Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Evaluation innovation'

In this Licentiate Thesis, human-centric evaluation of innovations are investigated with focus on examining and gaining understanding of important issues that needs to be considered in the evaluation process. The intention of my research is to contribute to IT-design processes so that future products and services, that are in various stages of development, become more responsive to users' actual needs and wants. IT has traditionally been used within the boundaries for either work- practices or private use. Nowadays, however, these boundaries have become increasingly blurred. Today's technology should not only support work, but also leisure. This means that the use of IT additionally includes areas such as entertainment, education, news, and marketing. Furthermore, IT- products and services should also be supportive for people in their different, although concurrent, everyday roles, such as parent, colleague, friend, consumer, and partner. These changed use contexts and use patterns have made it even more significant to understand the importance of designing technology to support different use situations. To get knowledge about how technology can support use patterns and use contexts a means is user involvement and through continuous evaluations. The evaluations reported in this thesis are evaluations of innovations. Evaluation of use of technology has often focused on usability aspects. Now, the area has developed to include additional use aspects, such as interaction and use experiences. Hence, the area of user evaluation has altered to include a broader question, how technology fits within a broad range of human needs. In this thesis, the reported evaluations mainly have been carried out in a Living Lab context. Living Labs aim to support innovation processes among businesses and local and central authorities by offering human-centric evaluation of innovations in a real-world use environment. The Living Lab concept is rather new. Thus, the evaluation processes, performed within this context, need to be examined. The investigation in this thesis has been carried out following an action research approach within a Living Lab. In this course, four human-centric evaluations were performed: a piece of furniture displaying video-art, a mobile marketing service, a civic-service office, and a mobile-phone bus timetable. The investigation has illuminated that the context in which the evaluations occur is critical. Hence, it needs to be considered and intentionally studied. My study has also shown that the development context for innovations is complex; there are many stakeholders involved with different knowledge interests and therefore, to reach a common purpose of the evaluation is complicated. In addition, it is difficult for stakeholders to express their evaluation needs clearly. Hence, a focus on needs facilitates planning and designing the evaluation process. In this research, an aspect that have been identified as important to consider in evaluations of innovations is that users are reluctant to change their behaviour; hence, it is not possible to evaluate the actual impact of an innovation on people's lives. Instead, the focus of the evaluation should be on valuing users' attitudes and thoughts related to the innovation. In addition, evaluations of innovations are often formative in character, aiming to form the innovations in some way. In these evaluations, it is important to include users who are innovative and open to new technologies. It is also important to include active non-users in evaluations, since their attitudes could reveal necessary changes that would make them want to use the innovation. Finally, when evaluating how an evaluand fits into a range of user needs, it has been found that user needs can be met at different levels. This means that a product, or a service, can meet the need of a user concerning one aspect, but still, the user might not be aware of the need of the product or service, as such. So, a need of an innovation might exist, but the users do not use it anyway; the users fulfil their needs by a different means. Therefore, if an innovation does what the users need it to do, a change in user behaviour needs to be encouraged to help the users change their actions.
Godkänd; 2006; 20070110 (haneit)

A global mapping of early stage medical technology companies has been implemented. The companies have emerging products within neurology and have undergone an evaluation by clinicians concerning the ability to provide clinical value for Swedish health care. The evaluation process has been executed by discussion with neurologists and neurosurgeons in combination with a literature survey. To limit the evaluation process, areas of stroke, traumatic brain injury, Parkinson’s disease, multiple sclerosis and epilepsy were chosen.

Some companies turn up to develop more requested products than others. Medfield Diagnostics AB, with their microwave screening product could in the future address the need for fast, accurate and accessible diagnosis of stroke and head trauma. The NBS system from Nexstim Ltd. has potential to provide clinical value by the ability of the products TMS technology to navigate in the brain. Elminda Ltd. product built of an evidence based rehabilitation platform could enhance recovery of patients with neurological disorders on an individual basis. BrainsGate Ltd. product to deliver drugs over the blood brain barrier provides totally new treatment options and NeuroSonix Ltd. ultrasound based product could assist the surgeon and decrease damageable embolic debris. Neurolife non-invasive solutions innovative device, which non-invasively measured the intracranial pressure, would be a totally new way to monitor patients.

A symposium was organized and three top ranked companies with stroke care products were invited to present their technology for Swedish clinicians in Stockholm. Participating companies were Nexstim Ltd., Elminda Ltd. and Medfield Diagnostics AB, who were all well received and considered to have interesting technologies with ability to provide clinical value.

Diplomová práce je zaměřena na měření efektivnosti procesních inovací ve společnosti Red Hat Czech s.r.o. Práce je rozdělena do tří částí. První část práce se zabývá teoretickými poznatky. Ve druhé části se jedná o představení společnosti a pochopení interních procesů a systémů firmy. Poslední část obsahuje návrhy na zlepšení tohoto projektu, které vychází z analýzy současné situace společnosti.

