An Absorptive Capacity Perspective of Open Source Software Development Projects

An organization’s absorptive capacity is important for facilitating innovation that can lead to organizational performance. I examine the effects of absorptive capacity on open source software development group performance. Specifically, in addition to the commonly noted importance of OSS developers, the role of the Internet-based user community is introduced as fundamental in developing absorptive capacity for open source software development projects. I suggest that the Internet-based user community and the development group enhance the open source software project’s absorptive capacity by strengthening two salient capabilities; knowledge acquisition and knowledge transfer. My dissertation research develops a model that relates knowledge acquisition and knowledge transfer to open source software development group performance and empirically test the model.