OPEN INNOVATION WITH SUPPLIERS: THE EFFECTS OF TIE STRENGTHS, RESOURCE VITALITY AND FUTURE BUSINESS

Knowledge distribution forces firms to search outside for new knowledge to sustain their competitive advantages. The purpose of this study is to examine how a firm can manage and govern supply ties in open innovation from a social network perspective. A systematic literature review methodology was adopted and 50 publications were synthesized to draw conclusions about the open innovation with suppliers. Building on SLR, we extend the idea of tie strength and introduce two forms of strong ties; “vital strong ties” and “overembedded strong ties”, and two forms of weak ties; “potential weak ties” and “infant weak ties”. The proposed framework suggested that the idea of open innovation is further than connecting to weak ties. Strong ties with vital resources are valuable source of knowledge in open innovation projects. Second, expectation of future business constrains opportunistic behavior of suppliers and affects knowledge flow positively in open innovation process.