Innovation outside the company’s core business is essential for any company in a fast-changing environment. Companies that want to engage in strategic innovation in order to embrace emerging opportunities need ways of managing the innovation process. There is currently limited research on how to select among and evaluate innovation proposals for emerging opportunities in the context of intrapreneurship. This master thesis investigates how an incumbent high-tech company that promote intrapreneurship uses criteria in the selection process of innovation proposals. The study conducts an embedded single-case study of the case company, referred to as Company A, by collecting qualitative data through archival documents and 19 semi-structured interviews. The study uses Christensen’s theory of disruptive innovation to analyse the results. Findings show that an incumbent high-tech company uses a set of criteria that is a mix of the previous findings in the context of new product development and external investors. The criteria utilized in the selection process are within the dimensions market and value, product and technology, operations and financials, corporate alignment, and team. The conducted interviews exposed that personal considerations constitute additional informal criteria for the evaluators, and much emphasis is put on the intrapreneur’s characteristics and presentation. Findings from the interviews suggest that criteria should be utilized less strict in the beginning of the process, which is supported by previous researchers. Criteria also contribute with transparency to the innovation process and can be used as guidelines for the innovator. Christensen’s theory contradicts the use of the criteria market size, corporate alignment and to validate the innovation with a customer because of the nature of emerging markets and technologies.
Innovation utanför företagets kärnverksamhet är viktigt för alla företag på en snabbt föränderlig marknad. Företag som vill satsa på strategisk innovation för att kunna ta tillvara på nya möjligheter behöver metoder för att kunna hantera innovationsprocessen. Detta examensarbete undersöker hur ett etablerat högteknologiskt företag som främjar intraprenörskap använder kriterier i urvalsprocessen att välja mellan olika innovationsförslag. Studien genomför en fallstudie genom att studera ett bolag, benämnt företag A, och samlar in kvalitativa data genom arkivdokument och 19 semistrukturerade intervjuer. Studien använder Christensens teori om disruptiv innovation för att analysera resultaten. Resultaten visar att det studerade högteknologiska företaget använder ett antal kriterier som stöds av tidigare forskares resultat inom området produktutveckling och externa investerare. Kriterierna som identifieras i studien är inom dimensionerna marknad och värdeskapande, produkt och teknik, företagsverksamhet och ekonomi, hur väl innovationen passar företaget och team. Intervjuerna avslöjade att personliga överväganden utgör ytterligare informella kriterier för de som utvärderar, som lägger stor vikt på intraprenörens egenskaper och presentation. Resultaten tyder på att kriterierna bör användas mindre strikt i början av processen, vilket stöds av tidigare forskning. Kriterier bidrar också till insyn i innovationsprocessen och kan användas som riktlinjer för innovatören. Christensens teori stödjer inte användningen av kriterierna marknadsstorlek, hur väl innovationen passar företaget och att verifiera innovationen med en kund på grund av osäkerhet kring framväxande marknader och nya teknologier.

