Oliver Gassmann (*born 22 March 1967) is a Swiss-German economist and Professor of Technology and Innovation Management at the University of St. Gallen. He is Chairman of the Directorate of the Institute of Technology Management (ITEM-HSG)[1] and co-founder of the Global Centre for Entrepreneurship and Innovation (GCEI-HSG).[2]
Oliver Gassmann studied economics at the University of Stuttgart-Hohenheim in 1998 and obtained his doctorate in 1997 at the University of St. Gallen (HSG) on the subject of Management of Virtual R&D Projects with highest honors. He held the position of Vice President of Technology Management at Schindler Elevators and Escalators from 1997 to 2002, where he was responsible for overseeing research and pre-development activities. In 2002, he qualified as a professor and was appointed full professor at the University of St. Gallen. Since 2007, he has served as the Director of the Institute of Technology Management (ITEM-HSG).[1]
Research visits took him to the University of California, Berkeley in 2007, Stanford University in 2012, and Harvard Business School in 2016. Gassmann is co-founder of several spin-offs, including the BMI Lab[3] and the BGW Management Advisory Group[4] as well as Avatarion Technology[5] and GLORAD.[6] He also holds several board memberships, including at Zühlke,[7] Hoffmann Neopac AG,[8] and Weidmann Holding AG.[9] Additionally, he serves on the Board of the Swiss Federal Institute of Intellectual Property.[10]
He is also the drummer in the professors' band "No Business",[11] which has been previously featured in Manager Magazine.[12] He is married and has three grown-up children.
Oliver Gassmann's research interests lie in the fields of technology and innovation management. At the outset of his career, he conducted extensive research on the internationalization of research and development (R&D) and is regarded as one of the pioneers of the concept of open innovation. Since 2002, he has been working with industrial consortia on realizable ways to open up industrial research and development. In 2006, he published the first special issue on this topic in the journal R&D Management.[13]
His work The Business Model Navigator[14] became an international bestseller and was translated into numerous languages. In 2021, it was nominated for the International Business Book Award[15] in the UK.
Gassmann's research is empirically based and phenomenon-led, often in close collaboration with industry. His work has been published in leading journals such as Research Policy,[16] Journal of Product Innovation Management,[17] R&D Management,[18] IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management,[19] Journal of Management,[20] and Long Range Planning[21]. More recently, he has also increasingly devoted himself to interdisciplinary studies, which have appeared in the Journal of Cleaner Production[22]Journal of Cleaner Production|, Journal of Translational Medicine,[23] Drug Discovery Today[24]Drug Discovery Today|, and Nature Reviews Drug Discovery,[25] among others.
With an h-index of 76[26] and almost 40,000 citations, Oliver Gassmann is one of the most influential scientists in his field. His work has been cited in Forbes,[27] Financial Times,[27] and Fokus.[28]
A bibliographic analysis by Pitt et al. (2021) identified him as one of the leading academics in the field of innovation and product development of the last 20 years. He is the only scientist who is not only among the ten most published authors but is also represented with two articles in the top 10 most cited works in the field.[29]
In 2023, Gassmann was recognized by research.com as the 'Best Researcher in Business & Management in Switzerland'[30]. He is one of the world's most cited researchers in the fields of business models[31] and R&D management.[32]
Bömelburg, R.; Gassmann, O. (2023). Collaborative advantage: How Open Organizations Thrive in Volatility. Palgrave Macmillan.ISBN 978-3-031-36305-4[34]
Schuhmacher, A., Hinder, M., Dodel, A., Gassmann, O. & Hartl, D. (2023). Investigating the origins of recent pharmaceutical innovation. Nature Reviews Drug Discovery, 22(10), 781–782. Investigating the origins of recent pharmaceutical innovation
Gassmann, O., Frankenberger, K. & Choudury, M. (2020). The business model navigator: The Strategies Behind the Most Successful Companies. FT Publishing International. ISBN 978-1-292-32712-9.[35]
Gassmann, O., Enkel, E. & Chesbrough, H. (2010). The future of open innovation. R And D Management, 40(3), 213–221. [1]
↑Gassmann, Oliver; Frankenberger, Karolin; Choudury, Michaela (2020-08-18). The business model navigator: the strategies behind the most successful companies. FT Financial Times publishing (2nd ed.). Harlow, England London New York Boston San Fransisco Toronto Sydney Dubai Singapore Hong Kong Tokyo Seoul Taipei New Delhi Cape Town Sao Paulo Mexico City Madrid Amsterdam Munich Paris Milan: Pearson. ISBN9781292327129.
↑Bömelburg, Raphael; Gassmann, Oliver (2024-02-21). Collaborative Advantage. Springer. ISBN978-3-031-36305-4.
↑Gassmann, Oliver; Frankenberger, Karolin; Choudury, Michaela; Csik, Michaela (2020-08-12). The Business Model Navigator. Pearson. ISBN978-1-292-32712-9.