Schemas for the Design and Governance of Collaborative Innovation

Abstract

As scientific and technological problems become more complex, governments, industry, universities and researchers have begun experimenting with multi-actor collaborations in order to bring down costs, avoid duplication of effort and increase efficacy. A number of public-private partnerships exist, each with its own governance structure and set of rules around intellectual property. While much anecdotal evidence exists concerning the functioning of these collaborations, there is, as noted by the OECD, a need for guidelines on how to construct and manage these partnerships. This paper meets this challenge by setting out two schemas through which to design, implement and monitor collaborations. The first schema is for relatively simple collaborations whereas the second allows actors to design more complex partnerships.