This thesis investigates the evolutionary foundation of the Innovation System concept and the quantitative techniques that could be used for a systemic evaluation of innovation policies. This topic has been covered through 6 chapters:
Chapter I: The innovation system concept, which is the central concept of this thesis, finds its foundations in the evolutionary theory of economics and the Schumpeterian point of view on the co-evolution of innovation, organizations and institutions. Developed by Nelson and Winter in 1982, this theory is based on the idea that the surviving firms on the markets are not necessarily the ones that maximize their profits. Indeed, their ability to survive is reinforced by the development of internal organizational routines allowing for a fast adaptation to their changing environment. Thus, when assessing performances in terms of innovation in general, the single firm should not by the only centre of attention anymore. The entire environment surrounding its innovation activities should by analysed to understand the conditions underlying its failure or success. The definition of the innovation system (IS) concept finds its roots in this theory: the environment in which innovation activities take place is as important as the decision of the single innovation actor. Defined as all the institutions and organizations involved in the creation and diffusion of new knowledge and technology, the IS includes not only stakeholders of the innovation process, but also all the transversal sectors affecting innovation near or far: labour market, finance, and education… In such a context, the main justification for public intervention shifted from the market failures described by the neo-classical theory, to systemic failures, i.e. the dysfunctions of the IS, on which governments may take actions. And this shift in the policy rationale also leads to specific evaluation techniques of public initiatives.
Chapter II: The IS concept is defined as all the institutions and organizations involved in the creation, diffusion and absorption of new knowledge and technology. An important question is raised by such a point of view: what is a system? What are its components? How does it foster innovation? This theoretical step is necessary to understand all the aspect of the innovation environment that are concerned by innovation policy design. How could a policy-maker integrate the systemic framework of the IS when initiating public action with the aim to improve performances in terms of science, technology and innovation? A large part of the economic literature is dedicated to the description of innovation systems. So the aim of this chapter consists of synthetizing the aspects referenced in the economic theory as the components of the IS in a normative exercise. First, the term “system” involves the articulation of several components and the relationships existing between them. Departing from this definition, three broad aspect of the IS are considered: the actors of the innovation process, the functions of the system and the resulting objectives that should be pursued by the stakeholders, and the instruments used by public authorities to intervene in such a systemic context. The actors involved in the innovation process are not only the recipient of a public policy, they are also policy makers, implementation agents and targets of the policy measures. The functions of the IS mainly concerns the creation, diffusion and absorption of new knowledge and technology. As the role of the State is to improve the performances of such a system, those functions should be considered as the objectives of public action. Finally, the instruments used by the State to reach these goals can also be detailed: innovation policies can be implemented through direct support measures (financial or fiscal tools), the improvement of the infrastructure allowing for the diffusion of innovation, or the general framework conditions affecting performances. The normative exercise ended up with an exhaustive taxonomy that may be used for further analysis
Chapter III: As the aim of this thesis is to develop analytical tools to integrate the IS point of view in public policy evaluation, the most important aspect of the work consisted in building an exhaustive database on innovation policies implemented in the EU28 Member States and its main non-EU competitors (Australia, China, Japan, the US, India, the Russian Federation, Brazil, South Korea and Canada). This database was constructed in the context of the ENIRI study conducted by the European Commission, between 2013 and 2015. This long-lasting work involved the collection of information concerning the innovation policy measures implemented in all the considered countries, both at the national and regional levels. This information was related to the IS dimensions highlighted in previous chapter. The main sources for data collection were the RIO (former Erawatch) and OECD STIP databases, the RIM Plus Monitor and national sources (Ministry websites), as well as national experts. The budgets was also included or estimated for the 2007-2013 period. Once the data were collected, the policy measures were classified according to the theoretical canvas developed through the taxonomy of chapter II. Functional matrices combining different aspects of the IS allowed for detailed information on the distribution of policy measures among the different dimensions of the system. For example, it is possible to estimate the percentage of policy measures implemented in one country that are dedicated to the fundamental research activities in SMEs. This distribution has been computed both in absolute and budget terms. This difference provided information on the contrast existing between governmental claims and intentions in terms of innovation policies and the effective use of money dedicated to the announced target. Indeed, it is not because a substantial number of policies are dedicated to a specific sector of beneficiary that the allocated budget will be more important. Thus, this policy database should shed a light on the way innovation policies are articulated at a national level, and how they are effectively implemented through their budgets
Chapter IV: The evolutionary foundations of the IS concept imply that there is no general equilibrium describing an ideal situation to which a specific case can be compared. In other words, there is no optimal innovation system, and no ideal configuration that should be imitated by the others. This absence of equilibrium and the systemic point of view adopted in this context lead to the use of alternative techniques to evaluate performances and policies. As suggested by Edquist (2006), this has to be done through a diagnosis of the IS, consisting in the identification of the systemic failures, and the elaboration of strategy to fix the problem. This demarche will be investigated in this chapter of the thesis and the following. In this section, a diagnosis of the IS of 37 countries (28 EU and their 9 non-EU competitors) will be realized through a typology based on innovation performances indicators. The aim of such an analysis is to see whether the different IS can be gathered in groups sharing the same characteristics, relative strengths and weaknesses. The expected results should reveal groups of countries sharing the same configurations in terms of innovation process, and facing the same type of weaknesses, dysfunctions or systemic failures. By doing so, one should be able to identify the needs of each IS, i.e. the components that may need improvement and eventually public intervention. To do so, a principal component analysis and a hierarchical ascendant clustering technique have been implemented on the 37 IS, revealing 4 clusters of countries, depending on their NIS characteristics and advancement: 1) The Asian economies, 2) The lagging-behind and catching-up NIS, 3) The small opened systems, 4) The technological leaders. This analysis has been realized for the 2003-2005 and 2013-2015 periods, revealing that, if the general features of the clusters do not tend to change over time, some countries faced a change a modification of their status: Korea left the Asian group to join the leaders, Cyprus and Ireland opened their boarders to a larger extent in a decade.
Chapter V: Innovation policy typologyThis chapter is focused on the construction of an innovation policy typology based on the distributions of policies obtained in the database presented in chapter III. The results of this typology will be compared with the diagnosis realized in previous section to see if the weaknesses and needs of the NIS are effectively targeted by public action in innovation. Also, the aspects that could enhance or weaken such action, and their combination with other component of the NIS could be better understood. To this purpose, a multiple factor analysis has been implemented on the distributions of policy measures in terms of NIS components, followed by a hierarchical ascendant clustering, revealing groups of countries sharing the same characteristics in terms of policy design and implementation. 34 NIS have been examined (India, Brazil and Russia have been removed from the sample due to the bad quality of the information), using both the budget-weighted and non-budget-weighted distributions of measures on the 2007-2013 period. However, the results of this typology cannot be interpreted separately from the general innovation framework in which the public action is implemented. Indeed, countries having the same features in terms of beneficiaries and/or objectives in terms of policy do not necessarily share the same kind of IS. These implementation characteristics should rather be interpreted in light of the results obtained in the NIS diagnosis typology, in order to examiner if the public money effectively go where it is needed. In general, the different examined countries seem to effectively tackle their weaknesses, but countries facing the same types of problems do not implement the same type of policy mix, reinforcing the hypothesis that the innovation process is embedded in a large institutional framework that my orient public action in a direction rather than another. Two specific cases hold the attention in those results: South Korea, whose leader status came along with an improvement of the in force regulatory framework and a focus on private research, and Japan, dealing with research in the pharmaceutical research and ageing-population issues.
Chapter VI: The impact of macroeconomic and IS factors on the efficiency of public R&DAnother point of view can be adopted in an attempt to integrate the IS representations in policy evaluation techniques: the analysis of their impact on the efficiency of public R&D in leveraging private investments. In this chapter, a combination of two types of analysis is used to examine the problematic: the study of the efficiency of public R&D expenditure and its determinants on one hand, and the investigation of a possible crowding out effect of public R&D on the private one on another hand. The crowding out effect is translated into efficiency analysis, considering the BERD funded by government as an input, and the BERD funded by business as an output. And if an increase in the output leads to a decrease in the output, public intervention is considered to crowd out private initiative, as the firm may decide to replace its own investment with public money, instead of using it as an extra resource to increase its R&D activities. In this context, the IS as environment of R&D activities can be seen as a determinant of this efficiency, as it can strengthen or weaken this crowding out effect. The question asked in this section is the following: how to quantify and model the interdependencies existing between the different components of a NIS in order to integrate them in a quantitative analysis. This has been done in this study by implementing factorial analysis (Buesa, 2010) on a set of indicators collected in the Global Competitiveness Index database, and considered as descriptors of the different aspects of the innovation system. Those IS factors are: 1) the general STI environment, 2) the accessibility of the financial markets, 3) the internationalization of the system, 4) barriers to entrepreneurship and 5) the flexibility of labour regulation. Afterwards, these variables have been added as efficiency determinants in a stochastic frontier model assessing a possible crowding out effect between public and private initiatives. The main results showed that there is an additional effect of public R&d expenditure on private R&D investments (no crowding out). Moreover, the general STI environment and accessibility of financial markets have a positive impact on this efficiency, contrary to the presence of foreign stakeholders in the system. The two last factors remain insignificant. Those results suggest that, if public intervention should have an effect on the performances of the NIS, this relationship is also reciprocal: a well-functioning NIS may have a positive effect on the results of a policy measure.
Doctorat en Sciences économiques et de gestion
info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

