While many organizational actors, including firms, governments, universities, and non-profit organizations may have an impact on the innovative capacity of the firms with which they engage, we have little knowledge of their relative importance. The literature on innovation intermediaries reports on the impact of specific types of organizations, but has not considered the relative importance of different types of organizations. While the studies using Community Innovation Survey (CIS) data are able to consider relative effects, data on the nature of those effects are limited. In the interests of a better understanding of the relative nature and degree of the innovation enabling contributions of a range of organizational actors, I conduct a comparative examination of the contributions of firms, governments, universities, industry associations, and research institutes. Using survey data from a sample of 499 firms, I identify the actors that are most strongly associated with each of ten innovation intermediation activities.

While many organizational actors, including firms, governments, universities, and non-profit organizations may have an impact on the innovative capacity of the firms with which they engage, we have little knowledge of their relative importance. The literature on innovation intermediaries reports on the impact of specific types of organizations, but has not considered the relative importance of different types of organizations. While the studies using Community Innovation Survey (CIS) data are able to consider relative effects, data on the nature of those effects are limited. In the interests of a better understanding of the relative nature and degree of the innovation enabling contributions of a range of organizational actors, I conduct a comparative examination of the contributions of firms, governments, universities, industry associations, and research institutes. Using survey data from a sample of 499 firms, I identify the actors that are most strongly associated with each of ten innovation intermediation activities.

Governments of the G7 have relied primarily on two strategies to develop their respective economies, the commercialization of research using licensing models and new venture creation. Yet, they have acknowledged no specific approach to achieving commercialization success. In fact, the results of the methods used for the commercialization of results are generally viewed as not satisfactory, thus creating room for new approaches to be proposed. One of the strategies used to assist the commercialization process has been recently instituted through social actors called innovation intermediaries. Their involvement in the commercialization process has the potential not only to facilitate the process but also to diffuse knowledge and foster innovation. To date, their practices are still under development, motivating academics in various disciplines to originate research studies aimed at gaining a better understanding of them. The literature has proposed definitions and attributed functions to innovation intermediaries, but it has not arrived at a definitive description of these actors or their activities. In practice, innovation intermediaries do not have a standard operational structure, established methods, or metrics to report their results; they have yet to, establish their own practices or use evidence to inform their activities. The objective of this study is to clarify their practices and challenge their current modus operandi with a view to improvement. To explain the activities of innovation intermediaries (their practice), to expose the role of evidence, and to represent the main concerns of innovation intermediaries, a framework based on distinctive attributes of the practice was produced using insights gained from a systematic literature review, an exploratory study, and literature stressing the importance of evidence. The framework was tested using a confirmatory study in the form of an online survey with the participation of 55 innovation intermediaries from around the world. The results show that innovation intermediaries have a predisposition to focus their practice on strategic concerns, finding a fit for the venture offering in the market while neglecting to oversee the mechanisms required for developing a viable venture offering. They tend to support their decisions anecdotally, referencing their previous experiences without the support of systematic methods to corroborate their conclusions. Their prioritized goals are first, to persuade investors and sponsors to collaborate with their clients; second, to help their clients occupy a leading position in their markets, and third, to support their clients to refine the venture offering and transform it into a commercial success. The emergent framework has characterized the practice of innovation intermediaries, identified particular gaps in their activities and their use of evidence, and suggested that the current focus in the practice of innovation intermediaries may not be contributing all that it could to the commercialization process. This framework may be of significant value to advance this field of knowledge and hopefully contribute to professionalize the practice of these social actors. Ultimately, this research could form the foundation for strengthening evidence-based best practices for innovation intermediaries.

While many organizational actors, including firms, governments, universities, and non-profit organizations may have an impact on the innovative capacity of the firms with which they engage, we have little knowledge of their relative importance. The literature on innovation intermediaries reports on the impact of specific types of organizations, but has not considered the relative importance of different types of organizations. While the studies using Community Innovation Survey (CIS) data are able to consider relative effects, data on the nature of those effects are limited. In the interests of a better understanding of the relative nature and degree of the innovation enabling contributions of a range of organizational actors, I conduct a comparative examination of the contributions of firms, governments, universities, industry associations, and research institutes. Using survey data from a sample of 499 firms, I identify the actors that are most strongly associated with each of ten innovation intermediation activities.

