In recent years, innovation has largely been told through the stories of major tech hubs, high-growth startups and the most advanced industrial clusters. Yet some of the most pressing challenges of our time are playing out far from the main centres of innovation: in urban outskirts, inner areas and territories facing economic and social fragility.

In these contexts, the real constraint is rarely a lack of talent. Rather, it is the scarcity of connections, opportunities and access to ecosystems capable of driving development.

This is where Open Innovation can fulfil one of its most interesting and often overlooked roles.

Traditionally, the Open Innovation paradigm has been associated with collaboration between large companies, startups and research centres. Today, however, its meaning is expanding. International organisations working on territorial development, from the OECD to the European Commission, increasingly highlight how a territory’s capacity to innovate depends on the quality of relationships between institutions, universities, businesses, civic organisations and local communities. The focus is gradually shifting from individual actors to ecosystems, and from technologies to the connections that enable ideas to become opportunities.

In a previous edition of this newsletter, we explored the role of Open Innovation in developing countries, highlighting how open collaboration models can help overcome structural constraints linked to limited resources by fostering the exchange of knowledge, skills and opportunities.

When we look at the dynamics shaping many fragile territories, surprisingly similar challenges emerge: fragmented stakeholders, limited access to professional networks, few opportunities for experimentation, and a reduced ability to attract investment and talent.

In both cases, Open Innovation proves effective because it brings together resources that, individually, would not be enough to drive meaningful change. Innovation thus becomes a collective process, capable of bridging economic, social and cultural divides by building collaborative networks.

This perspective is also firmly grounded in international research. Henry Chesbrough, the father of the Open Innovation concept, showed how value can emerge from the ability to combine knowledge from different actors. More recently, research on territorial innovation and so-called place-based innovation policies has highlighted how development processes achieve more significant results when they build on the economic, social and cultural specificities of individual territories rather than replicating standardised models.

In other words, innovation works when it starts with the places and the people who live in them.

Talking about innovation in fragile territories means, first and foremost, moving beyond a purely technological view of development.

Regenerating a territory is not just about urban renewal, attracting investment or introducing new technologies. It also means rebuilding skills, trust, participation and the ability to imagine the future.

In many contexts characterised by economic and social fragility, the scarcest resource is not financial capital, but the very perception of opportunity.

This is why innovation can take on the role of social infrastructure: a tool capable of connecting people, organisations and communities that might otherwise remain isolated.

The most interesting initiatives we see today emerge when different stakeholders move away from working in silos and start building shared platforms for territorial development.

Building ecosystems: the Caivano Next Academy case

A significant example of this evolution is the Caivano Next Academy.

The initiative brings together institutions, the University of Naples Federico II, businesses and the local community with the aim of creating new educational and professional opportunities for young students, NEETs and job seekers through dedicated programmes focused on the food and green sectors.

What makes this model particularly interesting is not only its educational dimension, but its ability to connect different stakeholders around a shared vision for territorial development.

The Academies do more than simply transfer technical skills. They foster connections between education, sustainability, employability and local development, building a network that brings together institutions, universities, businesses and professionals.

From this perspective, Caivano Next Academy can be seen as a territorial innovation ecosystem: a model in which the development of individual skills becomes a means of building collective capacity and creating new opportunities for the local community.

The municipal administration’s perspective on the initiative confirms many of the elements that international literature identifies as key drivers of territorial innovation: the central role of skills, collaboration among different stakeholders, the creation of opportunities and the building of trust among younger generations.

In this sense, the Mayor of Caivano, Antonio Angelino, highlights how the value of the Academy lies not only in education, but also in its ability to contribute to a broader vision for the development of the territory:

A similar approach can also be seen in another experience we had the opportunity to support in previous years.

“From All Roads to Rome” was an initiative promoted by Gruppo FS together with LVenture Group, Elis, ENI Joule and Binario 95, created to address social exclusion around railway stations through an Open Innovation process.

The project brought together startups, associations, industry partners, third-sector organisations and public stakeholders in a structured process combining design thinking, a call for ideas and acceleration, with the aim of developing new solutions for the social reintegration of people in vulnerable situations.

The challenges addressed ranged from employment reintegration and access to services to the organisation of support spaces and raising public awareness of social exclusion.

By involving startups and innovative organisations, the project developed social housing models, employment pathways, language support services, urban regeneration projects and new forms of assistance for vulnerable people.

Here too, the most interesting outcome was not limited to the individual solutions proposed, but lay in the ability to build a collaborative ecosystem around a complex social challenge.

Innovation became a space for organisations that would normally operate in different fields to come together, enabling them to approach the problem from complementary perspectives and develop more effective responses.

Innovating where it seems most difficult

The experiences of Caivano Next Academy and “From All Roads to Rome” show how Open Innovation can take on a different role from the one traditionally associated with business innovation.

Not just a tool for accelerating research and development processes, but a lever for building relationships, engaging communities and creating opportunities in the contexts that need them most.

Recent research on innovation ecosystems and place-based policies suggests that fragile territories can become true laboratories for experimentation. Not because they are free from challenges, but because they require public and private organisations to collaborate, moving beyond fragmented approaches and sector-specific thinking.

In these contexts, innovation first and foremost means creating access:

• access to skills;

• access to networks;

• access to experiences;

• access to professional opportunities.

It means creating the conditions for people to become active participants in change and for territories to develop new capabilities to generate long-term value.

From urban outskirts to emerging countries, including inner areas and socially vulnerable contexts, a common lesson emerges: development comes from the interplay between resources and relationships, between investment and the ability to build connections.

Skills, infrastructure and capital are necessary conditions, but it is the ability to bring them together through collaborative networks that creates lasting opportunities and real impact for local communities.

When businesses, institutions, universities, social organisations and communities work together towards shared goals, Open Innovation ceases to be merely a management model and becomes a true development infrastructure.

That is why talking about Open Innovation increasingly means talking about ecosystems, inclusion and the collective ability to imagine new possible futures.

And perhaps it is precisely in fragile territories that this vision can unlock its most transformative potential.