The essence of closed innovation is the combination of closed capital supply and limited R&D strength, and its purpose is to ensure technical secrecy, exclusive enjoyment and monopoly (Chandler's research also strongly proves the important role of enterprise central laboratory in realizing natural monopoly and economies of scale). As a direct result, the central research institutions of large enterprises (such as DuPont Laboratories of DuPont, Bell Laboratories of Lucent Technologies, Watson Laboratories of IBM, Central Laboratories of Hewlett-Packard and PARC of Palo Alto Research Center of Xerox, etc.) monopolized most of the innovation activities of the industry. For example, in 1946, the patents obtained by large American enterprises accounted for 64% of the total patents in the United States.
The closed innovation mode over-strengthens and controls the function of self-research, which means: ① those enterprises that can't afford high R&D investment will be at a competitive disadvantage; (2) Due to over-exploitation or out of market demand, a large number of technologies are shelved and unprofitable; (3) The backbone with important innovation achievements leaves their posts and sets up a new portal; (4) Enterprises ignore many excellent and cheap external similar innovations, leading to "behind closed doors"; ⑤ Limited by the existing organizational resources, knowledge and capabilities, enterprises cannot cope with rapid changes and emerging markets. Closed-end innovation can easily lead to "Silicon Valley Paradox": the enterprises that are best at technological innovation are often the enterprises that are worst at profiting from it. A typical example is PARC of Xerox, which was originally established to avoid the damage of destructive innovation to enterprises. Most of the innovations of its researchers have made great contributions to the whole society, especially to the computer field, but they have not brought benefits to Xerox's copier business. The market application of Xerox "by-products" even exceeds the main products. Therefore, we can use a "funnel" to describe the process from the idea generation to the final product entering the market under the closed innovation mode (see figure 1).
Existing market
Technology opportunity
Market opportunity
study
exploit
Enterprise boundary
research project
Closed "Funnel" of Innovation
In the era of knowledge economy, enterprises only rely on internal resources to carry out high-cost innovation activities, which is difficult to adapt to the rapidly developing market demand and increasingly fierce enterprise competition. In this context, "open innovation" is gradually becoming the dominant mode of enterprise innovation. This concept points out that under the closed innovation mode, enterprises should raise the role of external creativity and external market-oriented channels to the same important position as internal creativity and internal market-oriented channels, balance internal and external resources for innovation, not only pin their innovation goals on traditional product management, but also actively seek suitable business models such as external joint ventures, technology franchising, outsourcing research, technology partners, strategic alliances or venture capital, so as to transform innovative ideas into real products and profits as soon as possible. For example, the main owners of CD-R technology are Philips and Sony, but they don't need to produce CDs themselves, because each CD manufacturer has to pay 32%-42% of its production cost as patent fees, while Philips and Sony can earn a lot of money just by relying on patent fees. In 2004, the net profit of Philips' consumer electronics products was 249 million euros, and the net income brought by technology transfer fees was as high as 97 million euros, which has become the biggest profit source of Philips. For another example, Microsoft has been implementing the "technology export strategy" in a planned way. One of the reasons is that, due to the increasing cost of technology maintenance, "technology inventory is no longer a wealth but a burden".
The ultimate goal of open innovation is to obtain more benefits and stronger competitiveness with faster speed and lower cost. We can use a "sieve" to describe the process from the creation of ideas to the entry of final products into the market under the open innovation mode (see Figure 2), that is, enterprises not only innovate themselves, but also make full use of external innovations; Not only fully realize the value of self-innovation, but also fully realize the value of "by-products" of self-innovation, mainly through the seepage mechanism and channels in Figure 2 (including employees starting new enterprises, transferring foreign patent rights or employees resigning, etc.). ). Compared with Figure 1, Figure 2 has another detail, that is, under the closed innovation mode, enterprises understand market opportunities and technological opportunities from the inside, which is likely to lead to the deviation between supply and demand; Under the open innovation mode, enterprises' understanding of market opportunities and technological opportunities comes from the outside, which makes "effective supply" more possible.
External projects, market opportunities, technology opportunities, R&D solutions such as technology transfer, sale and joint venture cooperation in the current market of enterprises, internal R&D projects, new markets, enterprise boundary innovation projects, technology licensing, technology merger and acquisition venture capital.
Figure 2 "sieve" of open innovation