I'm giving a talk today at the Open Source, Open Development, Open Innovation workshop in Oxford:

Open source software is more than just a licence, it is also a software development methodology that allows companies to share resources and collaborate on non-core parts of their software/service offering. When managed well, open development enables a reduction in cost, and an increase in innovation as a result of the convergence of the best minds in the problem space. In this presentation Bertrand Delacretaz will describe how Day Software has embraced open development by positioning itself as the leaders in both open standards and open source software. We will examine how Day's active engagement with 25 open source projects and numerous standards groups has enabled the company to become a world leader in their market and in the open source projects they participate in.

The funny thing is that the above abstract was written by Ross Gardler while waiting for my own version of it - and it says exactly what I was trying to say, only better ;-)

The event is covered by a live blog, and you can ask questions there.

To put it simply, my conclusion is that quick feedback from users and customers is key to open innovation - and open source. if done right, provides lots of feedback, fast.