Nowadays, Logistics has become one of the most strategic areas for organizational performance, becoming progressively more and more challenging with the birth of new regulations, innovative technologies, and new customer demands, particularly related to the spreading of Industry 4.0 and the rise of new sustainability issues. The numerous changes that have been occurring in the sector are making it a priority for educational institutions to provide students and workers with high-quality competences and skills that businesses require in order to keep pace with the market. This paper presents some findings and perspectives from a European research project called “FRAMELOG, European Framework for ‘Knowledge Triangle’ in the Logistics Sector”, which is focused on the knowledge dynamics of the so-called Knowledge Triangle (hereafter, KT). The KT is considered a suitable framework for defining a macro knowledge ecosystem which links educational organizations, research institutions, and for-profit entities with the common scope of creating high-quality competences. In this macro perspective, we first performed a multiple case study analysis at European level to identify some effective methods and tools used to implement dynamic knowledge-creating connections among cross-sectorial key organizations in the logistics area. Subsequently, following a literary review and focus group activities, we identified a panel of indicators that can be used to assess and guide the building of collaboration between organizations, according to the Deming Cicle. In addition, some “Methods”, “Tools and Actions” and “Guidelines” were created to help organizations working in the KT ecosystem to effectively set up those steps needed to increase collaboration within it. From the early findings of the FRAMELOG Project, it appears that conjoint knowledge-creating dynamics, such as the sharing of good practices, the use of different guidelines and the application of stakeholder engagement techniques, can contribute to stimulating proactive relationships between organizations, in the common objective of creating high-level skills on logistic topics and for the overall logistics sector. Reducing the distance between organizations working in the fields of education, research, and business can enable the implementation of virtuous spirals of knowledge creation in all three areas, leading to the formation of an effective knowledge ecosystem for the logistics area; by extension, this can also foster an increase in the productivity of the whole industry and greater well-being at regional, national, and European levels.

Industrial clusters are characterized by an intense actors interacting with the effect of sharing existing knowledge and creating new one. In this environment knowledge unevenly flows across organizational boundaries and a significant part is exchanged via informal channels. Despite some scholars argued that only general and low-value information can be shared through this kind of channels (Breschi & Lissoni, 2001), empirical research show that specific and critical knowledge diffuses through informal networks as well (Dahl & Pedersen, 2004). Indeed, informal ties between firms represent the fertile ground for the so-called ‘information trade’, according to which firms must first give useful information in order to obtain it (Rogers, 1982). Von Hipple (1987) considers informal information trade between firms as an important form of cooperative R&D, likely to occur in industries where proprietary knowledge is critical for firms’ success. Although such knowledge spillovers are recognized to be not a critical factor for firms’ willingness to cluster (Krugman, 1991), they are an important form of knowledge transfer and their existence within clusters is undoubtedly linked to the one of informal networks. Scholars argue that formal ties among firms are important in explaining innovation exactly because they enable access to informal spillovers within a regional ecology (Owen-Smith & Powell, 2004, p. 9). This argument is motivated by the fact that a large portion of the knowledge exchanged across organizational borders is tacit in nature, which is informally transmitted by face-to-face interaction (Giuliani, 2010). It descends that informal inter-organizational networks represent interesting subjects of study for their pivotal role as conduits for information and knowledge diffusion. Although several studies recognize the importance of informal networks for the dissemination of knowledge, they mostly fail in assessing the extent to which inter-organizational informal ties represent conduits of work-related knowledge. The data belongs to an original dataset that we have built over time since the establishment of the ITC Pole of Abruzzo Region. First results highlight that a considerable part of informal ties represents conduits of work-related knowledge. The paper try to contribute to the literature by emphasizing the importance of informal inter-organizational networks; when studying industrial cluster as knowledge ecosystems, informal ties among cluster actors do exist and a considerable part of those are exclusively devoted to share work-related knowledge.

