to move ahead. The agenda
has to be set and partners stimulated to finish their contributions on time.
4. Joint innovating and commercialization implies that partners that do not comply with the rules have
to be disciplined. Companies that do not stick to the rules cannot remain part of the network. A
well-oiled innovation network increases the speed and productivity of innovat ion processes.
Partners that that are cutoff from the network lose considerably in the long term when innovation
networks are the locus of innovation.
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5. Open innovation also means openness in communication and in reporting among innovation
partners. Partners must trust each other on charging a reasonable price for the products or
services they offer to innovation partners in the network.
6. Manage the balance between internal management of the company and external management of
the network . External network management is very important, but it cannot be at the expense of
managing your own firm internally.
7. Choosing partners of similar size and ambitions can help improve collaborative innovation. Small
firms can collaborate successfully with large companies in developing or commercializing new
products, but it is easier to work with partners of a similar size. Such companies have the same
decision speed, same approach to innovation, have comparable organizational cultures, and use a
business logic that they mutually understand.
8. Cost control is important in open innovation. Each partner is preoccupied with his own part of the
project, and without cost control, costs are likely to soar rapidly. It is therefore essential that you
set priorities with your innovation partners.
9. When the number of partners with different competencies rapidly expands , “knowing who knows
what” becomes a major asset. Activating partners swiftly enables the network to bring together a
multitude of competencies in an accelerated way that cannot be copied by individually competing
companies.
10. Manage tensions and problems in the network proactively. Tensions inevitably emerge in
collaborative innovation relations. You have to be diplomatic and communicate openly with your
partners about problems. Evaluation meetings with innovation partners can help. It is important not
to wait until small but irritating problems have grown insurmountable.
IP Management
Open innovation implies that partners co-develop new solutions. IP-management in partnerships or
innovation networks is very important to avoid tensions in the network:
Define clear arrangements from the beginning.
In many cases, do-patenting is not an interesting solution. It is usually better to agree in advance
who will own a patent (with different types of patents perhaps attributed to different partners) and
how the partners get rights to use these patents.
IP-deals might be reconsidered as time goes on. Most contingencies are difficult to foresee when
the first deal is made. Adapting the arrangements to collaborate comfortably for all partners is
necessary in most collaborative ventures.
Patenting is expensive for small firms, especially when a company has to apply in many countries.
Small firms that apply a partner’s technology in their markets may face serious problems living up
to the conditions of the licensing agreement. The licensor may grant worldwide exclusivity to its
(small) partner, but the latter should consider whether it can generate enough sales in different
markets to comply to the sales set forth in the licensing agreement. Excessive sublicensing to
other companies may erode the position and profitability of the small partner.
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5 Cooperating with giants: Organizing and managing
open innovation successfully
5.1. Collaborating with large companies
Many small firms (in high-tech industries) need to collaborate with large companies to develop and
commercialize their technology. Small firms require complementary assets that established companies
own. Large firms can commercialize new technologies by leveraging their large-scale manufacturing
capabilities, brands, or distribution systems without investing large amounts of capital upfront. This
dependence of SMEs on large companies to generate value from their technologies has received
attention in the recent innovation literature
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. SMEs have for instance limited ability to profit from their
intellectual property because they lack enforcement power, especially when collaborating with large
firms. In the USA, the median cost to each party of proceeding through a patent infringement suit to a
verdict at trial is at least $500,000 where the stakes are relatively modest
36
. This is a higher cost than
most SMEs can withstand. In addition to the high cost and risk of legal enforcement, smaller firms that
collaborate with established companies may face the problem of lock in. The profitability of a small firm
that licenses its technology to an established company may depend, to a large extent, on the
decisions and strategic actions of the latter. This strategic dependence makes the small firm
vulnerable: when it discovers a patent infringement, it cannot act against the large company even if
objective legal assessments may indicate that the small firm has a strong case. Going to court against
an established company that represents a major revenue source is not a viable option for most SMEs.
Open innovation can only flourish, however, if relationships between large and small companies are
based on trust and result in mutual benefits. Fortunately, an increasing number of large companies are
successfully collaborating with dozens of small firms to create breakthrough products. Moreover, there
are more and more opportunities for collaboration between large and small companies. Underlying
drivers for this trend toward open innovation are the shortening of product lifecycles, increasing
international competition, and growing technological complexity. More and more large companies rely
on both internal and external knowledge sources to create new business
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. Even powerhouses such
as P&G, Unilever, Philips and Siemens, to name a few ones, are relying increasingly on technology
and expertise from external partners. Universities, research labs, crowds of experts, lead users, and
knowledge brokers are just a few examples of potential external sources of kn owledge. Small (high-
tech) companies, usually financed by venture capital funds, represent another interesting wellspring of
external knowledge for large companies. An increasing number of established companies now
recurrently collaborate with these start-ups and create new businesses sourcing their technology.
Therefore, large companies have a strong incentive to become a preferred partner of these high -tech
ventures. Established companies understand how to avoid conflicts and how to align their corporate
strategic objectives to grow new businesses to meet the financial objectives of venture capitalists. The
interests of corporate investors and venture capitalists are seldom, if ever, fully aligned, but they must
manage potential tensions anyway. Corporations can build a reputation as a trustworthy investor,
which allows them to attract the ventures with the best technology.
Open innovation also implies that large companies have to monetize their unused technology
38
. Large
companies have significant numbers of unused patents and in theory can valorize the technology by
licensing it, selling it, spinning off a venture, or even divesting a new venture that is ready to sell its
first products. Several large companies succeeded in increasing the productivity of its knowledge base
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by searching for different external paths to the market. Some companies have a corporate venturing
department, which among other activities spins off internal ventures. Alternately, an IP -department can
cross-license technologies with other large companies or license them out to other, non -competing
companies.
Unused technologies in large companies represent a fertile opportunity for individual entrepreneurs or
small firms to start a new business, and several large companies have sold or licensed unused
technologies. Results are mixed, however, because large firms have no real incentive to become
involved in technology deals with small companies. They often consider it too cumbersome or time-
consuming because in most cases small firms generate only small income flows for the licensor,
whereas the technology transfers might still require significant investments from engineering.
Furthermore, large firms that license technologies risk knowledge leaks with adverse competitive
effects as a consequence.
Although cooperation between large and small companies has previously been fraught with difficulties,
signs are appearing that the situation is changing. An increasing number of firms are practicing open
innovation, and large technology savvy companies are exploring new methods to cooperate with a
multitude of external innovation partners, including small companies. In the next sections, we present
two examples of a successful collaboration between a large and a small company. The first,
Isobionics, illustrates how an external entrepreneur can establish a successful venture by licensing
technology from a large firm. In this case, a start-up successfully commercializes the technology which
was previously developed by an established company. The other case, Airfryer, illustrates how Philips
successfully sources a technology for its kitchenware group from a tiny engineering company. In this
case, the large company brings the product to the market (B2C market), but this does not prevent the
small company from finding its own niche in the B2B market.
