User – User Innovation: Interactions Between Users and Firms in Innovation Processes
Francesco Schiavone · 2021
Both end-users and intermediate users hold a creative power that often leads to novel solutions to their daily problems. Users have the potential to revise and re-innovate existing products launched by manufacturing firms. Individuals, persons or firms and communities of end-users develop such innovations alone or with the complementary contribution of established firms implementing open innovation strategies. Users can decide to innovate old declining technology because they want to keep it in the market for one reason or another. Although all user innovators have the interest to develop an innovation, not all of them have the same qualities, skills and characteristics. User innovation complements manufacturer innovation. Commercialization of user-generated innovations can be complex and sometimes they end up in a corner due to a lack of knowledge on how to share and sell it to the world.