Knowledge is considered one of the most important competitive resources of small and medium size enterprises (SMEs). In order to be effective, knowledge management depends in a large degree on the employees, both on those holding managerial positions, and on regular staff. Aiming to identify patterns of knowledge management (KM) approach in Romanian SMEs and their connection with company’s human resource, the study applies an online survey with 108 SMEs from Romania. The study finds out that the majority of SMEs implemented KM practices derived from the problem-solving approaches of daily challenges and the knowledge handling procedures for employees. Also, the results indicate that 86,1% of the participants perceive knowledge and its management as valuable or highly valuable for their organization, highlighting a significant interest of SMEs in implementing more structured KM procedures and flows. Still, KM is a vague concept for and handled intuitively by most Romanian SMEs. These aspects hold back KM implementation, together with the lack of KM specialists and the need for additional human resources involved in KM. Overall, the study offers insights into the actual KM approaches adopted by Romanian SMEs, emphasizing the need of a better promotion among managers and practitioners of the conceptual and practical aspects related to knowledge management.

The general objective of this research is to identify and argue which are the main strategies that a university can apply in order to develop an appropriate entrepreneurial ecosystem mainly throughout managing the knowledge processes, knowledge resources and knowledge actors. Firstly, the content of the qualitative analysis serves the purpose of designing the framework about the role a university can play for contributing to local economic and social growth. Thus we are mapping and arguing the essential components and processes for serving the role of a university in developing an entrepreneurial ecosystem. In this sense we are approaching concepts like: strategic knowledge processes, the components of the entrepreneurial ecosystem, the role the university can play in developing the mechanism of an entrepreneurial ecosystem. Quantitative research is based on a survey using questionnaires filled in by students enrolled in business administration area programs and special programs offered to all those interested in becoming entrepreneurs. There were registered a number of 202 valid questionnaires and then we processed them by using the specialized software package SPSS v.25. The quantitative analysis offers the possibility of identifying the main factors which influence the students entrepreneurial behaviour. By processing the data throughout Principal Component Analysis (PCA) we identified a set of 6 factors which are the most powerful in predicting the students success as future entrepreneurs. In the discussion section we will argue the significance of each factor. Combining these results with the university’s resources (infrastructure, endowments, technology, human capital, intellectual capital, and knowledge) we concluded to a couple of strategies that universities might implement in order to develop an entrepreneurial ecosystem, starting with the perfecting of their main actors, which are the students.

The “knowledge ecosystem” is a fascinating metaphor, which allows us to effectively depict the exchange of information and ideas between the knots of a more or less defined network of entities having similar aims and operating in the same environmental context. The ecosystem metaphor has been variously argued to be fitting with the interplay that happens between different academic domains, which reciprocally share conceptual frameworks, empirical tools, and theoretical insights to push forward our knowledge about timely scientific issues. However, there is the risk that – far from bringing toward the establishment of a knowledge ecosystem – the exchange of information and ideas between different scientific disciplines triggers a process of knowledge contamination, which may produce unexpected drawbacks. In fact, knowledge contamination implies a sort of alteration of scientific domains which are more likely to draw research tools and approaches from other disciplines. Adopting an exploratory slant, this paper tries to investigate the interplay between management and two scientific domains which show an increasing influence on management studies, namely philosophy and neuroscience. A descriptive bibliometric approach was designed to shed light on the exchange of knowledge between management and these two disciplines. On the whole, the analysis concerned 199 scientific articles, 152 about the management-philosophy interplay and 47 about the neuroscience-management interplay. In this preliminary step of the research, the attention was focussed on the references made and the citations get by these items. Sticking to the exploratory nature of this research, we did not have research hypothesis guiding our excursion in the fields of knowledge ecosystem and knowledge contamination. Rather, we developed two assumptions, which steered our study. Specifically, it was thought that if the number of referenced articles belonging to the philosophy and neuroscience fields was equal or lower than the number of citing articles belonging to these two areas, then a knowledge ecosystem could be supposed to exist; alternatively, if the number of referenced articles belonging to the fields of philosophy and neuroscience was higher than the number of citing articles ascribable to these two areas, a knowledge contamination was expected to occur. The research findings supported the latter assumption, suggesting that management studies may be at risk of contamination from other disciplines. Further conceptual and empirical developments are required to fully disentangle the “knowledge contamination” issue in management studies and to identify the missing steps to the establishment of a knowledge ecosystem between management and related scientific disciplines.

