By opening a company’s innovation process to its environment, Open Innovation (OI) allows advantages such as better market orientation, reduced development risks and the utilization of external expertise. However, so far, the selection of appropriate external and internal OI-project actors is still a challenge for companies; adequate methodological support is limited and existing OI-specific selection processes or processes from other fields bear several deficits. Therefore our goal is the development of an OI-specific integrated selection approach. Based on a systematic comparison of stakeholder- and Lead-User identification processes as well as OI-specific requirement analysis, this work presents a first integrated approach for identifying and selecting OI-actors by combining stakeholder and Lead-User identification. An initial evaluation of the approach in industrial application was successful. Observed benefits and existing points of improvement are discussed.     «

By opening a company’s innovation process to its environment, Open Innovation (OI) allows advantages such as better market orientation, reduced development risks and the utilization of external expertise. However, so far, the selection of appropriate external and internal OI-project actors is still a challenge for companies; adequate methodological support is limited and existing OI-specific selection processes or processes from other fields bear several deficits. Therefore our goal is the deve...     »