Le négoce de licence est le moyen par lequel le détenteur d'un brevet va concéder l'exploitation d'un procédé dont il a la propriété a un licencié qui va en assurer l'exploitation sur un marché. Comme pour tout accord commercial, le négoce de licence contient des clauses financières qui sont : le cash, versé immédiatement par le licencié au licencieur et un taux de redevance représentant généralement un pourcentage du chiffre d'affaires que réalisera le licencié. Les données d'entrée du modèle sont : -les montants des dépenses de recherches et développement - la qualité de la novation contenue dans le brevet, qualité déterminée par le rapport d'antériorité - l'étude de marché. L'algorithme qui lie ces données par un calcul a pris en compte les pratiques observées par les professionnels du secteur. Nous avons analysé la redevance comme un partage de la marge réalisée sur le projet spécifique, cette redevance étant affectée par la prise en compte des éléments qui sont la force du brevet, déterminée par le rapport d'antériorité et l'âge du brevet. Ce modèle, dont les éléments et le principe sont le cœur d'une base logique de négociation commerciale de licence entre un offreur de technique et son acheteur par rapport à un marché peut aussi servir de début à cette négociation en fournissant une valeur ajoutée aux parties. Plus généralement, nous avons abordé le problème de l'évaluation des actifs incorporels, parmi lesquels figurent les brevets, pour une entreprise
Licensing is the way for a patent owner to allow the working of his patnted process to a licensee who will ensure this working on a specific market. Like any commercial agreement, licensee contract encloses financial terms through two elements which are : - the cash, paid without delay from licensee to licensor - the royalty rate paid from licensee to licensor, based on the licensee turnover the input data of our model are : - the research and developpment amount - the quality of the innovation which is contain in the new product or process; this quality is determined by the patent report - the market study the algorithm which links the input data by a computtion takes care of the practices of the professional of this activity sector. Also, we have analyse the royalties as a share of the margin realise on this specific project by the licensee. This royalties rates in affected by the considerations of two elements which are : the patent force which is determined by the anteriority report and the patent age. The cash, will be determined by the delay time which is necessary to recover the research an developpment expenses. This model, wich elements and principales are the heart of a natural licensee commercial agreement between a technology seller and is potential buyer right also serves at the beginning of this transaction by supplying an objective values for the parties. In conclusion, we have worked on the patents valuation, which are a part of the intangible asset for a society