5.2. A start-up creating a business from unused technology in a large firm
Large companies are great wellsprings of new technologies. However, only few technological
discoveries developed in the R&D labs of large firms are successfully launched as a new product or
service in the market. Most technologies gather dust on the shelves in large companies. A growing
number of companies, however, are implementing a “use it or lose it” strategy. P&G, for instance,
implements a patent strategy aimed at improving the company’s innovation process: all technologies
developed in the company could be licensed three years after market introduction (i.e. for used
technology) or five years after patent approval
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. The revenue stream from these licensing practices is
reinvested in the business unit that owns the technology. In this way, the business unit can balance
the risk of increased competition in the market with the royalty income it receives from licensing the
technology.
An increasing number of large companies with deep technological competencies make their
technology available for other companies to develop. However, it remains a question how individual
entrepreneurs and small firms can benefit from this open innovation strategy of large companies? How
do they collaborate with these large technology suppliers, and what are the challenges or potential
pitfalls when large and small firms collaborate? We examine these topics by analyzing how a start -up,
Isobionics, developed a rapidly growing business in the span of several years, developing and
commercializing a technology it licensed from a large manufacturing company.
Isobionics, a Dutch biotechnology company established by Toine Janssen in 2008, is located at the
Chemelot Campus in Sittard-Geleen (in the southeast of the Netherlands). The company is developing
a portfolio of flavors and flagrances synthesized using a biotechnological process that is based on a
proprietary plat form technology of DSM, a large Dutch chemical company that specializes in Life
Sciences and Materials Sciences products. Isobionics’ first product introduced on the market in late
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2010 was BioValencene™. This is an aroma substance for the food, beverage, flavor, and fragrance
industry worldwide, where it is used in soft drinks, detergents, soaps, and fine perfumery. In the
marketplace, it competes with conventional valencene, a citrus aroma, which is currently distilled from
orange peels, making it relatively expensive. Isobionics received the Frost & Sullivan 2010 Global
Technology Innovation Award for its introduction of BioValencene. In citing the value of the product,
the award stated, “…it has the capacity to change the functioning of the market by providing a unique
technology, being cost competitive and improving product functionality and process efficiency”
40
.
The Isobionics case demonstrates how an individual entrepreneur (or a small company) can
commercialize a technology that a large firm had placed on hold. The Isobionics story dates to 2007,
when researchers of DSM developed the idea to produce specific ingredients that could be
synthesized by micro-organisms using different key enzymes. This was the initial idea behind the
technology that Isobionics later developed into a product. The range of potential applications for this
platform was broad, extending from flavor and flagrances (F&F) to agrochemical products
(insecticides) and pharmaceutical products. The idea did at that point in time not land in DSM. The
management was open for external partners who may be interested in the commercialization of the
technology. The technology was also introduced to Toine Janssen, who had been working for several
decades at Royal Philips Electronics as a business director. After analyzing the idea and zero order
business plan, he concluded that synthesizing flavor and flagrances using DSM’s biotechnological
process was a promising, game-changing innovation. It could drastically reduce the production cost of
existing flavors and generate new types of fragrances.
Once he decided to pursue the technology, Toine faced several major challenges. First, the strategy
had to be sound. He focused on F&F because the agrochemical and pharmaceutical applications
required more demanding technical requirements and complex approval procedures. In contrast,
certifications in the F&F market required only one or two months. The F&F business had already
existed for centuries. Historically, flavors and fragrances have been made from natural resources such
as roses, oranges, and other fruits, trees, and so on. However, the industry was searching for
alternative production methods (biotechnology) because the natural resources had been expended to
their maximum capacity. The biotechnological process DSM had developed would give Isobionics a
major cost advantage over traditional F&F producers, and it had the potential to develop new flavors
and fragrances by collaborating with specific clients. Because more than 3,000 flavors and fragrances
already exist, Toine had to decide which flavors to develop first. Valencene (oranges) and nootkatone
(grapefruit) were the two first flavors that Isobionics decided to develop and produce first. Technically,
they were relatively easy to develop and the markets were small enough to accommodate products
from a small company such as Isobionics. Later, the company could migrate to menthol, strawberry,
and other flavors that represent markets many times larger than the valencene market. The market for
valencene was estimated at $10 million, nootekatone at $30 million, and menthol at $275 million. An
additional advantage was production overcapacity in the market: Isobionics could easily find
fermenters and did not need to invest in production facilities
41
. The development cost of the micro-
organisms that could produce a specific flavor was the single largest investment for Isobionics;
developing a new natural ingredient was estimated to amount to approximately €5 million. Developing
new flavors has traditionally been completed with different universities in Europe, with DSM, and with
other innovation partners. Competition among companies producing biotechnological F&F was limited.
At that time, Isobionics had two main competitors, but with 3,000 flavors it was easy to avoid
competition. Still entry barriers are considerable given the proprietary technology and the years
required developing the technology.
Second, Toine Janssen had to secure the required investments for his start -up once the business plan
was drafted. At the time Isobionics was established, the start-up was in need of considerable
investments to advance the technological development and commercialization of the first flavors.
Classic venture capital funds (VCF) were somewhat reluctant to finance Isobionics at the time it was
established, because the venture needed considerable investments which were too big a risk for VCFs
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in an early investment stage
42
. In the end, Isobionics was financed in a complex but interesting way
securing the company a broad financing base. The start-up was financed combining investments from
VCFs, a regional venture capital investor in which DSM participated, bank loans, and subsidies from
local and national governments. The financing enabled Isobionics to further develop the technology
and prepare the commercialization of BioValenceneTM, its first commercial product.
Third, Isobionics could not prosper without the continuous technological support of different innovation
partners. Isobionics is a start-up and, consequently, developing the first products and pilot production
runs had to be conducted by its partners, including several European universities, research labs, DSM
and other value chain partners. The technology licensed from DSM is a technological plat form that can
be used for different applications. Consequently, Isobionics has signed several research contracts with
DSM and other technology partners to develop the technology and to start the production of
valencene. As DSM and Isobionics started their technological collaboration, some DSM researchers
resumed working on this technology which they started as an internal DSM project. Their experience
gave Isobionics a considerable head start. Securing research time from large technology partners is
however not easy because the contract work for a start-up, who still has to prove its economic viability,
is competing with many internal projects within these large technology partners. Once the start -up
begins to prosper, as in the case of Isobionics, managers start to see the value of the R&D
collaboration and are eager to work with the venture.
Finally, Toine also had to license the technology from DSM. The negotiation resulted in a licensing
deal in which Isobionics could use the DSM’s technology for applications in the F&F industry. Signing
a licensing deal with a business manager in a large firm is not straightforward, because royalty income
only starts flowing in several years after the license deal was signed. By that time the manager has
other responsibilities within the company. Therefore, Toine had to look for innovation champions within
DSM to get the licensing of the technology on the agenda of the responsible DSM managers.
Innovation champions were senior managers in DSM who had a strong belief in the commercial
success of Isobionics. Everyone involved in establishing Isobionics agrees that Toine’s management
experience in large companies was crucial in dealing with large partners to guarantee Isobionic’s
commercial success.
