Theories of the firm and Open Innovation

Open innovation (OI) has only sporadically been related to existing theoretical frameworks such as transaction cost economics, the relational view, resource-based view, etc. We start with the need to connect OI to business and corporate strategy. Next, the relations with external partners can be examined in terms of transaction costs or transaction value. We argue that open innovation is not about minimizing transaction costs but to optimize the transaction value between the partners. In our attempt to connect open innovation to existing theories and theoretical concepts, we found that: (1) open innovation largely neglected the link with firms‘ business and corporate strategy; (2) some theories are more in line with the phenomenon of open innovation than others; (3) most theories that can be aligned with open innovation still have to be adapted to grasp a particular dimension of open innovation; (4) open innovation is a complex, multi- dimensional phenomenon which compels us to combine different perspectives into a broader, dynamic framework.