Mokter Hossain
Qatar University, Center for Entrepreneurship, Faculty Member
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The aim of this article is to assess the current state of research on open innovation in SMEs to understand why and how SMEs do open innovation. Stemming from a systematic literature review of 73 articles published in peer-reviewed... more
The aim of this article is to assess the current state of research on open innovation in SMEs to understand why and how SMEs do open innovation. Stemming from a systematic literature review of 73 articles published in peer-reviewed journals, from 1983 to 2017, we identify five main research focuses on open innovation in SMEs. Directions for future studies on open innovation in SMEs are provided in this article.
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A living lab is a physical or virtual space in which to solve societal challenges, especially for urban areas, by bringing together various stakeholders for collaboration and collective ideation. Although the notion has received... more
A living lab is a physical or virtual space in which to solve societal challenges, especially for urban areas, by bringing together various stakeholders for collaboration and collective ideation. Although the notion has received increasing attention from scholars, practitioners and policy makers, its essence remains unclear to many. We therefore performed a systematic literature review of a sample of 114 scholarly articles about living labs to understand the central facets discussed in the nascent literature. In particular, we explored the origin of the living lab concept and its key paradigms and characteristics, including stakeholder roles, contexts, challenges, main outcomes, and sustainability. While doing this, we discovered that the number of publications about living labs has increased significantly since 2015, and several journals are very active in publishing articles on the topic. The living lab is considered a multidisciplinary phenomenon and it encompasses various research domains despite typically being discussed under open and user innovation paradigms. What is more, the existing literature views living labs simultaneously as landscapes, real-life environments, and methodologies, and it suggests that they include heterogeneous stakeholders and apply various business models, methods, tools and approaches. Finally, living labs face some challenges, such as temporality, governance, efficiency, user recruitment, sustainability, scalability and unpredictable outcomes. In contrast, the benefits include tangible and intangible innovation and a broader diversity of innovation. Based on our analysis, we provide some implications and suggestions for future research.
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This study aims to review the frugal innovation literature in order to understand the main sources, theories, and overlapping concepts, as well as the input, success factors, impeding factors, and output of frugal innovations (FIs). A... more
This study aims to review the frugal innovation literature in order to understand the main sources, theories, and overlapping concepts, as well as the input, success factors, impeding factors, and output of frugal innovations (FIs). A systematic research approach was applied in this study to synthesize the frugal innovation literature. Using a standard research review protocol, 101 relevant articles were extracted from 11 publication databases. We found that even though frugal innovation literature is in an embryonic stage there are over a dozen of definitions of it. This study analyses various definition of frugal innovation. The FI concept overlaps with a large number of other concepts, thus hindering the pace of FI research. Combining many overlapping concepts into one-frugal innovation-would help to develop frugal innovation as a well-established discipline. The theoretical development of frugal innovation discipline is still in an early stage. Hence, theory-driven studies are necessary. FIs are emerging from numerous sources as such exploring it from various levels and units of analysis are important. FI requires a significant change in a firm's approach to innovation. It plays an important role in sustainability. Based on the analysis of the extant frugal innovation literature, this study points out research agenda.
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This study aims at mapping the frugal innovation phenomenon. The study reveals that scholars affiliated with Indian institutes and originated from India have played a key role in this research discipline. Country wise, the highest number... more
This study aims at mapping the frugal innovation phenomenon. The study reveals that scholars affiliated with Indian institutes and originated from India have played a key role in this research discipline. Country wise, the highest number of frugal innovation cases is from India. The articles on frugal innovation have published in a wide range of disciplines and journals. Scholars, practitioners, and policy-makers have understood frugal innovation concept in various ways. Studies are predominantly in sectors, such as healthcare, electric and electronics, transport, finance, ICT, and energy. On the contrary, despite high importance, agriculture and education sectors have received limited attention.
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Crowdfunding is an emerging phenomenon that has attracted significant interest from scholars and practitioners alike, mainly due to its appeal as an alternative source of funding. As crowdfunding has grown exponentially, so have the... more
Crowdfunding is an emerging phenomenon that has attracted significant interest from scholars and practitioners alike, mainly due to its appeal as an alternative source of funding. As crowdfunding has grown exponentially, so have the associated challenges and opportunities. In this conceptual paper, we define crowdfunding; discuss its characteristics, related terminologies, key elements and ethical issues. We also propose a typology for crowdfunding and indicate various issues associated with it. The final section includes the implications of this study and suggestions for future research. This paper aims to inspire a scholarly debate and further develop the theoretical foundation of the crowdfunding literature. This may also prompt practitioners to take note of the emerging concerns as the crowdfunding phenomenon is transforming from a marginal to a mainstream discipline.