In the last decades, evaluation has become an essential tool for policymakers, because it provides unbiased estimates of a policy effect. The purpose of an evaluation is to explore the causal relationship between the implementation of a policy and its effects – the “impact”. In the programming period 2007-2013, the European Commission – and the member States of the EU – have focused their attention on the development of innovation policies within Regional Innovation Systems: for this reason, the innovation policies have been particularly involved in evaluation processes. Six Italian regions have created the Poli di innovazione (Innovation poles), networks of universities, services centres, incubators, public and private laboratories, and enterprises, whose goals are to foster the creation of networks and to stimulate firms’ economic performance through the support in R&D activities. Due to the novelty of the policy, this research is a first attempt to evaluate the Poles, using the Tuscan context as case study. Tuscany Region have supported the creation of twelve poles, facilitating the access to a call for tender for the purchase of R&D qualified services. Using matching and difference-in-differences methods, it has been estimated the Average Treatment on the Treated – in terms of Total Factor Productivity and Labor Productivity – for three possible cases: subsidized SME, SME members of the Poles, subsidized SME members of the Poles. In addition, it has been implemented a model that include network centrality measures to assess the effect of the Poles on the performance of the firms. It emerges that the subsidized firms which belong to the poles experience on average a productivity gain towards the end of the period of subsidization, and the centrality of their pole have a positive effect, which is particularly relevant for the top enterprises – in terms of productivity.

In the last decades, evaluation has become an essential tool for policymakers, because it provides unbiased estimates of a policy effect. The purpose of an evaluation is to explore the causal relationship between the implementation of a policy and its effects – the “impact”. In the programming period 2007-2013, the European Commission – and the member States of the EU – have focused their attention on the development of innovation policies within Regional Innovation Systems: for this reason, the innovation policies have been particularly involved in evaluation processes. Six Italian regions have created the Poli di innovazione (Innovation poles), networks of universities, services centres, incubators, public and private laboratories, and enterprises, whose goals are to foster the creation of networks and to stimulate firms’ economic performance through the support in R&D activities. Due to the novelty of the policy, this research is a first attempt to evaluate the Poles, using the Tuscan context as case study. Tuscany Region have supported the creation of twelve poles, facilitating the access to a call for tender for the purchase of R&D qualified services. Using matching and difference-in-differences methods, it has been estimated the Average Treatment on the Treated – in terms of Total Factor Productivity and Labor Productivity – for three possible cases: subsidized SME, SME members of the Poles, subsidized SME members of the Poles. In addition, it has been implemented a model that include network centrality measures to assess the effect of the Poles on the performance of the firms. It emerges that the subsidized firms which belong to the poles experience on average a productivity gain towards the end of the period of subsidization, and the centrality of their pole have a positive effect, which is particularly relevant for the top enterprises – in terms of productivity.

This thesis takes a novel approach to evaluate the impact of the public policies of innovation and entrepreneurship on individual firms. This evaluation research uses 10-year time series data on Queensland businesses, Advance Queensland (AQ) program data and public datasets to investigate what types of companies get selected for the AQ program and the overall impact of these policies on innovation-driven entrepreneurship. The study found corrective general market behaviour and had a significant effect on the firms. The thesis contributes to the theory of entrepreneurial “Quality Signalling” and the government’s approach to the “Picking Winners” and “Picking the Willing” phenomenon.

In knowledge society theory, wealth is created by production of knowledge and information which are basic sources of innovation. Innovation has vital importance for providing firms survival and competitive power together with enabling countries sustained economic progress and competitiveness. Because of its importance, measuring innovation becomes necessary for evaluating countries&rsquo
performance and policymaking. First attempts to develop measurement framework for innovation was achieved by OECD via the Oslo Manual. Then, Latin American and Caribbean countries developed the Bogota Manual. As demonstrated by the Bogota example, industrial structures of developing countries including Turkey differ from the developed ones, which leads to failure of the methods used in developed countries for measuring innovation. In this thesis, the general innovation measurement concept and innovation systems in developing countries are discussed first in order for reflecting national capabilities of Turkey. Then, widely used innovation indicators of investment in R&
D, human sources, patents and utility models, scientific publications and high technology exports are evaluated in terms of measurement scale, advantages and disadvantages and inadaptability together with offering basic alternative or complementary solutions when possible and with bringing out points to pay attention if they are bound to be used

This paper investigates the relationship between student-led consulting teams and community organizations as one part of Eller Social Innovation (ESI). The research conducted to analyze the relationship between these entities is most similar to program evaluation. Program evaluation has become commonplace in the nonprofit sector and it is important method for these organizations to establish the value of all of their activities (Carman, 2007). Through data collected from interviews and surveys of community organizations, this article seeks to understand the efficacy of student-led consulting projects and determine the effect that they have on these organizations. The answer to this question will inform stakeholders in ESI about the potential value that further collaboration with community organizations could create for both parties.

