When large companies build ecosystems, should small companies join? A role for open innovation

The rise of the open innovation paradigm has encouraged the creation of innovation networks (ecosystems) involving a mix of partners: universities, research laboratories, start-up companies, small and medium- sized enterprises (SMEs), multinationals and governments. Physical proximity is an essential driver of open innovation e ectiveness. It enables the exchange of ideas and inside/outside exploitation of knowledge and resources. This paper investigates how some large companies invested in key relationships with external innovation partners through the creation and the orchestration of open ecosystems (e.g. open research campuses). By contrast, small companies cannot a ord to create and orchestrate their own local research ecosystem, but they do have the option to join or co-locate within existing ecosystems. This paper draws lessons from two of 13 case studies we collected, and compares and contrasts the experience of ecosystem builders and ecosystem joiners.