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Purpose – The purpose of this study is to provide state-of-the-art knowledge about business model innovation and suggest avenues for future research. Design – A systematic literature review approach was adopted with thematic analysis... more
Purpose – The purpose of this study is to provide state-of-the-art knowledge about business model innovation and suggest avenues for future research. Design – A systematic literature review approach was adopted with thematic analysis being conducted on 92 articles. Findings – The body of knowledge for this concept is in its infancy and is highly fragmented. This study therefore attempts to consolidate this fragmented knowledge. It reveals dominant themes, establishes coherence, and identifies conflicting arguments in the current literature. It also points out gaps in the research and highlights new directions for research. Research limitations – This study analyzed articles that were found based on a systematic literature review approach. Practical implications – This study identifies some fundamental issues that managers need to understand regarding business model innovation. Originality/value – The main value of this study lies in its synthesis of the current knowledge of business model innovation.
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Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to synthesize the extant literature on open innovation (OI) in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Design/methodology/approach – An examination of the literature was undertaken to review the... more
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to synthesize the extant literature on open innovation (OI) in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Design/methodology/approach – An examination of the literature was undertaken to review the studies on open innovation in SMEs. The selected articles were classified in different themes and analyzed accordingly. Findings – The study finds that adopting OI by SMEs improves their overall innovation performance. The authors found that a larger number of studies are based on a quantitative approach. Surprisingly, unlike in many other disciplines, scholars of North America have had a limited contribution. European scholars, along with some scholars from Korea and China, have been active in developing this field of OI in SMEs. Research limitations/implications – This study provides theoretical and managerial implications. With thematic analysis, along with identifying gaps, conflations, and contradictions in the literature, this study proposes an...
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This paper explores diffusion patterns of frugal innovations. Frugal innovation refers to products or services that are affordable, easy-to-use, and innovated under conditions of resource scarcity. When such innovations migrate from... more
This paper explores diffusion patterns of frugal innovations. Frugal innovation refers to products or services that are affordable, easy-to-use, and innovated under conditions of resource scarcity. When such innovations migrate from resource-scarce contexts to developed countries they are termed reverse innovation. The diffusion of frugal innovation is, however, uncharted territory. While practitioners show growing interest in scaling up frugal innovations, scholars have dedicated limited attention to their diffusion. Exploring four purposefully selected cases, we identify four main diffusion patterns of frugal innovations. We label these diffusion patterns local diffusion, proximity diffusion, distance diffusion, and global diffusion. Local diffusion refers to a frugal innovation that diffuses within its country of origin. Proximity diffusion indicates a frugal innovation that diffuses to neighbouring and nearby countries along with its country of origin. Distance diffusion is a frugal innovation that diffuses in distant countries, in addition to its country of origin. Both proximity diffusion and distance diffusion take place predominantly where the socio-economic environment is similar in diffusion countries. In rare cases, frugal innovation can diffuse globally, including into developed markets. This study ushers scholars into an emerging research domain and provides new insights for practitioners keen on scaling up frugal innovations
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Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore the development of crowdsourcing literature. Design/methodology/approach – This study is a comprehensive review of 346 articles on crowdsourcing. Both statistical and contents analyses... more
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore the development of crowdsourcing literature. Design/methodology/approach – This study is a comprehensive review of 346 articles on crowdsourcing. Both statistical and contents analyses were conducted in this paper. Findings – ISI listed journal articles, non-ISI listed journal articles and conference articles have had nearly the same contribution in crowdsourcing literature. Articles published in non-ISI listed journals have had an essential role in the initial theory development related to crowdsourcing. Scholars from the USA have authored approximately the same number of articles as scholars from all the European countries combined. Scholars from developing countries have been more relatively active in authoring conference articles than journal articles. Only very recently, top-tier journals have engaged in publishing on crowdsourcing. Crowdsourcing has proven to be beneficial in many tasks, but the extant literature does not give ...
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The Innovation Mill (IM) is an initiative which has been established in collaboration mainly among Nokia Corporation, Technopolis, and Tekes. Nokia Corporation provides its non-core ideas to other existing and start-ups companies through... more
The Innovation Mill (IM) is an initiative which has been established in collaboration mainly among Nokia Corporation, Technopolis, and Tekes. Nokia Corporation provides its non-core ideas to other existing and start-ups companies through IM to turn these ideas into valuable products and services. Nokia's idea database consists of enormous number of ideas that are non-core to it. Companies earn gratuitous licensing of ideas from the Nokia Corporation. This study explores the IM case to understand the insights of the initiative. IM case can be ...
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Abstract Online crowdsourcing platforms are increasingly used to capture ideas from crowd. Global companies are adopting crowdsourcing idea to connect with and get feedback from the users. The objective of this study was to understand... more
Abstract Online crowdsourcing platforms are increasingly used to capture ideas from crowd. Global companies are adopting crowdsourcing idea to connect with and get feedback from the users. The objective of this study was to understand what would motivate people to participate to innovate in online crowdsourcing platform, and to classify different motivational factors and incentives in online crowdsourcing platform. After an extensive literature review on motivation and incentive, different motivational factors and incentives were classified. ...
