Organizations want to have access to each other's resources and so they establish different forms of collaboration strategies (Podolny & Page, 1998). Knowledge sharing and also collaboration are dependent on an organizations' social network and the proximity within this network. A central element in the theory of clustering is the idea that physical clustering of businesses within specialized sectors is a source for regional economic growth (Porter, 1998). The spatial proximity of companies and institutions within related industries create a specific setting in which learning, knowledge sharing and mutual competition are encouraged (Raaijmakers, 2012). Additionally, active participation within the innovation eco system of a Science & Technology park provides actors access to knowledge, facilities and complementary contacts and network structures (Post, 2009). Collective ideation helps an organization to improve the positioning within the technological field and economic market (Alexy et al., 2013), especially within an innovation ecosystem because actors are dependent on each other's behavior (Pisano & Teece, 2007) to be successful in innovation. This research focuses on the question how to design the collective ideation process in particular to foster interactions within the context of a science & technology parks. This research is based 16 semi-structured interviews, conducted at all development stages (idea, startup, grow and mature) of Dutch science & technology parks with stakeholders from different perspectives, based on the triple-helix structure (government, industry, research). The study describes how multiple stakeholders benefit from collective ideation, what mechanisms and tools used in practice and also descibes prerequisites and limitations of collective ideation, This research contributes to consisting literature in three different ways. First, this research builds on theory on how to produce ideas as it offers an structural overview of the process and of the underexplored process-based facilitators (benefits, boundaries, strategies, mechanisms, deliverables) in the process of collective ideation (Harvey, 2014). This research can add a new collaboration method which can be a standard tool in the competitive toolbox of the organization (Alexy et al., 2013). Second, this research provides a new template of collective ideation and a new design of the creative process at the group (Harvey, 2014) and how this can be embedded in strategy (Alexy et al., 2013). Next to that, as relationships strongly depend on knowledge brokering within a network, this research extends understanding in the stickiness of knowledge (Zahra & Nambisan, 2011). It adds new insights on how these networks can be governed successfully (Alexy et al., 2013). Third, the concept of collective ideation is empirically tested at Science and Technology parks which provides a new framework that will help platforms to become more successful (Gawer & Cusumano, 2014). In other words, this research contributes on how to organize innovative activity and open innovation (Alexy et al., 2013; Chesbrough, 2003; Dahlander & Gann, 2010; Laursen & Salter, 2006).
