In this age of convergence, a combinative nature of innovation is in need of revisiting. The innovation based on combination is named "combinative innovation" and defined operationally as the innovation that combines different modes of combinations. Five modes are characterized and the framework is applied to the case of CDMA mobile phone development of Samsung Electronics Company in the 1990s. The case study demonstrates the usefulness of the framework and the future direction of further elaboration of the framework.