In sum, Isobionics illustrates how a promising venture can be established by l icensing unused
technology of a large company. It is a typical win-win situation. Isobionics profits from the collaboration
with DSM in different ways: First, it got access to a game-changing technology which was the
cornerstone for its commercial success. Second, it could build on the reputation of DSM to get access
to universities, technology labs, and commercial partners. Third, DSM was a formidable partner for
Isobionics in the further development and continuous technical support of Isobionics’ products . DSM,
in turn, did also win from its investment in Isobionics. First, it had the opportunity to follow the evolution
of Isobionics. In this way, it gained valuable lessons about the F&F applications of its technology which
it could apply in other industries. Second, the establishment of Isobionics implies that a technology
which was discontinued at DSM can be further developed and the new discoveries can very useful for
DSM’s research in related technology fields. Third, it could learn how the development and
commercialization of a new technology can be accelerated in a start -up which has the freedom to
make its own managerial decisions. Finally, the indirect participation of DSM also implies that
Isobionics can be acquired in case its business is becoming an interesting investment area for DSM.
Isobionics illustrates how a start -up can establish a business by licensing technology of a large firm.
Now, we turn to a situation in which a large company brings the technology of a small firm to the
market.
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Figure 10: Case Isobionics
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5.3. A large company creating value for a small firm’s technology
Small, high-tech firms are valuable sources of new-to-the-world technologies. Indeed, small
companies have developed radical, game-changing technologies. In several industries, however,
small firms cannot commercialize their own inventions because excessive investments in
complementary assets are required
43
. Examples of complementary assets include large-scale
manufacturing, brands, and distribution channels, just to name a few. A rapid increase in licensing of
technologies is occurring across the globe, and many small firms license their technology to larger
companies that own or control complementary assets. From their perspective, established companies
are increasingly aware of the growing technological capabilities of universities, research labs, and
high-tech start-ups. They leverage these external knowledge sources using licensing agreements,
corporate venturing investments, co-development agreements, and acquisitions. Licensing
agreements imply that the licensor and licensee share revenues, and the balance depends on their
respective bargaining positions. Both firms can design a deal in a clever way, however, which results
in a situation through which both firms profit from the new technology. We should not necessarily think
in terms of a trade-off as the bargaining metaphors suggest. In many cases, a small innovating
company can be highly profitable when it licenses its technology and does not hinder the established
licensee from integrating the technology into its product range. Moreover, the licensing deal can be
negotiated in a way that both companies are active as producers, but in different product markets. We
illustrate this with the case of the Philip’s Airfryer (see p 86).
The Airfryer is a new product in the Kitchen Appliances division within Philips. The Philips Airfryer uses
just one-half a tablespoon of oil to fry a variety of foods and snacks including fries, chicken nuggets,
other meats, and even tempura. Rather than boiling chips in hot fat, the Airfryer uses super-heated air,
producing the same quality chips. Its secret is the patented Rapid Air technology, which combines
fast-circulating hot air with a grill to create fries with up to 80% less fat, yet maintaining a great taste.
The Airfryer was launched in September 2010 in several European markets and was later introduced
in most European countries. Philips was not the first company to introduce healthier ways to fry,
however. Actifry of Tefal was already several years in the market, but it could not be compared with
the Airfryer because its frying time was 45 minutes—compared to 12 minutes for the Airfryer.
Furthermore, fries from the Actifry were considered not that tasty.
For quite some time, the Kitchen Appliances group had the ambition to develop new products that
could make cooking and frying healthier. With the Airfryer, Philips tried to make the frying process less
unhealthy, while keeping high-quality taste. Healthy frying was one of the group’s ambitions, and they
studied ways to achieve that target, consulting the literature and research from different institutes.
They had already developed a process to fry using hot air/steam rather than oil. In 2006, Philips had a
prototype, but the engineers were struggling to transform the technology into a feasible consumer
product. The process to bake fries led to acceptable results, but difficulties existed in translating that
technology into a consumer product that fits the Philips promise of “sense and simplicity”. The
appliance was too complex, too large, and too expensive.
The Kitchen Appliances group had contacts, however, with inventors who had developed similar
appliances, but they struggled with the same problems. They did not have solutions to create a home-
use appliance, simple and cheap enough to make it a success on the market . In early 2009, a small
engineering company—more precisely two individuals who worked together—presented their idea to
Philips. Their company had developed technology similar to what Philips had developed internally,
except that it was simpler. It had the proper execution to t ranslate the technical process in a consumer
product. The owners took the right steps to translate the idea into a product that could be sold as a
consumer good and was simple to use. It featured a basket into which the consumer placed the fries
and a simple user interface.
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Godwin Zwanenburg, director lead of Kitchen Appliances and part of Philips Consumer Lifestyle,
remarked that within big companies it is difficult to develop new, but simple products. Technicians
usually start with a blank sheet and look for what is possible from a technical standpoint. After the right
appliance is developed, commercial people express their wishes, which leads to more features being
added. These project dynamics are driven by the desire to make ‘a perfect appliance’, whereas
simplicity implies that ‘the appliance is not perfect, but good enough’. Small firms, on the contrary,
have limited resources and time to develop products: They have to deal smartly with constraints. The
result is that small firms are better at developing simple and easy-to-use products.
The small engineering company is a tiny Dutch company, existing out of an engineer and a seasoned
manager with 24 years’ of experience as a senior manager in the Braun division of Gilette. He left the
company when P&G acquired Gilette. His next effort was that he started to commercialize innovations
for different inventors. The engineer developed the technology that was used later in the Airfryer. He
detected that the existing turbo-fryers on the market did not work, and his simple adaptation to the air-
flow made air frying quite effective. The invention was patentable, and he succeeded in building a
prototype based on existing technologies. Subsequently, the company was granted a patent for this
invention. The application development and pre-production was completed by a Chinese company,
which Hans knew from his days at Gilette. It still took two years to develop a prototype that could be
demonstrated to potential customers. The manager of the small company decided to license the
technology to large companies active in the kitchen appliances industry that could leverage their
international presence, brands, and access to distribution channels. Interestingly, Braun was not
interested. Philips, on the contrary, was decidedly interested given its strategy to invent new ways to
prepare food in a healthier way. Furthermore, the company was already acquainted with the
technology but could not translate the technical process into an attractive and simple consumer
product. Godwin Zwanenburg, Director of Innovation Lead kitchen Appliances, sold the idea internally
and coordinated a demonstration at the Kitchen Appliances business of Philips. The commercial
people saw the technology as an opportunity. Philips asked for ‘ first rights of refusal’ for a period of
three months to test and evaluate the application. The evaluation was positive, and Philips launched
the internal development process and the potential business case.
