Aiming at reaping the benefits of open innovation, a growing number of organizations utilizes innovation intermediaries as external facilitators. However, the effectiveness of such intermediaries, especially in outbound open innovation, such as leveraging existing technologies in new market opportunities, remains unclear. We aim to investigate if and how externally conducted technological competence leveraging (TCL) projects provide value to the focal organization. Based on interviews with key personnel and analysis of reports from such projects conducted in the course of several research consortia at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, we find that the projects were successful in identifying new application fields. Further, the externally conducted projects also contributed to the development of TCL-related project capabilities within the focal organization. This research also identifies a number of barriers to short- and long-term success such as lack of a company-internal perspective and project owners without management responsibilities.

为了从开放式创新中受益，越来越多的组织将创新中介作为外部推动者。但是，这种中介的有效性，特别是在对外开放式创新中，例如在新的市场机会中利用现有技术等方面，仍不清楚。我们旨在调查外部开展的技术能力利用（TCL）项目是否以及如何为该焦点组织提供价值。根据在欧洲核研究组织欧洲核子研究组织（CERN）的多个研究财团对关键人员的采访和对此类项目报告的分析，我们发现这些项目在确定新的应用领域方面是成功的。进一步，外部开展的项目也促进了重点组织内部与TCL相关的项目能力的发展。这项研究还确定了短期和长期成功的许多障碍，例如缺乏公司内部的观点以及没有管理责任的项目所有者。