Innovation policy instruments through the lens of open innovation. An analysis in the Spanish context

Open innovation (OI) involves the deliberate use of external and internal knowledge flows by organisations in order to accelerate their innovations and expand the markets for the external use of innovations. Despite the relevance of OI for firms’ competitiveness, firms’ abilities to leverage and combine internal and external knowledge flows cannot be taken for granted. In this context, innovation policies can play a crucial role in stimulating firms’ OI strategies. The objective of this research is to examine the degree to which existing public innovation policies promote open innovation by companies. In doing so, we review the set of innovation policy instruments developed by governments within the Spanish national and regional innovation systems and examine the extent to which they support open innovation by companies, either by facilitating firms’ open innovation practices or by acting on the external factors that influence them. Our results show that innovation policies in Spanish national and regional settings partially promote firms’ open innovation, since governments base their actions on the interaction between science, industry and government, sometimes with intermediaries that promote it. We propose the development of instruments to encourage firms to implement open innovation practices in such a way that they complement the existing ones and can fully achieve the benefits associated with open innovation.