Governments of the G7 have relied primarily on two strategies to develop their respective economies, the commercialization of research using licensing models and new venture creation. Yet, they have acknowledged no specific approach to achieving commercialization success. In fact, the results of the methods used for the commercialization of results are generally viewed as not satisfactory, thus creating room for new approaches to be proposed. One of the strategies used to assist the commercialization process has been recently instituted through social actors called innovation intermediaries. Their involvement in the commercialization process has the potential not only to facilitate the process but also to diffuse knowledge and foster innovation. To date, their practices are still under development, motivating academics in various disciplines to originate research studies aimed at gaining a better understanding of them. The literature has proposed definitions and attributed functions to innovation intermediaries, but it has not arrived at a definitive description of these actors or their activities. In practice, innovation intermediaries do not have a standard operational structure, established methods, or metrics to report their results; they have yet to, establish their own practices or use evidence to inform their activities. The objective of this study is to clarify their practices and challenge their current modus operandi with a view to improvement. To explain the activities of innovation intermediaries (their practice), to expose the role of evidence, and to represent the main concerns of innovation intermediaries, a framework based on distinctive attributes of the practice was produced using insights gained from a systematic literature review, an exploratory study, and literature stressing the importance of evidence. The framework was tested using a confirmatory study in the form of an online survey with the participation of 55 innovation intermediaries from around the world. The results show that innovation intermediaries have a predisposition to focus their practice on strategic concerns, finding a fit for the venture offering in the market while neglecting to oversee the mechanisms required for developing a viable venture offering. They tend to support their decisions anecdotally, referencing their previous experiences without the support of systematic methods to corroborate their conclusions. Their prioritized goals are first, to persuade investors and sponsors to collaborate with their clients; second, to help their clients occupy a leading position in their markets, and third, to support their clients to refine the venture offering and transform it into a commercial success. The emergent framework has characterized the practice of innovation intermediaries, identified particular gaps in their activities and their use of evidence, and suggested that the current focus in the practice of innovation intermediaries may not be contributing all that it could to the commercialization process. This framework may be of significant value to advance this field of knowledge and hopefully contribute to professionalize the practice of these social actors. Ultimately, this research could form the foundation for strengthening evidence-based best practices for innovation intermediaries.

While many organizational actors, including firms, governments, universities, and non-profit organizations may have an impact on the innovative capacity of the firms with which they engage, we have little knowledge of their relative importance. The literature on innovation intermediaries reports on the impact of specific types of organizations, but has not considered the relative importance of different types of organizations. While the studies using Community Innovation Survey (CIS) data are able to consider relative effects, data on the nature of those effects are limited. In the interests of a better understanding of the relative nature and degree of the innovation enabling contributions of a range of organizational actors, I conduct a comparative examination of the contributions of firms, governments, universities, industry associations, and research institutes. Using survey data from a sample of 499 firms, I identify the actors that are most strongly associated with each of ten innovation intermediation activities.

Background: With the Open Innovation paradigm come new hopes for innovating companies. The ability to tap a global network of experts can, at least in theory, have a significant impact on an organization’s competitive strength. Before such a ‘network of experts’ can be used to its full potential however, a number of challenges related to knowledge markets seem to need solutions. About 10 years ago however, we could witness the entry of a new breed of company – calling themselves innovation intermediaries. These companies are built to profit from delivering the usefulness of knowledge networks to client (Seeker) companies. Though the use of such networks and markets have so far been uncommon outside of high-tech fields they are now starting to be seen used by companies in more mature environments.Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to examine the collaboration between SCA (a large Swedish corporation) and the innovation intermediary InnoCentive in order to create a better understanding of what kind of benefits can be derived from the use of an innovation intermediary, and how these benefits are best utilized. We also set out to identify relevant limitations of innomediary use and to seek to better understand how using an innomediary can fit a client company’s higher-order activities such as exploration and exploitation.Completion and Results: Our findings include that SCA are using InnoCentive mainly as a tool to solve highly specific problems and/or problems with a low degree of complexity that they encounter in their everyday activities. The challenges related to knowledge markets, we find, are avoided by keeping problem complexity low and problem modularity high for the problems sent out to the network. In addition, InnoCentive’s business model seems to eliminate costly negotiations between Seekers and Solvers. Using this kind of ‘market solution’ however, we argue, will put bounds on the usefulness of the network and makes it mainly suited as a tool for improving an organization’s exploitation capacity.

