There has been a heap of anecdotal evidence highlighting the rise of open innovation throughout the economy, but a recent report published by Accenture provides some quantitative data to back up the trend.  The study saw over 1,000 entrepreneurs from across the G20 nations asked about how they go about their work, and what barriers exist to prevent them achieving their goals.

The interesting part of the report from my own perspective was on innovation.  The report suggests that companies were far more likely to create jobs and prosper if they were innovation focused.

For instance, 91% of those who believed their businesses were innovation focused were confident of creating jobs in the coming years.  This was significantly higher than in those companies for which innovation was not such a core activity.

What’s more, open innovation was considered a key enabler of innovation in roughly three quarters of the companies surveyed for the report, with an impressive 86% revealing that they regularly collaborate with customers to co-create new products and services.

The revenue prospects of those firms engaging in open innovation were also revealed to be strong, with 91% of those companies who saw open innovation as a major enabler of innovation expecting strong revenue growth.  This compared to just 54% who said open innovation was not that important.

“As business leaders seek growth, they are increasingly finding the need to look beyond their shores and beyond their existing products and services,” the report said.   “This underscores the importance of policies that support risk and enterprise as a route to sustainable economic recovery in many markets that are experiencing sluggish growth today.   More countries are adopting entrepreneur-friendly policies, but many of these policies are still largely fragmented, and many of the entrepreneurs we surveyed consider them insufficient. Entrepreneurs are seeking a simplified regulatory environment that encourages open innovation, and offers them a combination of tax incentives and access to better and more flexible financing.”