Open Innovation in the Food and Beverage Industry

Marian Garcia Martinez

• Publisher: Woodhead Publishing
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9780857095954
• eBook ISBN: 9780857097248
• Topic: Technology & Engineering
• Subtopic: Food Science
• Index: Technology & Engineering

Food and beverage companies are increasingly choosing to enhance internal idea development by pursuing an 'open innovation' approach, allowing the additional exploitation of external ideas and paths to market. Drawing on a range of important case studies, Open innovation in the food and beverage industry investigates the challenges and opportunities afforded by the incorporation of open innovation into the food industry.Part one provides a comprehensive overview of the changing nature of innovation in the food and drink industry, acknowledging trends and considering the implications and impact of open innovation. Part two then reviews the role of partners and networks in open innovation, with collaboration, co-creation of value with consumers, the effectiveness of cluster organizations and the importance of network knowledge all discussed, before part three goes on to explore the establishment and varied management aspects of open innovation partnerships and networks. Finally, open-innovation tools, processes and managerial frameworks are the focus of part four, with discussion of the development, application and psychology of a range of initiatives.With its distinguished editor and international team of expert contributors, Open innovation in the food and beverage industry is a unique guide to the implementation and management of open innovation for all food industry professionals involved in management, research and product development, as well as academics with an interest in open innovation across all industries.- Investigates the challenges and opportunities afforded by the incorporation of open innovation into the food industry- Provides a comprehensive overview of the changing nature of innovation in the food and drink industry and reviews the role of partners and networks in open innovation- Explores the establishment and varied management aspects of open innovation partnerships and networks and discusses the development, application and psychology of a range of initiatives

Part I

The changing nature of innovation in the food and drink industry

1

Trends in the acquisition of external knowledge for innovation in the food industry

M. Acosta, D. Coronado and E. Ferrándiz, University of Cadiz, Spain

Abstract:

Within the framework of ‘open innovation’, a number of key issues related to the acquisition of external knowledge in food technology are addressed. The methodology relies on patents as a measure of the generation of new knowledge, and patent citations as a proxy for external knowledge acquisition towards innovation in food technology. The main results reveal different patterns of knowledge acquisition depending on the sector, and strong differences across countries. In addition, in relative terms, our data showed few differences in knowledge acquisition patterns between large firms (large in terms of their capacity to develop many patented technologies) and smaller firms.

Key words

food technology

food patents

food firms

non-patent and patent citations

1.1 Introduction

Scientific and technological knowledge acquisition from such organizations as other firms, universities and research institutes is a mechanism that may help firms to create, develop or improve their own innovations. This process of incorporating new knowledge from other institutions can be framed as the open-innovation paradigm. According to the open-innovation model, firms incorporate external as well as internal ideas, and internal and external paths to market, as they look to advance their technology (Chesbrough, 2003, p. 24). The original concept of open innovation coined by Chesbrough has been refined by the same author to denote the use of purposive inflows and outflows of knowledge, to accelerate internal innovation and expand the markets for external use of innovation, respectively (Chesbrough, 2006).

The open-innovation model assumes that competitive advantage through the development of new technologies or improvement of current ones can stem from the discoveries or ideas of others. This means that companies need not and should not rely exclusively on their own R&D (Chesbrough, 2006). Since Chesbrough’s seminal work, a considerable number of studies have analysed the open-innovation process at various levels, including at firm, industry and region levels (see van de Vrande et al., 2009 for a review), and new trends and directions have been identified (see, for example, Gassmann et al., 2010). Most analyses of the topic agree that the paradigm of open innovation is of particular interest to food sectors because of their many chain and network ties, but this potential has not been fully utilized (Saguy, 2011). Furthermore, there is scant evidence of the use of this potent tool in this sector (Fortuin and Omta, 2009).

