April 2016 Download this article as a PDF

Welcome to the April 2016 issue of the Technology Innovation Management Review. The authors in this issue share insights on managing and fostering innovation, whether developing frugal innovations through top-down or bottom-up processes, factoring in the impact of national culture on innovation, stimulating creative behaviours in teams, or weighing the pros and cons of engaging in open innovation.

This issue arose from the TIM Review's association with the ISPIM Innovation Summit, which was held in Brisbane, Australia, from December 6–9, 2015. Earlier versions of most of the articles in this issue were presented at this event and then further developed with input from the attendees and the journal's editorial and review process. ISPIM, or the International Society for Professional Innovation Management, is a network of researchers, industrialists, consultants, and public bodies who share an interest in innovation management. This year's ISPIM Innovation Summit is being held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia from December 4–7, 2016.

In the first article, Liza Wohlfart, Mark Bünger, Claus Lang-Koetz, and Frank Wagner compare top-down and bottom-up strategies for the development of frugal innovations: basic versions of higher-priced solutions made affordable for price-sensitive customer groups. Based on six case studies from various industries, they categorize efforts to develop such solutions into corporate frugal innovation and grassroot frugal innovation. They share lessons learned in comparing these two approaches, particularly in light of the three pillars of sustainability: economic, environmental, and social.

Next, Tony Smale from Forté Management in New Zealand examines the role of national culture in innovation outcomes and argues that it should be taken into account when designing innovation strategy and policy. The article takes a practitioner perspective, distilling the managerial implications and providing a list of questions that serve as a checklist to enable practitioners to analyze the implications of their own national and organizational context.

Then, Tracy Stanley, Judy Matthews, and Paul Davidson from the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) in Brisbane, Australia, present a case study designed to identify the factors that contribute to creative behaviours in project-based, interdisciplinary teams. Their findings highlight the value of structured approaches to managing discussions and decision-making processes, including the role of a technology manager with a dedicated focus on the identification and commercialization of new knowledge.

Next, André Ullrich and Gergana Vladova from the University of Potsdam, Germany, highlight that the possible negative consequences of open innovation are often overlooked, and that companies – particularly smaller ones – lack the tools to weigh the pros and cons of participating in open innovation. They describe the development of a framework and related software tool to help companies self-assess whether a particular open innovation project is likely to bring the desired benefits.

Finally, this issue also includes summaries of two recent TIM events. Andrea Baptiste, President and CEO of Benbria Corporation, shared her entrepreneurial experiences and the key lessons she learned transitioning from engineer to executive and "living the startup life". And Roni Zehavi, CEO of CyberSpark, introduced efforts to build an international cybersecurity hub and ecosystem in Beer-Sheva, Israel.

In upcoming issues, we will be examining innovation and entrepreneurship in India and in Australia. We also have other unthemed issues in progress, for which we welcome your submissions of articles on technology entrepreneurship, innovation management, and other topics relevant to launching and growing technology companies and solving practical problems in emerging domains.

We hope you enjoy this issue of the TIM Review and will share your comments online. Please contact us with potential article topics and submissions.

Chris McPhee
Editor-in-Chief

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Keywords: creativity, cybersecurity, entrepreneurship, frugal innovation, innovation, managing innovation, national culture, Open innovation, projects, startups