Small firms are usually reluctant to share information with large companies because the risk of
misappropriating the technology is very real. Philips’ extensive evaluation of the technology did not
pose a risk for the small engineering company, however, because Philips’ was reputed as a reliable
innovation partner. Philips relies recurrently on new technologies from universities, specialized
research labs, and high-tech start-ups. The electronic giant endeavors to be the preferred partner for
small, high-tech companies and will therefore never cheat on its innovat ion partners. Simply put, the
reputational damage would be too big. Likewise, the best small-scale technology firms in the world
want to team up with Philips because of its reputation as a reliable innovation partner. After all, it is a
matter of trust, because it is quite challenging for a small firm to take a large company such as Philips
to court. Philips’ reputation is one of the company’s strong assets: it facilitates information exchange
with potential technology partners, and it is an effective and cost-efficient way to manage open
innovation. The two companies only signed an non-disclosure agreement (NDA) before they started
the information exchange and a letter of intent covering the investigation phase. This also implies that
small firms must select carefully innovation partners which can be trusted.
In October 2009, the two companies signed a licensing agreement. Good licensing agreements reflect
the needs of both the licensor and the licensee. In this case, Philips was acquainted with the
technology, and the small engineering company felt no need to be involved actively in developing the
Airfryer. The company agreed to grant an exclusive license to Philips for the consumer market for a
period of five years. In addition, Philips received the right to buy the technology thereafter at a
predetermined price. The option to buy the technology was crucial for Philips because it is simply too
risky for a company to depend on external technology for its major business successes. Thus, Philips
would certainly buy the technology in case the Airfryer became a major business success.
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Next, the Philips Kitchen Appliances group is not active in the US and Japan. Therefore, the small
engineering company received permission to identify local manufacturers to produce the Airfryer,
eventually using the egg-shaped Philips design (see figure 7). The company was always consulting
Philips when contacting local producers and royalties earned in these markets were shared between
them and Philips. Furthermore, the Kitchen Appliances group was only interested in the mass
consumer market, not in the professional market. The small engineering company had the freedom to
build a business in the market for professional use of the technology such as snack bars.
Subsequently, in 2011, the company collaborated with a Chinese partner to develop a first version of
the fryer that could fry twice as much in half the time as the Philips Airfryer. the small engineering
company decided to license the t echnology on a non-exclusive basis to several suppliers because the
professional market was highly segmented geographically and in terms of products.
Most customers and health authorities perceive that the Airfryer is a highly innovative product that
drastically reduces the need for oil and creates fried food that is less unhealthy. The new technology
also required consumers to adapt their cooking habits. But the Airfryer could also fry a broader range
of products such as ‘croque monsieurs’ just to mention one example. Therefore, the Airfryer is
packaged with an inspiring recipe booklet, written by a culinary expert, which contains 30 easy-to-
prepare recipes, as well as cooking tips and tricks. Philips also opened the Philips My Kitchen Web
site and blogs where recipes could be added and where people could learn inspirational ways to fry
food. Finally, Philips collaborated with some snack producers, such as Mora
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to co-promote the
Airfryer and Mora’s frozen snacks. For the professional market, the small engineering company
worked with a major frozen snack producer to jointly bring the new fryer and the new snacks together
on the market, mutually helping each launch these new products successfully.
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Figure 11: Case Airfryer
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Key learning points
In the past, collaboration between large and small firms has been prone to different types of
problems. This situation is changing rapidly as large companies engage in open innovation.
They now recurrently rely on technology of small (high-tech) companies and/or monetize
unused technology by licensing the technology or spinning off internal ventures.
Consequently, new opportunities exist for small companies , but the collaboration can only be
successful if the relationship is managed in an appropriate way.
Small firms that collaborate with large companies have an enormous advantage if the top
manager has extensive experience as a senior manager in a large firm. This experience gives
the top manager a credible reputation among managers in the partnering company,
demonstrating that he understands how to present a business plan that makes sense for all
parties. The top manager also knows the decision-making processes in large companies and
how to deal with them.
Small firms should do their homework before they start collaborating with large companies.
Some large companies are trustworthy innovation partners because they recurrently
collaborate with partners and have built a reputation as a reliable partner in the VC
community.
Problems related to licensing an unused technology from a large company include:
o The Not Sold Here syndrome: Large companies start from the assumption that if they
can’t make a business, no one can.
o Owners of the technology (usually business group managers) do not have an
incentive to license a technology because royalty income will come in long after the
manager has left that position. This changes when a company has a ‘use or lose it
strategy’.
o Licensing to small firms implies significant work in return for small licensing revenues.
The venture manager, therefore, must be experienced in finding the innovation champions in
the company and contact the decision makers directly to keep the project on top of the pile.
A start-up relying on the technology may be in an advantageous position compared to other
start-ups, because it can use the large company’s reputation to acquire external financing.
Consequently, the large firm may invest, local governments can subsidize or invest more
easily, and banks will be less reluctant to grant loans.
Successful collaborations or licensing deals between large and small companies start with a
clear understanding of how each company wants to benefit from the collaboration, and the
work toward a win-win outcome. Let your partner pursue business opportunities in areas that
do not fit your business model. In the Airfryer case, this translated into opportunities for both
partners, one focusing on the consumer market the other one on the professional market.
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6 Conclusion
Many small companies today are confronted with harsh market conditions. The current economic crisis
has weakened their financial health, especially in industries that are globalizing rapidly. These
changing market conditions force them to look for new ways to differentiate their products and services
or create new businesses. Because they lack the required internal resources, SME’s often collaborate
with external partners to innovate successfully and reach more profitable positions in the competitive
landscape. Open innovation is thus a logical step to take for many small firms. SMEs in the low- and
medium-tech industries we examined indicate clearly that firms that know how to manage a network of
innovation partners can seize new business opportunities become key players in growth industries and
turn themselves into highly profitable companies.
Why should we care about open innovation in small firms in the so-called low- and medium-tech
industries? First, SMEs create the majority of the jobs in these industries in Western economies.
Moreover, globalization and commoditization threaten many jobs if companies do not change
strategies over time. Second, the firms we examined show that small companies can sidestep the
commoditization pressure and price competition successfully by using open innovation to develop new
and more profitable businesses. Third, an urgent need exists to study how open innovation is
managed and organized in small firms. Most management insights about open innovation are based
on cases of large manufacturing firms. Open innovation in small companies has received almost no
attention, although our sample proves that small firms can be very successful in using and integrating
knowledge from external partners to create new products or services. Fourth, managing and
organizing open innovation in SMEs is quite specific , and the lessons learned from open innovation in
large firms cannot be transferred to the context of SMEs. This renders the need for a specific
approach on open innovation in SMEs even more urgent.
How do small firms use open innovation to create and capture value?
In this report, we have examined how small firms can benefit from open innovation networks. We
summarize the most important findings:
Vision: Frequently, a (radically) new vision of entrepreneurs or managers is the starting point for the
business model of SMEs. A quilts manufacturer defining the company as “a provider of healthy sleep”
is a completely different vision about the industry than what most quilt manufacturers have in mind.
The vision may be disruptive, but entrepreneurs always have strong background knowledge of the
industry. What works is a vision, not a dream. In most cases, the vision can be considered as a new
value proposition, which the company brings to potential customers (not necessarily existing ones). A
radically new value proposition may offer customers new meaning to the product or service offering.