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ABSTRACT In this paper we argue that companies need to change their corporate strategies towards more open and at the same time they should be cautious about how to deal with their technology related activities. We further argue that... more
ABSTRACT In this paper we argue that companies need to change their corporate strategies towards more open and at the same time they should be cautious about how to deal with their technology related activities. We further argue that technology transfer is risky but not involving with technology transferring is risker, at least, in long run, particularly for technological firms. Due to openness of innovation, firms are under a new dilemma for which they need different strategies than traditional ones. Firms are increasingly considering technology and knowledge as their crucial resources. They started to abandon the idea that the generation of new knowledge comes from internal research and development. Additionally, to remain competitive, managing intellectual resources is a necessity for them. Many large firms are earning a significant portion of their revenues from technology transfer but larger proportion of the firms still struggling to deal with their technologies. Open innovation concept has exposed this technology transfer issue more vividly, hence, made crucial for managers and academicians to ponder upon it.
ABSTRACT Open innovation concept changes the course of many strategic functions in the business world. At least, due to openness of innovation, intellectual property (IP) management is witnessing a new and unique type of experience, which... more
ABSTRACT Open innovation concept changes the course of many strategic functions in the business world. At least, due to openness of innovation, intellectual property (IP) management is witnessing a new and unique type of experience, which requires different strategies for firms to take. Many leading companies are earning a fair amount of their revenues from IP out-licensing. Others are heavily involved with IP in-licensing to reduce their internal R&D costs or IP cross-licensing for mutual benefits. Some are winning and other are losing in this newly developed IPs regime. Thus, IP is a glowingly pivotal player in the open innovation phenomenon. The study aims to explore this relatively new phenomenon - how IP plays roles in open innovation paradigm - which has so far been studied very sparsely. The paper concludes with a suggested research agenda and provides some managerial implications to find insight on the role of intellectual property in open innovation paradigm.
The objective of this study is to identify factors associated with idea selection and implementation through online open innovation platforms. Analyzing data of implemented ideas from Dell IdeaStorm platform, we found that only a small... more
The objective of this study is to identify factors associated with idea selection and implementation through online open innovation platforms. Analyzing data of implemented ideas from Dell IdeaStorm platform, we found that only a small fraction of the submitted ideas is implementable. Consequently, firms tend to adopt targeted open innovation for idea generation on online platforms. The number of implementable ideas increases steadily overtime; whereas, the number of community members grows very fast. Sole ideas get implemented quicker than those of linked with other ideas. However, sole ideas need longer time, more comments, and points for implementation. Higher number of idea submissions from a member increases his/her chance to achieve more implementable ideas. Active members are involved not only with idea submission but also in various other tasks such as commenting and voting.
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ABSTRACT Purpose ‐ The purpose of this paper is to identify strategic and tactical factors that are crucial to explore, in future, to get insight into the open innovation spectrum. Design/methodology/approach ‐ The study is based on... more
ABSTRACT Purpose ‐ The purpose of this paper is to identify strategic and tactical factors that are crucial to explore, in future, to get insight into the open innovation spectrum. Design/methodology/approach ‐ The study is based on literature review. To explore progress and future needs of open innovation studies, various contributory papers have been consulted and analyzed. Findings ‐ Definition of open innovation is yet to be clear-cut. What open innovation is and what it is not, is still being debated. Moreover, open innovation overlaps other concepts such as user generation, crowdsourcing, and distributed innovation. Even though research on open innovation has significantly grown, there are still many issues that need to be addressed to get insight about open innovation in various contexts. Studies are mostly performed in the context of large firms and in developed countries. Research in the context of developing countries is still almost an untouched area. Open innovation in the small to medium-sized enterprises' (SMEs') context has gained a foothold just recently. It is crucial to explore some managerial challenges, such as technology transfer, inbound and outbound process, absorptive and desorptive capacity development, particularly in the global open innovation context and it is essential to investigate how open innovation can be implemented for sustainable development. Originality/value ‐ This study is one of the few, if not only one, that has reviewed the trend of open innovation research and its practical implementation. Both researchers and practitioners will get a snapshot of open innovation and its growing necessity in the business world. Some issues have been highlighted, so that future study can be focused in those directions.
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Abstract: Frugal innovation and reverse innovation have very recently emerged as interesting concepts. Frugal innovation is based on cost constraints to serve low-income countries in developing countries. When frugal innovation comes to... more
Abstract: Frugal innovation and reverse innovation have very recently emerged as interesting concepts. Frugal innovation is based on cost constraints to serve low-income countries in developing countries. When frugal innovation comes to developed countries and become commercially successful it is considered as reverse innovation. Recently, many companies, such as GE, Siemens, Procter and Gamble, etc. have engaged heavily in frugal innovation and in reverse innovation. Open innovation, on the other hand, has not been ...
