Over the last 30 years, Open Innovation has established itself as a key strategy, with increasingly widespread adoption that is not limited to the integration of new technologies but represents a profound change in business models and organizational processes. Yet, as Open Innovation has spread, so have highly visible initiatives such as accelerators, challenges, and innovation labs; whose real contribution to deployed outcomes is often unclear. In some cases, firms adopt an embedded approach to Open Innovation, while other times they create Open Innovation programs that prioritize visibility to outside entities for different purposes than producing actual innovation. This creates a practical and research problem: the same “Open Innovation” label can describe either embedded initiatives that repeatedly convert external engagement into product launches and operational adoption, or symbolic efforts that primarily generate visibility and legitimacy without durable implementation.