The network of partners: Common in all cases is that the SMEs establish a network of external
partners. Partners may be technology partners such as universities, research labs , or other companies,
but in most cases these are not the most important partners in the network. An SME commonly starts
from the vision or concept and searches for partners depending on the technology, value chain
positions, and competencies it needs to realize the new product offering. In most cases, the network is
small at the beginning (two to three partners), but other SMEs take a different approach and set up a
large consortium of partners. The size of the network is determined by the type of products or services
the SME wants to launch.
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Networks of partners have to be managed as well, but the type of management differs from the
internal management of a firm. A network of partners is only viable when each partner is better off
compared to not participating in the network. Not every partner is automatically better off joining the
network. Partners may have to bear considerable risks or investments in dedicated complementary
assets. In open business models, therefore, one has to analyze the joint value creation together with
the value distribution among the different partners. Strong network management is necessary to
balance the need to maximize the joint value creation and the continuous tension between partners to
claim a larger share of the pie for themselves. One of the major learning points to emerge from the
cases is that open innovation networks are sustainable only when the value that is jointly created is
several times larger than what partners can realize on their own. It is easier to deal with tensions
among partners when everyone will lose significantly if partners leave the network. Conversely, a
network is not sustainable when partners can benefit more from a stand-alone strategy.
Building strong ties to cope with environmental and relational risks. The biggest challenge in an open
innovation network is the market and technological risk on the one hand and the relational risk on the
other hand. Business model innovations are high-risk ventures because a firm must search for new
technologies and develop new products. Furthermore, the customers’ reaction is not easy to predict. In
addition, the SME depends significantly on its partners’ commitment. The glue of an open innovation
network is the personal ties between a few key managers and actors. A personal bond, alignment in
commitment, and transparency among the partners are necessary elements.
Dependence on partners’ IP. Low-tech SMEs can rely on others’ IP, or they co-develop technological
innovations. Most of the small firms we interviewed have negotiated technology agreements such as
licensing deals with their partners. SMEs can be vulnerable because partners will ask for a return on
their technology investments. Worldwide licensing deals can be challenging for SMEs , which forces
them to sublicense to other companies. This, in turn, may endanger the open innovation venture.
Licensing deals can also be negotiated in a way that allows both partners to profit maximally from the
technology. This is especially the case when both partners have different objectives: they may focus
on different markets (the B2B and B2C markets in the Airfryer case) or one may be interested in the
technology as such while the partner is only interested in a particular application (see Isobionics and
Quilts of Denmark cases).
A stepwise approach. SMEs change their business model in a stepwise way. In most cases,
companies begin with a (radically) new product or service, but this is only a start. There are several
reasons why open innovation is a never-ending process for SMEs. First, unlike some high-tech
industries, where companies have ironclad IP protection, most low-tech SMEs are not well protected
by their intellectual property rights. In some cases, competitors can copy products in less than six
months. Second, the first open innovation initiative presents new strategic options for SMEs: they build
new skills and competencies over the years, and they become financially stronger. Therefore, some
SMEs unfold their business model innovation in several consecutive steps , building new competencies
and a stronger financial position at the same time. Finally, a business model change creates
opportunities to change a second and a third time. Curana switched from an OEM to an ODM
business model. Once the company was recognized as an ODM, it changed its business model again
by proactively designing bicycle parts. Because of this change, the company was recognized in the
industry as a trendsetter. This, in turn, triggered Curana to build a brand-based strategy. These
consecutive steps propelled the company into a leading position in the bike accessory market. If the
company stayed tuned to the ODM business model, it would already be confronted with several
competitors imitating the ODM move.
The benefits and cost of relational capital. Relational capital plays a central role in developing an open
innovation based business model. The competitive strength of the SMEs is no longer (only) related to
its internal competencies, but (also) to its network of relationships. After some years, an SME has a
large network of organizations upon which it can rely. These contacts give the innovating SME a
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strong position for two reasons. First, knowing this multitude of partners (and partners of partners) and
having a preferential relationship with them makes the company more agile and knowledgeable than
other firms in the industry. Second, the central position of the SME in the network als o gives it a
stronger negotiation position vis-à-vis other organizations in the network.
Does open innovation fit your company’s needs?
We have described and analyzed 10 successful cases of open innovation in small - and medium-sized
firms. There is no doubt that you, as a manager of a small firm, identified similar problems as these
managers did. You are likely experiencing continuous globalization pressure and competitors are
eating away your firm’s margins. You can invent all kinds of short -term tactics to defend your market
position in the short run, but what options do you have within two or three years: In the long run,
companies that face stiff competition have to reinvent their businesses, looking for new ways to
reposition their products and services.
Some of the SMEs we described opened new market space, which made their competition irrelevant
(at least for several years). They started with a strong vision or conviction that was cultivated by their
excellent knowledge of the industry. Do you have a vis ion? Do you know which new products concepts,
which new experiences can shake up your business? Remember, we are not talking about a business
plan for the next five or 10 years. What you need is a strong idea for a new product or business. In this
respect, we should keep Albert Einstein’s quote in mind: “If at first, the idea is not absurd, then there is
no hope for it”. The idea of a healthy sleep, a mudguard combining aluminum and plastic, or a virtual
way to shop for fashion are all somewhat crazy at first look. But, they each changed the industry and
turned the innovating companies profitable.
Have the courage to act. Each entrepreneur we met took risks, sometimes considerable, and made
investments. Imagining a new product is one thing, whereas start ing the venturing process is another.
The courage and perseverance of each of these managers is a trait characterizing most of the
managers we met.
Third, open innovation requires mangers to know how to build networks with other organizations
through their personal networks. The managers we met constantly reach out to other companies. They
are strong in network building and “knowing who”.
A policy initiative: How to accelerate and deepen learning about open innovation among
entrepreneurs
One way to accelerate the use of open innovation in small firms is to diffuse successful cases using
audio-visual tools on the Internet. Entrepreneurs and small business managers are not triggered to
learn and to become more innovative by studies or lists of recommendations that academics or
consultants develop. In contrast, they are spurred to take action when they are confronted with the
testimonials of entrepreneurs who are using open innovation successfully to develop new businesses.
Mangers of small firms are usually too busy with day-to-day management to join international
conferences to learn about open innovation. Most managers learn about innovation management and
open innovation in local, small-scale, innovation networks that in many cases are organized by local
agencies. These initiatives are organized locally and therefore have the advantage that they are
accessible even to managers of the smallest company. The disadvantage is that the scale is too small
to invest significantly in developing content and guidelines. Therefore, it is quite useful to start up an
European-wise initiative to make short videos that illustrate highly successful entrepreneurs who have
been transforming their business through a network of partners and how managing such a network is
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an increasingly important lever in gaining competitive advantage. We suggest developing short movies
(10-15 minutes) of 50 to 100 interesting cases around Europe and uploading them on YouTube,
Slideshare, and so on. (For a good example, see the videos on the Web site of the Belgian Design
Forum.) These videos can be combined with a package of practical management tools for the many
local initiatives to use, whereby managers of small firms learn how to innovate and set up innovation
networks. Some interesting initiatives are taking place in Flanders; for example, the Innovation
Network of the Chambers of Commerce or related activities of the Innovation Centers. The videos and
the tools have an advantage: These local entrepreneurs are working together within local initiatives
and can tap into a broad range of top-performing companies that are practicing open innovation
successfully. In contrast, most initiatives today are relying on a few local examples. The expertise
could be upgraded easily to a best practice level when local trainers could work with these videos and
management tools.
