Investigating the open innovation policy tools aimed at supporting Iranian New Technology-Based Firms

In this paper, we investigate the implementation experience, performance, and challenges of open innovation tools under the law for supporting New Technology-Based Firms (NTBFs) from 2012 to 2022. This law is the most important national initiative for supporting innovative and technologically capable firms entailing more than 110 tools – of which 10 tools are dedicated to supporting open innovation and we focus on them in this paper. By adopting a qualitative research method and we conducted a content analysis of data gathered from semi-structured interviews, reports, and documents pertinent to open innovation (inbound, outbound, and coupled) tools. Our findings reveal that events and networks and meeting the technological needs of large companies are the two tools with higher influence on performance in match-making and the exchange of ideas and knowledge among NTBFs. Compared to international experiences, the creation and diffusion of knowledge and joint research are less supported tools in Iran. Assessing open innovation tools, policy-level open innovation coordination, and encouraging large public firms toward engaging in open innovation, are the key practical and theoretical implications of this paper.