Video Abstracts

Authors: Oliver Alexy (Imperial College London) and Markus Reitzig (speaker in the video abstract, London Business School)

Abstract: Strategy research is fundamentally concerned with how firms create value and how they capture it. In the field of innovation strategy, established theory proposes that firms create value through research and development (R&D), whereas they use patents, brands, and complementary assets to capture innovation rents. In this paper we advance the theory on strategic innovation management by refining our understanding of how firms capture value from innovation. Using a variety of different data sets, we empirically analyse the effects of corporate patent ‘donations’ to the OSS community, in order to infer on the strategic motives for this seemingly counterintuitive action. We find no indications that private patent donations increased the overall value creation in the industry (PIE). However, our data suggests that firms collectively ‘donated’ patents to the OSS community in order to mitigate their financial risks of implementing OSS into commercial products. We propose that the mutual claims not to assert private intellectual property rights against OSS-related projects represent a collusive corporate effort to capture value from a largely collective good.

Authors: Christina Raasch, Cornelius Herstatt (speaker in the video abstract), Kerstin Balka

Abstract: Over the last decade, Open Source Software (OSS) development has received considerable scholarly attention, much of which is based on the presumption that the ‘open source model’ of development holds some lessons of broader applicability. Nonetheless, our knowledge of the deployment of the ‘open source model’ outside the software industry is very limited. This paper focuses on the open source development of tangible objects, so-called open design. We propose a generalised definition of open source development and develop a framework linking actors, objects, governance structures, development processes, and outcomes. This framework is then analysed in detail, drawing on 27 exploratory interviews and six case studies selected from a pool of more than 75 projects, to advance propositions for future research on open design. The analysis reveals that open design is already being implemented in a substantial variety of projects with different organisational and institutional structures

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Authors: Matthias Stuermer, Sebastian Spaeth, and Georg von Krogh (ETH Zurich)

Abstract: The private-collective innovation model proposes incentives for individuals and firms to privately invest resources to create public goods innovations. Such innovations are characterized by non-rivalry and non-exclusivity in consumption. Examples include open source software, user-generated media products, drug formulas, and sport equipment designs. There is still limited empirical research on private-collective innovation. We present a case study to 1) provide empirical evidence of a case of private-collective innovation, showing specific benefits, and 2) to extend the private-collective innovation model by analyzing the hidden costs for the company involved. We examine the development of the Nokia Internet Tablet, that builds on both proprietary and open source software development, and that involves both Nokia developers and volunteers who are not employed by the company. Seven benefits for Nokia are identified, as are five hidden costs: difficulty to differentiate, guarding business secrets, reducing community entry barriers, giving up control, and organizational inertia. We examine actions taken by the management to mitigate these costs throughout the development period.

Authors: Nicolai J. Foss, Keld Laursen, and Torben Pedersen

Abstract: The notion that firms can improve their innovativeness by tapping users and customers for knowledge has become prominent in innovation studies. However, the literature fails to deal with the fact that firms that engage in this practice must design their internal organization to support it. Specifically, we argue that new organizational practices, notably intensive vertical and lateral communication, rewarding employees for sharing knowledge, and a high degree of delegation of decision rights, can leverage knowledge absorption from customers in the context of innovation. Six hypotheses are developed and tested on a dataset drawn from a survey of 169 Danish firms which was implemented in 2001 among a sample of the largest Danish firms.

Sidney G. Winter (Wharton School) and Prof. Charles Baden-Fuller (Cass Business School. Speaker in the video abstract)

We discuss in some detail two approaches to the replication of practices between units within an organization or a family of organizations. One approach involves the use of causal principles and the other relies on an extant working example (a template).  Definitions are provided for the key concepts of templates, principles, and background knowledge.  We address the challenges of providing operational measures for successful replication, and for comparing the efficacy of principles and templates. The analysis identifies important contingencies affecting the relative performance of the two methods; the nature and implication of these are discussed.

Prof. Joel West, San José State University, CA

In 1948, the field of information theory was launched by Claude Shannon of Bell Labs. However, from 1950-1965 the field was developed and disseminated by the faculty and graduate students of MIT's Course VI. This paper outlines the evolution of MIT communications research during this period, through institutions such as the Research Laboratory of Electronics, textbooks such as a Transmission of Information and Information Theory and Reliable Communication, and journals of the IRE and IEEE.
This paper is adapted from Chapter 2 of the forthcoming book Digitizing Communications: From MIT to Qualcomm, by Joel West and Caroline Simard (http://www.DigitizingCommunications.com). The book traces the linkages between three aspects of postwar US communications industry: information theory, professors-turned entrepreneurs Irwin Jacobs and Andrew Viterbi, and the direct and indirect role they played creating the San Diego telecommunications industry during the period 1980-2005.

Oliver Alexy and Joachim Henkel (speaker in the video abstract), TU München
The engagement of individuals and corporations in Open Source Software (OSS) projects has received considerable research attention. Yet, the diffusion process of OSS engagement within corporations is largely unknown, as are the reasons why individuals in their role as employees consider and, eventually, decide to engage in OSS. In this paper, using concepts of innovation diffusion by Rogers and Davis’ Technology Acceptance Model we analyze individuals’ tendency to get their company and themselves involved into OSS. We find that the intention to engage in OSS has in many cases not yet transformed into actual engagement, and analyze the reasons. For this, we introduce inventories on innovativeness and openness to OSS research and analyze in how far they influence an employee’s view on OSS. We also consider the impact of peer influence and promoting behavior. We find that benefits to the corporation play an important role in employees’ evaluation of OSS. Still, its further diffusion and an increased commitment culminating in the revealing of proprietary software are inhibited by a fear of organizational change and a lack of promotors.

Dominique Foray, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne,PDF download
Abstract: This paper addresses the issue of indicators development that aims at providing a broad and deep measurement base on which research in the «economics of knowledge» can prosper. While initial quantification attempts in the area of the knowledge economy proceeded from both national accounting (Machlup, 1962) and growth accounting (Abramovitz and David, 2001), the use of indicators that have a direct bearing on knowledge (Jaffe and Trajtenberg, 2002) is becoming progressively the dominant approach. There is no summation (or composite value), as in accounting, but a collection of available statistics on several dimensions of knowledge, such as scientific and technological knowledge, innovations’ inputs and outputs or organizational practices. The strength of this latter approach is that, conditional upon the quality of the indicators, it allows a true grasp of the phenomena of knowledge and innovation which are being considered. Economics of knowledge is now exactly at the point where it can become a strong empirically disciplined science depending upon whether enough progress can be made on developing the underlying data and ensuing indicators. This paper argues that the economics of knowledge is at the crossroads and uses the development of knowledge management indicators as an example.

Georg von Krogh, Sebastian Spaeth and Karim R. Lakhani, published in Research policy in 2003.Abstract: This paper develops an inductive theory of the open source software (OSS) innovation process by focussing on the creation of Freenet, a project aimed at developing a decentralized and anonymous peer-to-peer electronic file sharing network. We are particularly interested in the strategies and processes by which new people join the existing community of software developers, and how they initially contribute code. Analyzing data from multiple sources on the Freenet software development process, we generate the constructs of "joining script", "specialization", "contribution barriers", and "feature gifts", and propose relationships among these. Implications for theory and research are discussed.