Few significant changes in Programmable Logic Controller (PLC) software design techniques have taken place since PLC's were first introduced in the 1960's. Programs written in the traditional language used in PLC's, ladder logic, are generally thought to be difficult to maintain and modify, and thus ill suited to the support of modem flexible manufacturing processes. This work demonstrates that the choice of PLC software structure used in a project has an impact on process flexibility with an appropriate choice providing significant cost savings in development time. An overview of work on formalised programming tools conducted in academia is provided together with a report on the PLC software structures used in industry. The factors influencing the choice of PLC and software structure are identified. Familiarity was found to be a major factor influencing selection. A method for comparing code structures, which allows the results to be expressed as a time saving (and consequently a cost) has been created. Implementation of this approach was used to show that the formalised programming tool under test provides a 33% increase in "right first time" rate together with an 80% time saving over traditional contact based ladder logic. Among experienced practitioners, performance with step-based ladder logic was found to be a close match to the formalised tool, demonstrating that the commonly perceived limitations are the result of the structure in which the language is used rather than a function of the programming tool itself. Further investigation of participant preferences among skilled PLC users showed a mismatch between their performance with a tool and their preference, with at least 25% selecting a tool based on their prior knowledge rather than performance. This highlights the need for the use of objective measures when conducting evaluations between products and technologies. With the information provided in this work, automation end users are provided with a mechanism for ensuring the selection of automation tools best suited to their business needs, whilst at the same time providing automation vendors with the ability to best demonstrate the strengths of the products.

Leading innovation is a difficult process because it is replete with tensions and paradoxes. Innovations require leaders to switch leadership styles depending on the context and the phase of innovation. This study used two leadership theoretical frameworks, transformational and transactional leaderships, to understand the leadership behaviors used to promote and manage the process of innovation. The purpose of this study was to explore leadership behaviors exhibited by evaluation team leaders during the process of innovation. The focus of the study was on leadership behaviors and study participants are individuals who identify as evaluators who led a team of two or more evaluators. This study used Critical Incident Technique (CIT) to better understand the leadership behaviors exhibited during the process of innovation. Through semi-structured interviews, participants described a specific innovation that he/she led during the past 24 months, the actions they took to lead and support their team, outcomes and their perspectives about the process. Contradictory behaviors were exhibited at all three key stages of innovation—insight, prototype, and adoption. Leaders described both transformational and transactional leadership behaviors at all the major innovation phases. Leaders were both people and task oriented in their leadership style.

Cette thèse invite à mieux comprendre les enjeux autour du développement des projets innovants de transports intégrés dans les territoires, souvent caractérisés d’écomobilité. Par la réalisation de nouveaux comportements pour les usagers, mais aussi par de nouvelles relations entre acteurs, à la fois usagers, entreprises et collectivités, ces projets invitent à repenser dans une perspective plus large les logiques de performances et d’évaluation. Les outils traditionnels utilisés dans le champ économique ne semblent pas suffisamment saisir la complexité inhérente à ces programmes, il est donc opportun de développer de nouvelles pistes davantage orientées dans une approche ouverte et pluridisciplinaire. Pour cela, nous appuierons notre réflexion par le croisement entre deux programmes situés dans les Yvelines. En effet, ce territoire semble le terreau de nombreuses initiatives au cours des dernières années. Les résultats obtenus à l’issue d’un travail de terrain ayant permis de rencontrer un large panel d’acteurs, permettront d’améliorer le champ des connaissances de ces programmes émergeants et de tirer des enseignements dans le cadre de futurs projets
This thesis calls for a better understanding of the challenges surrounding thedevelopment of innovative integrated transport projects in the territories, oftencharacterized by eco-mobility. By implementing new behaviors for users, but also bycreating new relationships between actors, both users, companies, and local authorities, these projects call for a rethinking of the logics of performance and evaluation in a broader perspective. The traditional tools used in the economic field do not seem to grasp sufficiently the complexity inherent in these programs, so it is appropriate to develop new perspectives more oriented in a multidisciplinary approach.For this, we will support our reflection by crossing two programs located in the Yvelines area. Indeed, this territory seems to be the breeding ground for many initiatives in recent years. The results obtained from a fieldwork meeting with a wide range of stakeholders will help to improve the knowledge base of these emerging programs and to draw lessons for future projects

