Small and medium-sized enterprises and the challenge of open innovation

• Autor(a) principal: Inês, Ana Isabel Pereira da
• Data de Publicação: 2021
• Outros Autores: Pires, Patrícia Maria Pereira, Leite, Mariana Pinho, Moreira, António Carrizo
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: https://doi.org/10.34632/gestaoedesenvolvimento.2021.10030

Technological and market changes, a clear consequence of the increasing globalization process, have created a need among small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) that has never been felt before: that of successfully competing in broader markets. For that, SMEs need to be competitive in the market, adopting practices that allow them to obtain knowledge and resources that, together with their technologies, differentiate them from their competitors. As such, open innovation is an interesting path for all SMEs that seek to complement their internal resources and knowledge base through inter-organizational relationships. Through open innovation, companies interact with the outside world, changing the classic closed innovation paradigm. Through this bibliographic study, based on the analysis of 15 core articles on open innovation in SMEs, it was possible to identify the different strategies, perspectives and impact of open innovation on SMEs. Clearly, limited resources make SMEs more likely to interact outwardly , in order to obtain new knowledge and resources to leverage its competitive advantages. It was possible to conclude that SMEs rely heavily on open innovation practices, since, given their small size, they do not have all the necessary resources and knowledge. The results of this analysis also demonstrate that there are internal and external factors that influence the adoption of these practices, also highlighting the role of CEOs and the importance of social networks to access knowledge created outside the company's borders.