On appropriability strategies for open organizations.

Open innovation research links openness of organizations to the choice of appropriation strategies. It looks at partial openness but neglects the feasibility of fully open forms. However, the emergence of successful organizations producing open source tangible goods seems to contradict that only hybrid forms can survive. This paper analyzes how fully open organizations establish their appropriation strategies. I conducted an inductive study with four case studies of organizations that follow a fully revealing approach. The findings suggest that openness drives the selection of appropriation methods. The appropriation strategy consists of an orchestration of suitable methods along with community management. Furthermore, the engagement with users' communities provides indirect benefits that counteracts some disadvantages of openness and enhances the value of the firm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]