Given the increasing complexity of global ecological and social problems, innovation plays a key role in solutions for sustainable development. Within innovation ecosystems, intermediaries such as innovation hubs play an important part in influencing other actors like startups, investors and policymakers to create solutions for change. Therefore, it is essential that innovation hubs incorporate sustainability into their practices, if they are to contribute to addressing the Global Sustainability Challenge (GSC).   To see how this could be done, this study examines the case of the Venture Café Global Network (VCGN) a type of sector agnostic innovation hub. The study used a multi-method qualitative approach. Data was gathered through semi-structured interviews with different players in the innovation ecosystem, as well as with actors from within VCGN, and through a documentary analysis.   The results and discussion are presented according to certain overarching themes that emerged from the interviews and answer the research questions. Along with a longer list of recommendations, this study concludes that the adoption of a shared organisational definition of sustainability is the bedrock for any sustainability integration and vital for innovation hubs to impact other actors in their innovation ecosystems, to address the GSC.

abstract: Public organizations have been interested in tapping into the creativity and passion of the public through the use of open innovation, which emphasizes bottom-up ideation and collaboration. A challenge for organizational adoption of open innovation is that the quick-start, bottom-up, iterative nature of open innovation does not integrate easily into the hierarchical, stability-oriented structure of most organizations. In order to realize the potential of open innovation, organizations must be willing to change the way they operate. This dissertation is a case study of how Arizona State University (ASU), has adapted its organizational structure and created unique programming to incorporate open innovation. ASU has made innovation, inclusion, access, and real world impact organizational priorities in its mission to be the New American University. The primarily focus of the case study is the experiential knowledge of administrative leaders and administrative intermediaries who have managed open innovation programming at the university over the past five years. Using theoretical pattern matching, administrator insights on open innovation adoption are illustrated in terms of design stages, teamwork, and ASU's culture of innovation. It is found that administrators view iterative experimentation with goals of impact as organizational priorities. Institutional support for iterative, experimental programming, along with the assumption that not every effort will be successful, empowers administrators to push to be bolder in their implementation of open innovation. Theoretical pattern matching also enabled a detailed study of administrator alignment regarding one particular open innovation program, the hybrid participatory platform 10,000 Solutions. Creating a successful and meaningful hybrid platform is much more complex than administrators anticipated at the outset. This chapter provides administrator insights in the design, management, and evaluation of participatory platforms. Next, demographic assessment of student participation in open innovation programming is presented. Demographics are found to be reflective of the university population and provide indicators for how to improve existing programming. This dissertation expands understanding of the task facing administrators in an organization seeking to integrate open innovation into their work. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Public Administration 2016

This dissertation consists of three independent studies - two empirical studies and one literature review - that examine different issues regarding the involvement of employees in innovation within the growing open innovation environment. In particular, I focus on the different facets and vital enablers that influence involving the general workforce in innovation, among which trust plays a critical role for their active involvement and their decision to contribute to innovation. In the first study, the focus is on a powerful set of enablers of high involvement innovation, namely; the new corporate web technologies, and their role in accelerating a wider base of collective innovation. The second study then examines the involvement of a very specialized category of the workforce in innovation which is the highly qualified external workforce. Those employees represent a rich yet underexplored resource of employee innovation. Finally, in the third study, I focus on exploring the different roles played by innovation intermediaries and argue that intermediaries could take a more active role in open innovation, through proposing the ‘trust incubator’ role. New insights coming from this thesis advance the current discussion of actively and effectively involving employees in innovation, as well as uncover important and current related issues and allow us to draw conclusions that are useful for both research and practice.