Crowdfunding has recently emerged as a buzzword in the cultural and creative sector, mainly indicated as an alternative to the decrease of public funding (Bonet and Donato, 2011; Bertacchini et al. 2011). However, this issue is still not investigated in specific fields such as the cultural heritage sector that is yet reluctant to implementing crowdfunding campaign. This paper aims at filling this research gap by focusing on exploring the perception of crowdfunding in cultural heritage institutions by means of an empirical investigation of a relevant sample of organizations in France. The results of the research shed light on the uses and values of crowdfunding in this specific context, paving the way for future comparative research in a broader geographical areas.

In the face of the dramatic shrinking of public and private funding, the cultural and creative sector is increasingly relying on crowdfunding around the world. This is especially true for the crowdfunding models of project-based donations and rewards (RC/DC), rather than longer-term equity and lending models. Yet international cultural and creative crowdfunding (CCCF) remains a fragmented and below-potential market, where a high number of diverse platforms operate at national or international level in a highly specialized manner, sometimes also with matching public funding. The reasons for the untapped potential of CCCF include a lack of transparency and capacity (of operators’ financial practices) and of trust, coupled with quite differently binding (or favouring) national fiscal regulatory frameworks. This paper focuses on regulation by critically comparing and discussing the main features of the two major frameworks for CCCF activity, namely the USA and the EU. We begin by analysing the RC/DC development in both regions. This analysis emphasizes the legal and regulatory situations in both areas, and their possible impacts on CCFF operators. This review of the regulatory circumstances illustrates the current situation for national (and regional) policy surrounding RC/DC in contrast to other pre-sale or charitable fundraising revenues. In the final section, we outline the major areas over which regulatory action might be expected, including taxation and matching (subsidies), consumer and investor protection, and information provision. In most of these areas, public policy specific to CCCF is relatively under-developed. For each of these areas, we discuss critical design features for policy and, correspondingly, identify how efficiency and equity might be affected by policy. We conclude by recommending key policy priorities and suggesting directions for future research in this emerging arena.

Trade fairs, conferences and congresses serve to exchange expertise and knowledge. Often the existing potential cannot be used despite high concentration of knowledge carriers or is subject to barriers in the communication. This paper presents a proven design of an open workshop, which offers the possibility to involve the participants of such events for an interdisciplinary exchange, up to the targeted scientific, social or economic problem solving. The design of the workshop will involve participants being led by a “step-by-step guide (“Workshop Tourguide”). By setting the framework and the specific request for individual ideas, the first step is to create an “Idea Market” that will be made visible to everyone. In a development loop, the ideas are verified and developed within the knowledge ecosystem in order to continue their work in groups. Through the process of making all ideas visible and accessible at all times, ideas are effectively enhanced in their quality. In the final step, the ideas in teams are worked out with the help of the “Proposal Design Canvas” and recorded for further development. As it has been shown, by applying this design, empirical barriers to knowledge exchange and communication can be resolved in order to work cooperatively on solution proposals. The workshop design can be applied to dynamic and fluctuating events such as trade fairs, conferences and congresses in order to interrogate bundled knowledge, bring it together in a targeted manner and further develop it through grinding processes. The “Workshop Tourguide” serves as an adaptable template that can be used for all creative solution finding.

The extant literature has often concluded that small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are confronted with the lack of various resources (ranging from the tangible to the intangibles ones), a fact which determines them to act proactively and acquire the needed assets via different forms of collaboration with their counterparts. In this vein, the creation or affiliation to strategic networks have emerged as a fruitful path towards knowledge sharing as a reaction to fierce competition and with a view to enhance their competitiveness and renewal capacities, more specifically, their innovative performance. Starting from these premises, the current endeavour aims to advance some theoretical propositions depicting managers’ multifaceted communication and interaction relationships with their prospective or extant partners in an endeavour to share relevant knowledge. By addressing varied forms and channels for knowledge sharing, the paper intends to assemble a coherent and comprehensive puzzle, theoretically positing the influence of a multifold relational design on SMEs innovative performance. Thus, it paves the way for a better understanding of the state of the field and avails new empirical research directions.