Treatment and monitoring of tuberculosis have been met with various interventions to reduce its prevalence. One such intervention, to detect and prevent latent tuberculosis infection (LTBI), is the tuberculin skin test (TST), for which an induration response on a patient’s arm is an indication of LTBI. The test requires the patient to return to a clinic 48 to 72 hours after TST administration for assessment of the response. This is a challenge because of financial and accessibility obstacles, especially in under-resourced regions. A mobile health (mHealth) application (app) has been developed for remote assessment of the response to the TST. The previous version of the LTBI screening app, however, had usability limitations. The app is intended for use by patients and healthcare workers; thus, ease of use is important. There is a lack of literature on the usability of mHealth apps, especially in under-resourced settings. In this project, the user interface of the app was redesigned and tested. The Information Systems Research (ISR) framework was integrated with design thinking for this purpose. The project included creating mock-ups of the interface which were iteratively prototyped with ten student participants, adjusted, and assessed according to the user feedback. Thereafter, the Android Studio software was used to adjust the user interface based on the insights gained through the progression of prototypes. The usability of the updated app was tested and assessed with ten healthcare workers at a community health clinic in Khayelitsha in Cape Town, South Africa. Data collection and analysis comprised both qualitative and quantitative methods. Observations, the “think aloud” approach, and the post-study system usability questionnaire were used for data collection. Student participants highlighted various usability limitations of the app during each iteration. The major usability limitations included: the complex image capture protocol, misunderstanding of instructions, and time taken to capture images. Engagement with students allowed for improvement of the app interface and enabled adequate preparation for testing in the field with end-users. Furthermore, improving the app interface before engaging with healthcare workers, enabled context specific limitations that would affect the usability of the app, to be explored during the field testing. These included safety concerns when using the app and the privacy of health information. Future work should explore how these concerns, as well as other social factors, affect usability. Furthermore, improving the image capture protocol is required for improving the usability of the app.

The concept of behavioural additionality, which was originally associated with the question of 'what difference does policy make in the behaviour of the firms it supports?', has increasingly been used by scholars, evaluators and policy-makers not only in the field of evaluation of innovation policies but also within the context of fundamental discussions of policy rationales. A survey of the evaluation literature concludes that the concept lacks a clear definition and theoretical background as it does not have a unit of analysis. An empirical analysis of the current practice of innovation policy evaluation endorses this finding and outlines the uniqueness of behavioural additionality in terms of its evaluation. A survey of policy discussions around the concept reveals that behavioural additionality has been argued as the hallmark of an evolutionary view in respect of innovation policy. However, the thesis suggests that the concept also lacks an appropriate framework of analysis to accomplish this.The thesis argues that behavioural additionality should be redefined by using the concept of organisational routines as the unit of analysis and the evolutionary approach as the framework of analysis. To this end, a theoretical and generic approach that conceives behavioural additionality as the government-influenced evolution of organisational routines at the micro, meso and macro levels is devised. The thesis unfolds how behavioural additionality is created by reinforcing ostensive, performative and artefact aspects of routines within firms. The possibility, rationale and evaluation of behavioural additionality are also discussed. Empirically, the thesis applies a plausibility probe that employs two case studies of Turkish TIDEB and British Collaborative R&D programmes to illustrate the micro level of the approach developed.It is concluded that the proposed approach provides a better theoretical understanding for behavioural additionality, which would increase its impact on policy-making. This new approach also represents a concrete attempt to utilise the framework and unit of analysis of the evolutionary approach in the field of evaluation for the first time.

L’innovation représente un processus vital pour les entreprises en vue d’assurer leur développement. Diverses actions et stratégies nouvelles sont mises en œuvre par les entreprises pour faire face aux exigences de marchés et accroître leurs performances. Une bonne connaissance du processus d’innovation et de l’organisation de l’entreprise est nécessaire pour permettre aux managers de les gérer efficacement et les adapter aux défis et changements dans leur environnement. D’où la nécessité pour les entreprises de disposer d’outils et de méthodes pour mesurer en continu leurs activités d’innovation. L’objectif de notre recherche est de proposer un cadre de mesure des capacités à innover des entreprises basé sur un ensemble de quinze pratiques d’innovation, chacune des pratiques étant subdivisée en plusieurs critères qui sont des phénomènes directement observables en entreprise. L’approche méthodologique s’appuie sur les méthodes d’agrégation multicritères et utilise la notion statistique de la valeur-test pour proposer une typologie des entreprises en quatre classes d’entreprises innovantes (proactive, préactive, réactive et passive). Une étude expérimentale a été menée sur un panel de vingt entreprises industrielles françaises. Un outil logiciel mettant en œuvre notre proposition méthodologique a été développé. Il permet d’analyser et d’évaluer les processus innovants d’un ensemble d’entreprises, de les affecter à une classe d’entreprises et de leur donner des recommandations sur les actions pertinentes à mettre en place pour accroître leur capacité à innover. Ce qui en fait un support efficace pour l’aide à la décision en matière de management de l’innovation
Innovation represents a vital process for companies to insure their development. Several actions and new strategies are implemented by companies to increase their performances and so face market requirements. A good knowledge of both the innovation process and the company organization is necessary to allow the top management to manage them effectively and to adapt them to the challenges and the changes in their environment. Consequently, it is important for the companies to have tools and methods to measure continuously their innovation activities. The objective of our research is to suggest a framework to measure innovation capacities of companies based on a set of fifteen innovation practices, each practice is subdivided into several criteria which are directly observable phenomena in company. The methodological approach is based on the multicriteria aggregation method and the use of statistical notion of value-test to propose a typology of innovative companies of four classes (proactive, preactive, reactive and passive). An experimental study was led on a sample group of twenty French industrial companies. A software implementing our methodological proposition was developed. It allows to analyze and to estimate the innovative processes of a set of companies, to allocate them to a class and to give them recommendations for the relevant actions to follow to increase their innovation potential. This research proposes an effective decision-aid tool that helps in the innovation management

