"Ours is a sort of 'group therapy' on the theme of innovation. As academics and representatives of the most important European companies, we will dialogue with honesty and without pretension, we will not deny the problems we encounter on a daily basis, the failures we incur and the enormous potential of our societies,” explains Professor Henry Chesbrough from the University of California Berkeley and intellectual father of the concept of Open Innovation, explains to LUISS Open in a preview of the spirit of the European Innovation Forum (EIF) hosted by LUISS University. The event is a meeting place for leading European companies - including Italy’s Enel, FCA and Vetrya - who intend to discuss Open Innovation.
"The World Economic Forum in Davos, the Ambrosetti Forum and many other similar events are wonderful occasions to bring the business world and the public together, but in such venues companies must always show their most captivating and brilliant faces,” says Chesbrough. “Instead, when I coined the concept of Open Innovation in 2003, I was privately contacted by several successful companies that wanted to start from their own difficulties and limits to do even better on the road to innovation. Today, with the European Innovation Forum, we are providing a space for business leaders to meet as well as a protected environment where they can speak frankly. For example, there are not many opportunities for leaders of two European companies from different sectors such as Lego and Renault to talk about common challenges, such as managing relationships with startups.”
“Open Innovation turns 17 this year, it’s almost an adult, and so we asked Chesbrough if it was time to analyze its strengths and weaknesses. “Open innovation can be considered the antithesis of the traditional model of vertical integration, in which research and development carried out by one company lead to products developed and then distributed and sold by the same company,” he responded. “In the age of open innovation, company innovation is driven by collaboration, ideas and resources from outside of the classic definition of a company.”