A short note on the theoretical implications of this report
We studied the phenomenon of open innovation based on qualitative case studies of a set of SMEs in
low- and medium-tech industries. Our findings call for a more rigorous analysis of the links between
open innovation on the one hand and strategy or business modeling on the other hand. Some articles
on this topic have been written, but to our knowledge, they are based on the ICT industry
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. The
lessons from these publications may be too specific for the ICT industry and as a consequence not
relevant for many other industries.
A second research topic that should be explored in greater detail is the link between open innovation
in SMEs and the role of the entrepreneur or SME manager. The cases show convincingly that the
entrepreneur plays a crucial role in the whole process. He perceives the new business opportunities,
and his personal commitment and conviction help determine the success and development of the
innovation network. Indeed, success hinges on his personal network and his capability to manage the
network. We did not examine the entrepreneurship literature to analyze open innovation in SMEs.
Clearly, potential exists to connect the two literature streams to strengthen the analysis further.
Third, the potential exists to connect open innovation in SMEs to the discovery driven growth theory of
McGrath and MacMillan
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. The stepwise development of the open innovation strategy of different
SMEs is a nice illustration of this theory, which emphasizes the role of experimenting in new venture
management.
Finally, the cases point to the need to integrate different management disciplines to understand open
innovation in SMEs. The need to combine innovation management, entrepreneurship, and strategy is
urgent to understand the richness of these open innovation cases. The three disciplines have been
developing largely independently. But to understand the complexity of open innovation in SMEs, we
must create bridges among these management disciplines.
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Knowledge Partner
ISBN-NUMMER: 9789078858881
D/2012/11.885/01
NOTES
Chapter 1
1 Chesbrough, H.W., Vanhaverbeke, W. and West, J. eds. (2006), Open Innovation: Researching a New
Paradigm, Oxford University Press .
2
I am grateful to André Spithoven (Belgian Science Policy Office) for calculating the open innovation intensity
for both large and small innovating companies in Belgium. Open innovation intensity for both large and small
innovating companies in Belgium can be calculated using the European Community Innovation Survey (CIS).
SMEs are companies with less than 250 employees (N = 792); lager companies (≥ 250 employees; N = 175).
The calculation covers the period 2002-2004.
Open innovation can be measured in different ways. Developing a search strategy is one of the most
important aspects of open innovation. The CIS survey identifies nine external information sources for
innovation. The nine external information sources are categorized into three types: market sources
(suppliers of equipment (i), customers (ii), competitors and other firms with similar activities (iii), commercial
labs, private R&D organizations, and consultants (iv)); institutional sources (universities and university
colleges (v), government and public research organizations (vi)), and other available sources (professional
and industrial associations (vii), trade fairs, exhibitions, and conferences (viii), scientific journals and
trade/technical publications (ix). A firm’s search strategy is defined by calculating the ave rage score of the
binary questionnaire items used to register a firm’s use of each of the nine information sources. This
measure is then rescaled so that it has a minimum value of 0 and a maximum of 10. The search intensity is
calculated by dividing the search strategy score by the employment of the firm.
External R&D indicates how heavily companies rely on five possible external R&D activities: the acquisition
of readymade products/services developed by third parties (i); the acquisition of processes set up by
external parties (ii); the outsourcing of R&D activities (iii); the acquisition of innovative, externally developed
machinery, equipment, and software (iv); the acquisition of external knowledge through licenses or other
types of contracts (v). A company’s external knowledge acquisition is captured by calculating the average
score of the five questionnaire items registering a firm’s use of these external sources of R&D. Again, the
score is rescaled to include a minimum value of 0 and a maximum value of 10. The external R&D intensity
reflects external R&D per employee.
Collaborative innovation indicates whether innovating firms engage in collaborative innovation activities with
six potential partners: clients (i); suppliers (ii); competitors (iii); consultants and private R&D organizations
(iv); universities (v); and public research organizations (vi).Collaborative innovation is captured by calculating
the average score of the six questionnaire items registering the firm’s use of coopera tive agreements with
innovation partners. Also this variable was rescaled and the collaboration intensity measures the
collaboration per employee.
Variable Small and medium-sized
enterprises
(N-SME = 792)
Large firms
(N-large = 175)
Mean Standard
deviation
Mean Standard
deviation
Difference
Search intensity 0.228 0.200 0.016 0.009 0.212****
External R&D intensity 0.101 0.112 0.008 0.006 0.093****
Collaboration intensity 0.052 0.100 0.008 0.007 0.045****
Notes: **** = statistically significant at 0.1%.
Source: Belgian Science Policy Office
The figures show that SMEs have, on average, much higher intensity in open innovation practices than
larger companies. Open innovation is relatively more important for small firms than for large ones.
95
3
See in Chesbrough, H.W. (2003), Open innovation; The new imperative for creating and profiting from
technology, Harvard Business School Press, Harvard : Boston: MA and Chesbrough, H.W. (2006), Open
business models: How to thrive in the new innovation landscape, Harvard Business School Press, Harvard :
Boston: MA.
4
Van de Vrande, V., De Jong J.P.J., Vanhaverbeke, W. and De Rochemont, M. (2009), Open innovation in
SMEs: Trends, motives and management challenges, Technovation, 29(6-7),423-437; De Jong, J.P.J. and
Marsili, O. (2006), The fruit flies of innovations: a taxonomy of innovative small firms‚ Research Policy, 35(2),
213–229; Massa, S. and Testa, S. (2008), Innovation and SMEs: Misaligned perspectives and goals among
entrepreneurs, academics, and policy makers, Technovation, 28, 93–407.
5
See Van de Vrande, V., De Jong J.P.J., Vanhaverbeke, W. and De Rochemont, M. (2009), Open innovation
in SMEs: Trends, motives and management challenges, Technovation, 29(6-7),423-437 and Kim, H. and
Park, Y. (2010), The effects of open innovation activity on performance of SMEs: the case of Korea,
International Journal of Technology Management, 52(3/4), 236-256.
6
See in Chesbrough, H.W. (2003), Open innovation; The new imperative for creating and profiting from
technology, Harvard Business School Press, Harvard: Boston: MA and Chesbrough, H.W. (2006), Open
business models: How to thrive in the new innovation landscape, Harvard Business School Press, Harvard :
Boston: MA.
7
Chesbrough, H.W. (2007), Why companies should have open business models, MIT Sloan Management
Review, 48(2), 22-28.
8
There are different approaches to business models. Different authors have analyzed the business models
along different frameworks. Prominent approaches are: Afuah, A (2004), Business Models: A strategic
management approach, McGraw-Hill; Morris, M. and Schindehutte, M. (2005), The entrepreneur’s business
model: Toward a unified perspective, Journal of Business Research, 4, 123-128; Osterwalder, A. (2004),
The business model ontology – a proposition in a design science approach , Ph. D. Thesis University
Lausanne, Ecole des Hautes Etudes Commerciales HEC. 173 p; Osterwalder, A., Pigneur, Y. and Tucci, C.L.
