Cocreating breakthroughs in sustainability: Implications for global business leaders

This article examines how multinational corporations (MNCs) can cocreate breakthroughs addressing grand challenges in sustainability through a novel approach integrating sustainability-oriented innovation (SOI), open innovation (OI), and collaborative competition among five to 10 prequalified teams of senior researchers from a diverse and inclusive range of universities all focused on solving the same challenge. Traditionally, MNCs like BASF, Unilever, and Kraft Heinz have relied on bilateral research collaborations with top-25 universities, yielding incremental progress published in papers but not breakthroughs commercialized with SOI impact. But the rapid rise of sustainability challenges requires so much SOI impact that more holistic and integrated approaches to SOI and OI are required, approaches that engage a wider and more inclusive selection of university teams and that combine collaboration and competition for accelerated cocreation and commercialization. We propose a strategic framework that merges SOI and OI principles into university-catalyzed collaborative competitions. The strategic framework is illustrated through three cases describing how BASF, Unilever, and Kraft Heinz have cocreated radical solutions to grand sustainability challenges. Our analysis and synthesis of the new collaborative-competition model provide managerial and academic insights into how collaborative competitions can be established and performed to enable MNCs to more effectively solve grand sustainability challenges.