The purpose of our study is to examine the impact of reverse knowledge transfer from foreign subsidiaries to parent companies on the latter’s R&D performance, based on a questionnaire survey of Japanese companies. Based on intensive review of existing studies on global R&D and reverse knowledge transfer, we try to advance the current literature by examining issues that have been unaddressed: what are the type of knowledge and mechanism of knowledge transfer from subsidiaries to parents? In particular, we focus on the transfer of “tacit knowledge” as well as “unintended” transfer and investigate their impacts on the parents’ R&D activities and related performance. To pursue the purpose, we conducted a questionnaire survey of more than 3,000 Japanese MNCs with overseas subsidiaries. The result showed the following points. First, concerning the type of knowledge, the transfer of tacit technological knowledge as well as market-related knowledge has a significant positive impact on the parents’ R&D performance. Second, regarding the pattern of reverse knowledge transfer, unintended knowledge transfer has a positive effect on the parents’ R&D performance to a certain point before turning negative. In other words, there is an inverse U-shaped relationship between unintended reverse knowledge transfer and R&D performance of the parent companies.

In the shift toward Servitization, the adoption of a Product Service System is a key element in ensuring competitiveness of firms. Nevertheless, an increasing attention must be put on Product Service Systems design, especially on the design of product and service components, together with the effective design of their interaction as a system. The aim of this study is deepening the interrelationships between the adoption of Open Innovation practices and product-service design. The research involves a stratified sample of 9 companies adopting different categories and degrees of Product Service Systems. The research protocol was built in order to investigate the adoption of Open Innovation practices distinguished in inbound, outbound and coupled practices, with the aim of understanding if there are particular (set of) practices adopted within contexts characterized by different degrees of product-service design relevance. Analysis of results allowed to formulate three different theoretical propositions, linking the relevance and characteristics of Open Innovation practices to certain context of Product Service System adoption.

Knowledge translation activated by knowledge-intensive organizations is supported by several factors among which intangibles assets. This paper aims at analysing knowledge translation and organisational performance in the football industry, discovering both the role of professional football players’ skills transfer and determinants helping to achieve positive performance at organizational level. The research question is answered through a quantitative method using both the multiple regression analysis and the network analysis. This research investigates the performance of the professional football players before and after the transfer process from a club (source organization) to another club (recipient organization) in order to analyse the intra-organizations dynamics. We try to understand which factors are helping knowledge and specialist knowledge to be transferred and to contribute to the successful run of organisations in the football industry. We show the need for the coexistence of variables’ combinations to achieve the transferability of professional football players’ capabilities and performance. The results of this paper are for academic community, practitioners and policy makers as theoretical and practical advances.

Recent technological advancements have induced significant changes in the whole society, and thus in workplaces and lifestyles. A drastic reduction in physical activity has been documented by recent scientific investigations, with consequences on human postural attitudes. It is a fact that, in any given moment of the life, human body has a “posture” can be static (resting) or dynamic (walking). Moreover, when people assume poor postures during the day, their body become more susceptible to injuries (Aartun, 2014). Recent epidemiological data stated that back pain starts early in life and that prevalence rates increased rapidly during adolescence, reaching adult levels around the age of 18 (Jeffries, 2013). Furthermore, several authors considered long retained erroneous positions as a possible cause of postural diseases which do contribute, in their opinion, to the development of pathological forms (Shalavina, 2013). With this evidence, prevention should have a central role in order to avoid damage and pain in day-to-day life (Cardon, 2004; Calvo-Munoz, 2012), but it is poorly practiced in the majority of countries, even in the Western world. This paper analyses through a holistic approach the effects of knowledge translation (Simeone et al, 2017) adopting new technologies in healthcare system and in particular exploring how the interaction among health complex system’s stakeholders in open innovation processes can influence the co-creation value in health lifestyle process. A pilot project has been carried on with the involvement of 432 people in Apulia Region, including the management of residence for elderly people, physicals, elderly patients and their families and medical professionals. The study analysed previous database on the use of technologies in health care organizations and it brings to light the fact that chronic populations is growing, so the necessity to ward diagnosis of chronic diseases became an important aspect to reduce the costs in the Healthcare assistance.