(2005), Clarifying business models: Origins, present, and future of the concept, Communications of the
Association for Information Systems, Vol. 16, 1-25; Shafer, M.S., Smith, H.J. and Linder, J.C. (2005), The
power of business models, Business Horizons, 48(3), 199-207. Chesbrough, H.W. and Rosenbloom, R.S.
(2002), The role of the business model in capturing value from innovation: evidence from Xerox
Corporation’s technology spin-off companies, Industrial and Corporate Change, 11(3), 529-555; Johnson,
M.W., Christensen, C.M., and Kagermann, H. (2008), Reinventing your business model. Harvard Business
Review, December, 51-59.; and Johnson, M. W. (2010); Seizing the white space: Business model innovation
for growth and renewal, Harvard Business Press, Boston: MA.
9
Faems, D., de Visser, M., Andries, P. and Van Looy, B. (2010); Technology Alliance Portfolios and Financial
Performance: Value-Enhancing and Cost-Increasing Effects of Open Innovation, Journal of Product
Innovation Management, 27: 785-796.
10
See for instance Yin, R. K. (1994), Case study research: Design and methods (2nd ed.). Newbury Park, CA:
Sage.; Eisenhardt, K. M. (1989), Building theories from case study research. Academy of Management
Review, 14: 532–550.; Eisenhardt, K.M and Graebner, M.E. (2007), Theory building from cases:
Opportunities and challenges, Academy of Management Journal, 50 (1), 25-32. Qualitative, in-depth cases
are also valuable for theory building since there is no theory about open innovation in SMEs. We choose
multiple case studies because this research method provides a stronger base for theory building compared
to single cases. Theory and model building from multiple cases yields more robust, generalizable, and
testable theories than single-case research.
Chapter 2
11
A business model can be defined in different ways. A. Osterwalder and Y. Pigneur (2009),
Business model Generation is one of the most influential books on business model innovation
besides M.W., Johnson (2011) Seizing the white space: Business model innovation for growth
96
and renewal, Harvard Business Press, Harvard: MA. The core ideas of this book are summarised
in the following HBR article: Other definitions of open innovation have been provided by Johnson.
M.W., Christensen, C.M. and Kagermann, H. (2008), Reinventing your business model. Harvard
Business Review, December, 51-59. Other definitions have been provided by A. Afuah (2003),
Business Models: A strategic management approach, McGraw-Hill Irwin. Boston: MA; R. Amit
and C. Zott (2001), Value creation in e-business, Strategic Management Review, 22, 493-520;
and Rosenbloom and H.W. Chesbrough (2002), The role of the business model in capturing
value from innovation: evidence from Xerox Corporation's technology spin‐off companies,
Industrial and Corporate Change , 11(3), 529-555.
12
Kim, W. and R. Mauborgne (2005), Blue ocean strategy: How to create market space and make
te competition irrelevant, Harvard Business Review Press, Harvard: MA.
13
Johnson. M.W. (2011), Seizing the white space: Business model innovation for growth and
renewal, Harvard Business Press, Harvard: MA.
14
The role of the business model creating economic value from technological inventions is one of
the central themes in Chesbrough, H.W. (2003), Open innovation; The new imperative for
creating and profiting from technology, Harvard Business School Press, Harvard: Boston; and
Chesbrough, H.W. and Rosenbloom, R.S. (2002), The role of the business model in capturing
value from innovation: Evidence from Xerox Corporation's technology spin‐off companies,
Industrial and Corporate Change, 11(3), 529-555.
15
In reality, the customer value proposition is a bit more complex. Isobionics’ customers, notably food
manufacturers, can use BioValencene™--the first commercialized flavour by Isobionics—to create natural
citrus flavours and fragrances for their products without worrying about quality issues that plague natural
extracts. Furthermore, Isobionics’ technology allows developing new flavours and flagrances (F&F) that do
not exist in natural products. This opens completely new markets for the F&F industry.
16
Curana developed the B”Lite as an open innovation project. Pilipili, a design company in the neighbourhood,
was involved as a strategic partner in the project. Later, other partners joined the project delivering unique
skills and competencies that Curana did not master. We will discuss the how Curana managed its network of
innovation partners in Chapter XXX. Here, we focus on the stepwise development of the B”Lite proje ct,
neglecting the collaboration between different partners during the project.
17
Johnson. M.W., Christensen, C.M. and Kagermann, H. (2008), Reinventing your business model. Harvard
Business Review, December, 51-59.
18
See, for instance, Govindarajan, V. and Trimble, C.(2005), The 10 rules for strategic innovation, Harvard
Business School Press, Harvard: MA; Christensen, C.M. (1997), The innovator’s dilemma: When new
technologies cause great firms to fail, Harvard Business School Press, Harvard: MA. Christensen, C.M.
(1997), The innovator’s solution: Creating and sustaining successful growth , Harvard Business School Press,
Harvard: MA.
19
This is exactly what McGrath and MacMillan call discovery driven growth. Many of the issues on which she
touches in her publications about strategic growth are reflected in our approach about discovering and
seizing new business opportunities. See R. McGrath and I.C MacMillan (2009), Discovery driven growth: a
Breakthrough process to reduce risk and seize opportunity, Harvard Business Press, Boston: MA.; R.
McGrath (2010), Business Models: A discovery driven approach, Long Range Planning, 43, 247-261.
20
Pine, B.G. and Gilmore, J.H. (2011), The experience economy, Harvard Business Review Press, Boston:
MA.; Pine, B.G. and Gilmore, J.H. (1998), Welcome to the experience economy, Harvard Business Review,
July-August, 97-105; GILMORE, J.H and B.J. Pine (2007), What consumers really want: Authenticity,
Harvard Business School Press, Boston: MA.
97
21
These conditions have been analysed in detail by Gans, J.S and Stern, S. (2003), The product market and
the market for “ideas”: commercialization strategies for technology entrepreneurs, Research Policy, 32, 333-
350. Markets for ideas have been explored at length by Arora, A. and Gambardella, A. (2010), Ideas for rent:
An overview of markets for technology, Long Range Planning, 19(3), 775-803.
22
See also G.A. Moore, Crossing the chasm: Marketing and selling technology products to mainstream
customers, HarperCollings Publishers, New York.
Chapter 3
23
See previous chapter for a more detailed description how Curana developed the B”Lite. I refer to the
“Curana BVBA” teaching case for a more extensive description of Curana’s open innovation strategy. The
case is published by the European Case Clearing House (ECCH 810-062-1).
24
For differences between conventional and discovery driven growth, s ee R. McGrath and I.C MacMillan
(2009), Discovery driven growth: A Breakthrough process to reduce risk and seize opportunity , Harvard
Business Press, Boston: MA, p. 13.
25
Barometers used for meteorological purposes are always calibrated as if the user is at sea level. The
effective air pressure is not measured, but the air pressure in relation to 0 metres is measured. For this
reason a meteorological barometer must always be calibrated before using it for the first time. In contrast, a
real pressure barometer should measure the air pressure exactly at a particular altitude.
