Linking Community of Practices and Open Innovation Through Absorptive Capacity: A Conceptual Framework for University-Industry Collaboration

Across organizations, community of practice (CoP) plays an important role for knowledge creation. This informal structure assists intra-community knowledge transfer which facilitates the learning or absorption of new knowledge. However, lack of research examines the role organizational absorptive capacity in assisting CoP towards open innovation. Based on resource based view and dynamic capabilities theory, this paper proposes a conceptual framework to investigate the relationship between CoP involvement and absorptive capacity and open innovation. This framework provides a sound basis for further research to shed light on the effects of R&D CoP with regards to university industry collaboration. Contributions to research and practice are discussed.