A defining characteristic of the open-innovation model is the ‘revealing’ of inventions, findings, discoveries and knowledge (von Hippel and von Krogh, 2003, von Hippel and von Krogh, 2006, Gassmann et al., 2010). ‘Revealing’ occurs when the available useful knowledge is transferred to others through compensation (e.g., licensing) or through a ‘free revealing’ process of spillovers for which there is no compensation to the innovator (e.g., published patents or papers, or informal contacts with researchers). In this chapter, we analyse the particular dimension of the open-innovation process by which firms incorporate new knowledge developed by others without paying any compensation. The focus is the acquisition of freely available knowledge by food firms to create or develop their own patented technologies. To explore this aspect of the open-innovation process in food technology, we address the following four key questions:

1. What are the sources of knowledge for patented food technology?

2. What kind of scientific and technological knowledge is the most widely incorporated in food technology?

3. Are there differences across countries or firms?

4. Has there been a growing trend towards open innovation in patented food technology?

The chapter is organized as follows. Section 1.2 reviews the relevant literature on the importance of the acquisition of knowledge in food sectors. Section1.3 describes the methodology to measure open innovation. Section1.4 explains the data and sources. Section 1.5 provides answers to the main research questions. Section 1.6 summarizes the main results and notes some policy implications.

1.2 Reasons for open innovation in the food industry

A comprehensive analysis of the entire open-innovation process in food sectors is beyond the scope of this chapter, but it is worth noting that as a general framework, the open-innovation paradigm provides an interesting theoretical umbrella. In the following paragraphs, we summarize several reasons why food firms rely on external scientific and technological knowledge to support their own innovation.

First, firms in the food industry have several well-known characteristics that distinguish them from firms in other industries:

1. They operate in a mature and relatively low-technology sector (Christensen et al., 1996, Grunert et al., 1997).

2. Very often, food innovations are initially developed in smaller companies that may lack the know-how needed to commercialize them (Fryer and Versteeg, 2008).

3. Patented food technology is highly concentrated in a few firms, most of which are multinational companies (Alfranca et al., 2004).

4. Innovation in food sectors is usually incremental rather than radical, mostly comprising improvements or variations of existing products (Galizzi and Venturini, 1996, Grunert et al., 1997).

5. Therefore, the food industry brings to the marketplace the benefits of research conducted further upstream (Garcia Martinez and Briz, 2000, Traill and Meulenberg, 2002).

Second, as a result of the characteristics summarized above, the food industry is thought to draw not only on R&D but also on interactions with other actors, during which process the technological and scientific knowledge produced outside the firm plays an important role. The New Food Economy (Kinsey, 2001, Weaver, 2008) partially explains this process. In the New Food Economy, innovation is generated in networks in which value is created through productive working relationships or collaboration (Avermaete and Viaene, 2002). Several studies have pointed out that enterprises in food sectors are highly dependent on external sources of information for innovation and hence must open their innovation process to their network (Avermaete et al., 2004, Sarkar and Costa, 2008). External sources of knowledge include business relationships, access to research providers and collaboration infrastructure (Avermaete and Viaene, 2002, Broring, 2008). This enhances the capacity of firms to capture knowledge from their environment and incorporate new knowledge, which could explain the number of innovations in food sectors. The rare empirical research on this topic in food sectors confirms that firms in this industry benefit more from spillovers from outside the industry than from those within it (see Ramani et al., 2008).

Third, previous empirical research has shown that the knowledge useful for food firms originates in multiple scientific and technological sectors, such as pharmaceuticals, chemicals and agriculture (Galizzi and Venturini, 1996, Wilkinson, 1998, Connor, 1988), machinery, tools and electrical product sectors (Johnson and Evenson, 1999) and emergent scientific fields, such as nanotechnology (Sanguansri and Augustin, 2006, Kalpana Sastry et al., 2009) or biotechnology (Levidow and Bijman, 2002, Carew, 2005).

Despite the importance of previous scientific and technological knowledge for innovation in food firms, there is still scant empirical evidence on the science-technology links in food sectors. Alfranca et al. (2004) analysed knowledge flows within multinational food companies, concluding that food and chemical capabilities within this industry are significantly related. The paper by Acosta and Coronado (2003) examined the science–technology flows and revealed multiple relationships between industrial sectors, including between the food industry and scientific fields. This previous research has shed light on some important issues of innovation and knowledge diffusion in food sectors, but to our knowledge, only Acosta et al. (2011) have used patent citations (PCs) to analyse the use of scientific knowledge by food firms.

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Table of contents

• Cover image
• Title page
• Table of Contents
• Copyright
• Contributor contact details
• Woodhead Publishing Series in Food Science, Technology and Nutrition
• Foreword by J. Hyman
• Foreword by W. H. Noordman and E. M. Meijer
• Part I: The changing nature of innovation in the food and drink industry
• Part II: Partners and networks for open innovation
• Part III: Establishing and managing open-innovation partnerships and networks
• Part IV: Open innovation tools, process and managerial frameworks
• Index