Open innovation is a relevant approach to support the development of established companies as well as startups in the contemporary economy. Entrepreneurs are increasingly using this approach to develop new products, services and processes fostering the rule that collective intelligence wins against the single innovator. Interestingly, public bodies are increasingly supporting the development of open innovation tools to assist companies. Many regions are supporting the development of accelerators to support the development of startups. Thus, open innovation is used both by private firms and public bodies. In the Region Friuli Venezia Giulia, in the northeast of Italy, the local Government has developed a program to support start-uppers creating specific tools dedicated to helping new entrepreneurs to fine tune their business ideas. The program’s name is Imprenderò, and it offers various free educational as well as consulting services to promote the entrepreneurial culture, teach the basics of management, organization, accounting, and business planning, and help start-uppers to define their strategy, and build their investment plan and budget. This paper employs a mixed method approach, to analyze both quantitative as well as qualitative data coming out from the program. Data are collected during the years 2011-2012. The study employs a multiple case study approach, using the Culture-Ambience-Organization-Strategy (CAOS) model by Paoloni (2011), to deepen variables that affect the opportunity brought by open innovation approaches, trying to understand also the differences between male and female entrepreneurs. Interestingly enough, the effectiveness of the program appears to be strongly related to some variables. More precisely: culture and competitive ambiance, as well the organization and strategy decided by the start-uppers influence the effectiveness and efficiency of open innovation tools. The study is novel and useful for several reasons. First, it allows first to detect variables that influence the likelihood of venture opening, with particular reference to the knowledge transfer to and from start-ups, also considering the gender issue. These results can build within existing literature review on entrepreneurship, as well as knowledge management. Additionally, the case study methodology can gather insights about how entrepreneurs have embraced difficulties in providing managerial suggestions. The overall results might be useful for policymakers to develop concrete actions to support entrepreneurship. Finally, the sample may be considered relevant since the program granted free access to everybody, and therefore covered the all population of the single area analyzed.

As purveyors of knowledge-based services to the manufacturing sector, industrial service enterprises must deploy the information technology (IT) resources that, in combination with other non-IT resources and competencies, enable their capacity for organizational learning (OL), and for explorative learning in particular. In this context, we take a configurational approach to investigate the digital ecosystem of explorative learning in these firms to explain their competitive performance. The ‘digital ecosystem’ notion refers to the interplay between the three following configurational elements: 1) IT capabilities for exploration (IT infrastructure and e-business), 2) strategic capabilities for explorative learning, and 3) organizational size. The aim here is to identify the different causal configurations that account for the nonlinear complex interplay of these three elements as they jointly enable explorative learning and thus affect competitive performance. Survey data obtained from 92 industrial service enterprises were analysed with the fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) method in order to answer the following research question: What are the different digital ecosystem configurations for explorative learning that are associated to high levels of competitive performance? As it allows for equifinality, the fsQCA analysis identified six causal configurations that characterize the sampled firms’ digital ecosystem of explorative learning, two being equally associated with high innovation performance, and four being equally associated with high productivity.

This paper proposes a descriptive review of service ecosystems, as the first step of a systematic literary review aiming to improve the existing understanding of service ecosystems in the management field. For the purpose of this study, 188 articles were selected and examined according to the following analytical categories: 1) Areas of knowledge within which authors have published research on service ecosystems; 2) Years in which the articles were published; 3) Countries where authors have published research on service ecosystems; 4) Journals in which authors have published their researches; and 5) Type of paper and adopted methodology. According to the research’s findings, a growing interest toward service ecosystems has been developed for the last ten years, especially referring with the two main areas of Decision Making and Ecosystems Management.