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Firms are often criticized for their reluctance to embrace sustainability in their business strategies. Frugal innovation is a recent concept that represents a new way for firms to serve underserved customers in developing countries while... more
Firms are often criticized for their reluctance to embrace sustainability in their business strategies. Frugal innovation is a recent concept that represents a new way for firms to serve underserved customers in developing countries while also promoting sustainability. Based on three cases of frugal innovation at the grassroots level in India, this article demonstrates how frugal innovation presents a promising way to tackle some of today's pressing societal problems with new business models. We use a range of parameters for economic, social, and environmental sustainability to strengthen the case for frugal innovation. This article attempts to inspire scholars to consider frugal innovation further in their future research endeavors and encourage firms to integrate it into their existing business models.
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This study aims to explore how frugal innovations (FIs) emerge at the grassroots level of developing countries and employ novel business models to contribute to sustainable development. It explores various business model elements, mainly... more
This study aims to explore how frugal innovations (FIs) emerge at the grassroots level of developing countries and employ novel business models to contribute to sustainable development. It explores various business model elements, mainly viewed through the lens of value proposition, value creation, and value capture. FIs transform underserved customers at the grassroots level into novel consumer groups. By exploring three FI cases, this study contributes to the literature about FI business models. It shows how individuals with limited education, funds, and resources can bring affordable products to market using outside the box thinking to meet the needs of underserved customers in developing countries.
Firms are often criticized for their reluctance to embrace sustainability in their business strategies. Frugal innovation is a recent concept that represents a new way for firms to serve underserved customers in developing countries while... more
Firms are often criticized for their reluctance to embrace sustainability in their business strategies. Frugal innovation is a recent concept that represents a new way for firms to serve underserved customers in developing countries while also promoting sustainability. Based on three cases of frugal innovation at the grassroots level of India, this article demonstrates how frugal innovation presents a promising way to tackle some of today's pressing societal problems with new business models. We use a range of parameters for economic, social, and environmental sustainability to strengthen the case for frugal innovation. This article attempts to inspire scholars to consider frugal innovation further in their future research endeavors and encourage firms to integrate it into their existing business models.
Activities within the sharing economy (SE) are in a precarious situation due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Even though the SE is considered a disruptive phenomenon, especially in the accommodation and transport sectors, the Covid-19 has... more
Activities within the sharing economy (SE) are in a precarious situation due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Even though the SE is considered a disruptive phenomenon, especially in the accommodation and transport sectors, the Covid-19 has raised concerns about its survivability. Thousands of people have lost their jobs, the value of SE firms has dropped, and many service providers have no other option but to stop working. Understanding the effect of the Covid-19 pandemic on the SE sector is therefore essential. The objective of this study is therefore to examine the effect of the Covid-19 on sharing economy activities. We have used various publicationsdsuch as news articles, TV news items, YouTube videos, and blog postsdas data sources for this study purpose. Through content analysis, the study shows how the SE phenomenon is coping with the changing environment caused by the Covid-19. We analyzed the SE sector mainly from the perspective of four stakeholders: SE firms, service providers, service receivers (customers), and regulatory bodies. We explored the SE phenomenon based mainly on the following themes: anxiety, cancelation, job loss, income reduction, hygiene and safety, overcoming strategy, and outcomes. Based on the findings, we point out implications and avenues for future research.
Frugal innovation (FI) demonstrates a new entrepreneurial landscape where small firms with limited resources develop innovations for underserved customers in low-income countries. FIs also create new markets and contribute to... more
Frugal innovation (FI) demonstrates a new entrepreneurial landscape where small firms with limited resources develop innovations for underserved customers in low-income countries. FIs also create new markets and contribute to sustainability. The studies so far have highlighted various frugal products introduced by large and small firms around the world. This study aims to explore the process of how individuals at the grassroots level successfully conceptualize, develop, and diffuse their FIs to achieve commercial success. It analyzes the antecedents, processes, and consequences of FI development and commercialization, and explores how FIs evolve and diffuse in emerging markets. It also seeks to identify what triggers and motivates individuals to engage in FI. The study points out the initiative that individuals take and the challenges they face, from inception to the successful commercialization of their innovations. We therefore portray an overall understanding of the antecedents, processes, and consequences for these entrepreneurs. Along with the scholars, the findings of this study will be insightful for practitioners who are interested in the frugal innovation phenomenon. It points out issues, such as the dual-business model, innovation to serve low-income customers, and diffusion patterns that managers need to understand when shaping their business strategies, for emerging markets in particular and the world in general.