While some companies aspire to finding sources of innovation from among their networks of suppliers and business partners, Proctor & Gamble has taken the open approach to innovation a step further with its Connect + Develop initiative.

Connect + Develop is a strategy through which P&G aims to acquire at least 50% of its innovations from outside company walls. The idea is not to replace its own research and development capabilities but to have them work more effectively and reduce the time taken to bring products to market. In addition to developing new products itself, the company looks around to identify companies that have developed proven goods, packages, technologies, business processes and engineering solutions that have the potential to be improved, scaled up and marketed globally, either by P&G itself or through joint ventures with other companies.

The company has several means of capturing these solutions. It has a website through which people can submit ideas based on P&G's list of requirements and technology briefs. Then it uses what it calls its "intelligence search engine". This consists of a group of people located around the world who act as corporate matchmakers—they assess the innovations, run them past the appropriate business unit and communicate with the companies or individuals that have developed them. The company has also created an IT platform through which it can share technology briefs with its main suppliers.

"We don't corner the market on good ideas," says P&G spokesperson Jeff LeRoy. "We have 9,000 researchers in the areas in which we work, but there are 1.5m scientists and engineers globally working in the same field. So if we can go outside the company and find a best-in-class solution, why not do that?"

The implications of P&G's open-source approach have not been lost on other companies. Today, mechanisms are being sought to facilitate the interaction of large companies with smaller, innovative entrepreneurs. FedEx Labs, which supplements the R&D behind the products and technologies supporting FedEx's global delivery business, recently moved into EmergeMemphis, a business and IT incubator that hosts small startup companies. The idea is that FedEx researchers can interact with developers and designers from outside the company.

With the cost of developing new products and technologies rising, these kinds of initiatives are becoming more common as companies look outside their own walls for sources of knowledge, expertise and innovation.