The exponential growth of data existing on the web and generated by organizations and individuals, computer systems and digital devices, is opening new scenarios and opportunities for their exploitation, and new technological and managerial challenges are arising about the collection, transformation, storage, processing, usage, and visualization of such huge amount of data. The Big Data paradigm has therefore emerged as a socio-technical system that allows for offering innovative services in many data-intensive applications and domains. Within the Big Data field, the Big Social Data concept emerged as a relatively new phenomenon with multiple meanings and applications. According to the literature, the Big Social Data paradigm still lacks of a clear and shared definition. Thus, through a Systematic Literature Review, this paper aims at fulfilling this gap by providing a conceptualization of the Big Social Data paradigm that includes a possible definition, the distinguishing characteristics and properties, and some applications in real-life settings. Furthermore, by leveraging an existing taxonomy of data types, this paper proposes an extension that is specific for the Big Social Data domain, by introducing a new category of data type, namely “Digital Context Data”, which includes data related to the patterns of digital context dynamics. Finally, specifically for this new category of data type, two example applications in data-intensive domains (i.e. smart tourism and e-health) have been provided to demonstrate how the Big Social Data paradigm can describe, both explicitly and implicitly, the patterns of digital context dynamics.

Companies are required to be compliant to differing kinds of legal and regulatory obligations due to their differing business models and the extremely diverse products and services they offer. Today the question “what is RegTech” is still not properly addressed. This paper is discussing definitions in the literature that represent the meaning for academics, practitiones and Authorithies to deliver the conceptual definition to be used in research and scientific literature. The mission of our research is to have a map of regulatory technology with relationships to the FinTech innovation for: (i) financial stability; (ii) prudential regulation, so protection of the customers; We will conduct a systematic literature review in Scopus and ISI Web of Science, SSRN, Google Scholar and Microsoft Academic as well as advanced research of the contents provided consultancy firm involved in RegTech and Authorities. The keywords are “RegTech” AND “is” OR “aimed to” using an inductive coding counting the word indicated as a direct object aside from the verb inside each contribution. This paper gives a definition of the regtech concept from consultants, academics and authorities expressing Regtech’s perimeter and compare results between academics, practitioners and authorities. In our study we address the following questions: (1) What is RegTech? (2) How is RegTech definition in the literature? (3) Which topics and uses are discussed in the context of RegTech by actors involved? The theme is very new and the existing academic literature is today narrow in this field.

Digital entrepreneurship represents a relevant socio-economic and technological phenomenon that creates new spaces of opportunities where different kind of organizations can leverage digital technologies to shift the traditional mode of creating, supporting and doing business. Among these organizations, incubators should effectively exploit digital technologies to support the creation and development of innovative startups. Notwithstanding, some studies show that they have still a physical characterization of their operating activities and core initiatives and use digital technologies mainly for communication purposes, through their web sites and social media channels. Moreover, how much incubators and organizations like incubators use carefully digital technologies to support new entrepreneurial and innovation processes has not yet been analysed in literature. Based on these premises, the aim of this paper is to shed light on how incubators are adopting digital technologies (with a focus on social networking sites) to support the process of creation of new ventures. A web-based document analysis methodology has been used to investigate the level of diffusion and adoption of digital technologies among Italian Startup Incubators using the information available on the websites of the analysed incubators. Results obtained show that, while the contents describing all the phases and issues of the incubation programs (e.g. modules and duration, number of calls, participating requirements, selection process, etc.) benefit of the usage of digital technologies in almost the incubators analysed, the core services for incubating the startups are delivered mainly through a face-to-face and physical approaches, with the unique (few) exception of services provided to submit online ideas and project proposals. Besides, most of the analysed incubators leverage digital technologies to give visibility to their partners and collaborators. Finally, a positive correlation has been found between the number of social media used and the intensity of usage. According to the value of these two variables, four archetypes have been proposed with a brief description and guidelines for the development of the digitalization processes of incubators.

Our paper aims to re-interpret e-health at the intersection between the fields of Social Innovation (SI) and Knowledge Ecosystems (KE). In doing this, a systematic literary review about SI, KE and e-health was carried on, in order to identify common issues between the two selected fields of research. Taking into account the review results, we identified the notion of co-creation as the most effective in the investigation of e-health at the merging between SI and KE theoretical perspectives. The EMSE (Emergency Medical Service Ecosystem) model was, finally, examined within the provided theoretical framework.