On May 6th I was running a workshop together with Ouke Arts of PricewaterhouseCoopers on Open Business Model Innovation. LEF Open Innovation (@ Media Plaza Utrecht) had put an interesting program together to discuss the topic “What is open innovation?” Open Innovation is a term promoted by Henry Chesbrough (Prof. University of Berkeley). The idea behind open innovation is that companies work with other companies on innovation. They either source it in, or source it out (eg. patents they do not use).
Just at the time I needed to do prepare the workshop Alex Osterwalder and Yves Pigneur released their book chunk on Open Business Models on the Hub. Alex describes here the difference between the outside in and inside out approach. Very visual presentation on how these business models work. Examples of Glaxo and Proctor & Gamble included.
But how does open innovation work for the participants of the workshop? During our workshop they audience had difficulties in coming up with a definition. Is it that you work close together on the innovation process with other companies? But what if a company recently invented an idea or concept and you start working with them rightaway? Is that inside out open business models? Or is it just smart sourcing? Anyhow, we had great discussions, people helped each other with describing business models and we concluded: Invent your business model! Inside, outside and upside down! (you can take a look at our slide pack here).
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