26
The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (NASCAR) is a business venture that sanctions and
governs multiple auto racing sports events. It is the largest sanctioning body of stock car racing in the United
States including the Sprint Cup Series, the Nationwide Series, and the Camping World Truck Series. It also
operates oversees in 39 states.
NASCAR's headquarters are located in Daytona Beach, Florida, although it also maintains offices in four
North Carolina cities: Charlotte, Mooresville, Concord, and Conover [4] Regional offices are also located in
New York, Los Angeles, Bentonville, Arkansas, and international offices in Mexico City and Toronto.
Additionally, owing to its Southern roots, all but a handful of NASCAR teams are still based in North Carolina,
especially near Charlotte.
NASCAR is one of the most-viewed professional sports in terms of television ratings in the United States. In
fact, professional football is the only sport in the United States to hold more viewers than NASCAR [5].
Internationally, NASCAR races are broadcast in more than 150 countries [6]. NASCAR holds 17 of the top
20 attended single-day sporting events in the world,[7] and claims 75 million fans who purchase more than
$3 billion in annual licensed product sales. Fortune 500 companies sponsor NASCAR more than any other
motor sport, [8] although this has been in decline since the early 2000s.
27
Iansiti M. and Levien, R. (2004); The keystone advantage: What the new dynamics of business ecosystems
mean for strategy, innovation and sustainability, Harvard Business School Press, Boston, MA.
28
There is a rapidly growing literature stream. A few examples are Chesbrough, H.W. and Rosenbloom, R.S.
(2002), The role of the business model in capturing value from innovation: evidence from Xerox
Corporation's technology spin‐off companies, Industrial and Corporate Change , 11(3), 529-555; Morris,
M., Schindehutte, M., and Allen, J. (2005), The entrepreneur’s business model: toward a unified perspective,
Journal of Business Research, 58, 726-735; Shafer, S.M., Smith, H.J., Linder, J.C. (2005), The power of
business models, Business Horizons, 48, 199-207; Osterwalder, A., Pigneur, Y., Tucci, C.L. (2005),
Clarifying business models: origins, present and future of the concept, Communications of the Association
for Information Systems.
Chapter 4
98
29
Chesbrough, H. (2007), Why companies should have open business models, MIT Sloan Management
Review, Winter 2007, 48, 2,22-28; Gassmann, O., Enkel, E. (2004), Towards a theory of open innovation;
three core process archetypes, R&D Management Conference RADMA, Lisbon, Portugal.
30
Larsen P. and Lewis, A. (2007), How award-winning SMEs manage the barriers to innovation, Creativity and
Innovation Management, 16 (2), 142-151.; Van de Vrande, V. de Jong, J.P.J., Vanhaverbeke, W. and de
Rochemont, M. (2009), Open innovation in SMEs: Trends, motives and management challenges,
Technovation, 29, 423-437.
31
Seminal contributions are Dyer, J. and Singh, H. (1998), The relational view: Cooperative strategy and
sources of interorganizational competitive advantage, Academy of Management Review, 23(4), 660-679;
and Powell, W.W., Koput, K.W. and Smith-Doerr, L. (1996), Interorganizational collaboration and the locus of
innovation: Networks of learning in biotechnology, Administrative Science Quarterly, 41, 116-145.
32
In 2006, Netflix, a major movie rental company, organized a crowdsourcing contest on the Internet. The idea
was to build a better way to recommend movies to its users than its own software. The winning idea would
receive a million dollars. The contest was a huge success. Three years later, the Web-based movie rental
service company awarded a team of mathematicians and computer engineers called BellKor's Pragmatic
Chaos. The group developed software that is at least 10% more accurate than Netflix's current software
(Cinematch) at predicting which movies customers will like based on their past preferences. Crowdsourcing
contests are also possible for smaller companies —although most likely in smaller, more focused
communities. Moreover, small contests can be held among employees, suppliers , and local communities of
designers, engineers, and so on.
33
These value networks have been described by different authors. Iansiti M. and Levien, R. (2004); The
keystone advantage: What the new dynamics of business ecosystems mean for strategy, innovation and
sustainability, Harvard Business School Press, Boston: MA; and Allee, V. (2008), Value network analysis
and value conversion of tangible and intangible assets, Journal of Intellectual Capital, 9, 1, 5-24.
34 Gilmore, J.H and B.J. Pine (2007), What consumers really want: Authenticity, Harvard Business School
Press, Boston: MA.
Chapter 5
35 Katila, R. Rosenberger, J.D., Eisenhardt K.M. (2008), Swimming with Sharks: Technology Ventures,
Defense Mechanisms and Corporate Relationships, Administrative Science Quarterly, 53: 295–332.
36 See National Research Council (2004): A patent system for the 21st Century, The national Academic Press,
Washington, D.C. See also J.O Lanjouw, and J. Lerner “Tilting the Table? The Predatory Use of Preliminary
Injunctions,” The Journal of Law and Economics. (Vol. XLIV, no. 2, 2001, 573 -603) for an analysis of how
smaller firms are disadvantaged disproportionately by high IP litigation costs.
37 See Chesbrough, H. (2003) Open Innovation: The New Imperative for Creating and Profiting from Technology.
Harvard Business School Press, Boston, MA.; and Vanhaverbeke, W., Van de Vrande, V. and Chesbrough,
H. (2008). Understanding the Advantages of Open Innovation Practices in Corporating Venturing in Terms of
Real Options. Creativity and Innovation Management, 17, 251-258.
38 Chesbrough, H.W. and Garman (2009), How open innovation can help you cope in lean times, Harvard
Business Review, December, 69-76.
39 Sakkab, N. (2002), Connect and develop complements Research and Development at P&G, Research -
Technology Management, 45 (2), 38-45.
40 For more information about the Frost and Sullivan 2010 Global Technology Innovation Award, see
http://www.isobionics.com/press3.htm
99
41 A fermenter is a vessel in which an optimal environment can be created for micro -organisms to grow and
reproduce. Cultivating these mirco-organisms yields a desirable substance. In the case of BioValenceneTM,
bioengineered micro-organisms are dropped in a vessel of 25.000 litres of water to which sugar is added.
42 This is a common problem for biotech and pharma ventures.
43 Two inspiring articles to understand how complementary assets play a role in the valu e appropriation of
innovations are Teece, D.J. (1986). Profiting from technological innovation: Implications for integration,
collaboration, licensing and public policy. Research Policy, 15 (6): 285-305; and Gans, J.S., and Stern, S.
(2003), The Product Market and the Market for Ideas: Commercialization Strategies for Technology
Entrepreneurs, Research Policy, 32: 333-350.
44 See www.more.nl for more information about this snack producer.
Chapter 6
45 See Chesbrough, H.W. and Appleyard, M.M. (2007), Open Innovation and strategy, California Management
Review, 50 (1), 57-76.
46 See R. McGrath and I.C MacMillan (2009), Discovery driven growth: A Breakthrough process to reduce risk
and seize opportunity, Harvard Business Press, Boston: MA.