Bringing down the city walls: new open innovation for new open cities

According to Henry Chesbrough, "Open Innovation is a paradigm that assumes that firms can and should use external ideas and internal and external paths to market… The central idea behind open innovation is that in a world of widely distribute knowledge, companies cannot afford to rely entirely on their own research".  Under this approach the ideas and skills of a wide range of stakeholders including suppliers, skilled workers, clients, financiers, external research centres and universities and end users – assume far greater importance.

A related concept is that of the "Open Living Laboratories" promoted by DG Research in the European Commission. These are described as being "about experimentation and co-creation with real users in real life environments, where users together with researchers, firms and public institutions look together for new solutions, new products, new services or new business models.  Cities are ideally placed to play series of important roles in influencing the "ecology" of actors that characterises this kind of open innovation. However, in order to do this they often need to forge new partnerships with local, regional and national bodies. The work carried out by URBACT projects can provide crucial insights and tools as to how to achieve this.

The article starts by defining open innovation and then describes a series of fields in which cities can put open innovation in motion: by creating interconnected spaces which function as "living labs", by attracting talent and skills, by creating the technological infrastructure and by investing across boundaries. It also provides two practical illustrations of how cities can be involved: Manor in Texas, United States and Oulu in Finland. 

According to Eurico Neves "No matter how pleasant narrow streets and medieval city centres may be for tourist, cities can no longer be confined within walls – they must continue to open up". He concludes : "Open innovation will require from many city officials a strong change of perspective and attitude. The traditional tools – awards, land, money – are no longer sufficient. What is crucial is to listen, to share ideas, and to provide opportunities to those who often have none."


Read more:

• Download Open_innovation_-_E_NEVES_Feb2010.pdf (465.12 KB) – PDF
• Innovation & Creativity - area of expertise – URBACT website