Welcome! This web site reports since 1997 on mass customization, personalization, customer integration, and open innovation -- strategies to co-create value between companies and customers. It supplements my blog on these topics. It is edited by Frank Piller, RWTH Aachen and MIT Smart Customization Group. Most information here is in English, but some links also refer to German texts. If you find that some information is missing, please contact me for any hints or further questions.

Recent developments and trends: Frank Piller's MC & OI web blog

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Internet Links: del.icio.us community bookmarks for mass customization and user / open innovation

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Corporate Lectures and Conference Keynotes

Creating value by integrating customers with mass customization and open innovation strategies is a fascinating topic for conferences and workshops on corporate strategy, innovation, marketing, and relationship management [ More information].

Ralf Reichwald & Frank Piller: Interaktive Wertschöpfung. Open Innovation, Individualisierung und neue Formen der Arbeitsteilung. Gabler Verlag, Wiesbaden 2006. []
New GERMAN text book on a combining theory of customer co-creation, open innovation and mass customization. More information.

Frank Piller: Mass Customization. Gabler Verlag, Wiesbaden. 4te aktualisierte Auflage 2006. []
Based on an empirical study of 200 pioneering companies the book provides an in-depth analysis of mass customization strategies. The fourth edition of the book has been completly updated and revised. More information.

The Customer Centric Enterprise: Advances in Mass Customization and Personalization, edited by Mitchell M. Tseng and Frank T. Piller, Springer New York / Berlin 2003 [Chinese translation: 2004]
Following an interdisciplinary approach, leading scientists and practitioners share their ideas for building a customer centric enterprise from the perspective of design, engineering, and marketing. More information.

Mass Customization und Kunden-Integration: neue Wege zum innovativen Produkt , herausgegeben von Frank Piller und Christof Stotko, Symposion, 2003 []
The first customizable book on mass customization, customer integration and open innovation. The book's first part presents a managerial discussion on the implementation of a mass customization strategy and extents the concept towards a new approach: Open Innovation: Using customer integration and toolkits for user innovation to create better fitting new products. More Information

DOCUMENTATION: Proceedings of the 2003 World Congress on Mass Customization and Personalization, edited by Ralf Reichwald, Frank Piller & Mitchell Tseng, Munich October 2003.
The MCPC was the largest international event in the field of mass customization and personalization ever. The conference proceedings contain more than 1500+ pages on mass customization and personalization. More information here.

This site is published in cooperation with the IIMCP - The International Institute on Mass Customization & Personalization (iimcp.org) -- a society to support research and implementation of mass customization related business processes (more info)

Extreme Customization: Full Text Proceedings of the MCPC 2007 Conference at MIT. The MCPC 2007 has been THE event of the international mass customization community. The conference is over, but you still can order the conference proceedings.

William J. Mitchell, Frank T. Piller, Mitchell Tseng, Ryan Chin, Betty Lou McClanahan (Editors): Extreme Customization. Proceedings of the MCPC 2007 World Conference on Mass Customization & Personalization. October 7-9, 2007 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. More information.

Interaktive Wertschöpfung: Our GERMAN textbook providing a combining theory of customer co-creation, open innovation and mass customization. Download the book here (in German language).

Interaktive Wertschöpfung. Open Innovation, Individualisierung und neue Formen der Arbeitsteilung. von Ralf Reichwald und Frank Piller unter Mitarbeit von Christoph Ihl und Sascha Seifert, Gabler Verlag Wiesbaden, Juni 2006. Ca. 380 S., ISBN: 3-8349-0106-7, 24,90 EUR. Mehr Information And: The book in the press & blogs.

Webinar Downloads:
(1) Executive briefing on mass customization.
(2) A trend report on user co-creation and user manufacturing.

These webinars provide a good introduction into my thinking & research on mass customization, open innovation, and user co-creation. Use code "aix" at check-out for a 10% discount!

Direct from the MC&OI Web Blog edited by Frank T. Piller

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Frank Piller's MC&OI Web Blog.

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The following press reports provide a good introduction into mass customization and open innovation:

Mass Customization

The Personal Touch: Mass Customization, SAP Info - The SAP Magazine, Vol. 120, September 2004: 12-16. pil2005-3.pdf, pil2005-3d.pdf, pil2005-3j.pdf 

Customers as Co-Designers: The miAdidas mass customization strategy, IEE Manufacturing Engineer, Vol. 82, August 2003: 42-46. iee03.pdf 

• AT&T Report: Mass Customization (2007) []
• Hochpaterre - Schweizer Zeitung für Design: Mass Customization (2005) []
• Impulse: Mass Customization (2005) []
• Internet World Business: Mass Customization in BtoB (2006) []

User co-creation & crowdsourcing ("interactive value creation")

Interactive value creation with users and customers. In: Anne S. Huff (ed.): Leading Open Innovation, Munich: Peter-Pribilla-Foundation 2008: 16-24. piller_2008-pribilla.pdf 

• Assignment Zero: Mass Customitation & Crowdsourcing (2007) []
• MIT Technology Review: User innovation and fabbing (2007) []
• Brand Eins: Crowdsourcing und Open Innovation (2007) []
• Z-Punkt: Fabbing, Rapid Manufacturing and Mass Customization (2007) []

Open / User Innovation

An interview with Eric von Hippel, MIT, on Democratizing Innovation. MC&OI Blog 2005 . Download.

Von Open Source zu Open Innovation, Harvard Business Manager, 25 (2003) 12 (Dezember): 114. hbm03.pdf

• GDI IMPULS: Open Innovation (2007) []
• innovare: Interview on Open Innovation (2007) []
• Chicago Tribune: Threadless and Crowdsourcing (2006) []
• Business 2.0: Crowdsourcing and User Idea Contests (2006) []
• Der Spiegel: Open Innovation (2005) []

More press coverage can be found here.