Open Innovation Alliances as complex adaptive systems

Open Innovation Alliances (OIAs) have characters of dynamics, heterogeneity, openness, and complexity. Traditional reductionism and mathematical statistics cannot explain emergence, which is the impact of agents of interaction on external environments. Some scholars have proposed to study OIAs in the view of a dynamic adaptive system. This paper clarifies OIAs as complex adaptive systems(CAS) according to properties and mechanism of CAS based on prior research. This study illustrates that open innovation alliance is a complex adaptive system and responds quickly to environmental changes. Furthermore, the properties and mechanisms of CAS in OIAs provide a useful framework for designing agent-based models on the next step.