The 1st Annual World Open Innovation Conference in Napa was held in early December last year, run by the ‘Founding Father' of Open Innovation, Henry Chesbrough with Wim Vanhaverbeke, Joel West and Frank Piller. The event brought together a broad range academics and industrialists to discuss emerging trends in open innovation research and practice. It was also an opportunity to make connections between open innovation and longer established academic domains such as dynamic capabilities and knowledge management through the presence of David Teece and Ikujiro Nonaka. 
One interesting theme that was noted at several points in the conference was link between the ‘maker’ movement, 3D printing, and open innovation. This message was reinforced by the announcement at the conference of the new strategic alliance between TechShop and Fujitsu’s open innovation activities.
A detailed summary of the day 1 and day 2 activities can be read on Joel West's open innovation blog, and there is also a slideshow on YouTube of themes discussed at the conference.
The event also served as an informal launch event for the latest book edited book by Chesbrough, Vanhaverbeke and West on “New Frontiers in Open Innovation”.
