Corporate Open Innovation Portals: An Active Part of an Open Innovation Strategy

As part of the Open Innovation movement, many companies now actively solicit technical solutions, products and business ideas from innovators, customers, suppliers, and the broader marketplace of technology providers.  Some companies have begun utilizing structured innovation submission programs, typically implemented through their corporate websites.  This article helps companies understand Collaborative vs. Direct Portals, and the importance of IP-anti-contamination and efficient filtering in choosing the best innovation portals for their unique situations.

“Young inventor invents technical tool for big company” – that’s a news story to which we all respond.  The underdog saves the big company with a great idea.  That was the story reported in a business article in the New York Times (February 22, 2014), a tale of Mark King, a young 21-year-old community-college dropout, who responded to a call for ideas on a website sponsored by General Mills.  King responded to a technology problem posted on the company’s website and invented an organoleptic analyzer — a way to measure the texture of granola bars. King’s side of the story is good reading (story link here), but we’re interested in the corporate side of that story – why and how companies like General Mills decided to utilize an idea submission program.

Read more in yet2’s Corporate Open Innovation Portals.