Things are much easier on the web today with the innovation of search engines for information, online marketplaces like ebay for unique items or eharmony for dates.  The same can be said for innovation, there is so much out there but it is often simply not in the hands of the people or companies that best utilize it.  Take a software company right now that is looking at their product roadmap and thinking about what new product and/or features to add.  I am confident that somewhere in the world that 80% of the time someone has already solved and coded the feature/function that you seek.  But due to transaction (aka search) costs - it is easier to build it than to search for the needle in the haystack.

This dilemma is exactly what Open Innovation seeks to solve.  It is easy to see with tangible goods where even my 6 year old picks up the value of using ebay when searching for Nintendo DS games or Scooby Doo videos.  But what about things like software or the next great environmentally friendly package design.  What if those inventions were not conceived by people with the motivation and/or insight on how to turn them into commercial innovations? 
Waste, that is what happens.  The next big boost in economic growth (usually driven by productivity gains) will be based on a new model for sharing, searching and implementing on other people’s ideas.

I am confident that if we continue breaking down the traditional linear product/service development cycle into a more fluid, interconnected process that the pace of Innovation will begin to expand.  Look for additional posts on what I think it will take to create this shift in Innovation toward a new ecosystem for growth.