Technology innovation is needed to support sustainable waste management systems and innovation should be viewed as a central focus of policy design. The difficulty is that policy is designed at a single point in time where as the environment and the processes of innovation are dynamic. The research investigates the extent to which the design of European Union waste policy and its implementation in the UK stimulates the opportunity for technology innovation. The research investigates how understanding of the relationships between EU waste policy, the process of innovation and technology assessment technique affect the opportunity for technology innovation. The research reviews the development of integrated waste management system models highlighting their limitation in evaluating waste technology options within the wider policy context in an uncertain environment over time. The review identifies their failure to consider the interaction between the financial, environmental, social and operational objectives of new technology. The research describes how failure to simulate system characteristics such as waste process operational demands/constraints, varying spatial resolutions, flexible system boundaries and the uncertain environment over time can affect the opportunity for technology innovation. The research describes the development of a modelling tool addressing these limitations in SIMILE Process Simulation Modelling Software. The model uses the Bedfordshire sub-region of the UK as a case study mapping the flow of waste from generation to disposal. The model calculates a single cost function based on economic, environmental and social costs through, wherever feasible, attributing monetary values to all impacts of any technology. Scenarios are modelled to investigate the extent to which ED waste policy and its implementation affects the opportunity for technology innovation. The model is used to investigate the extent to which relationships between the financial, environmental, social and operational objectives of technology create barriers to new technology. The research identifies how the design, development and application of waste strategy assessment models can influence the opportunity for technology innovation. The research identifies how policy imposes additional cost burdens on the opportunity for technology innovation in the Bedfordshire region. The research concludes by suggesting how policy might be designed to stimulate and support technology innovation.

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Aeronautics and Astronautics; and, (S.M. in Technology and Policy)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Engineering Systems Division, 2013.
This thesis was scanned as part of an electronic thesis pilot project.
Title as it appears in MIT Commencement Exercises program, June 2013: Analysis of short Innovation contests as a strategy for technology procurement in government. Cataloged from PDF version of thesis
Includes bibliographical references (p. 83-88).
Technologies over the past three decades have democratized the tools of knowledge creation, thus creating increasing communities of innovators outside traditional organizations' boundaries. Cost effective ways of leveraging these innovative crowds can be imperative to creating and maintaining value. One specific way for organizations to tap into this diverse audience is through the use of short innovation contests. The purpose of this thesis is to better understand the application of this strategy as a tool for technology procurement in the context of government. Through a contest, participants approach a well-defined challenge independently, conducting different experiments to find a solution. The combination of these various "trials" leads to an increased probability for a government agency to find one particularly good, extreme-value solution. Contests can also allow government agencies to engage individuals who are normally unable or unwilling to compete in traditional government contracts, thus alleviating certain imperfections in the competitive market of government contracting. This open design strategy for procurement is fundamentally different than traditional procurement methods. For this reason, there is inherent uncertainty in the organizational implications contest implementation will have in government agencies which has made program managers hesitant to employ this strategy in their programs. This thesis sheds light on the cost structure, program management implications, and policy considerations for short innovation contests. An empirical analysis is presented for four short innovation contests used for technology procurement in different government agencies. For each case study, the cost of the contest was compared to traditional procurement and key program management considerations were identified. Additionally, recent policy initiatives passed for prize-based contests were analyzed for their applicability to short innovation contests. It was found that three of the four contests procured technology solutions for estimated costs of less than half that of traditional procurement methods. It was also found that recent contest policy initiatives were unsuitable for short innovation contests. This thesis provides recommendations for policies appropriate for short innovation contests and considerations that must be made to expand the use of this strategy as a tool for technology procurement in government agencies.
by Emily Dawn Calandrelli.
S.M.in Technology and Policy
S.M.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Nuclear Science and Engineering, 2012.
Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.
Includes bibliographical references (p. 311-326).
The U.S. government and others around the world have been exploring strategies to respond to climate change for nearly two decades. Consideration of these efforts as well as the 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, the 2011 nuclear accident at Fukushima Daichi, and improved shale gas recovery methods are spurring debate on energy policy options. An important focus of this debate is the role of innovation in reducing carbon emissions while also maintaining the affordability of energy supplies. The scale of the required transition to a low-carbon energy system is large. A simple calculation scheme based on the Kaya identity is used to evaluate this transition and to estimate the magnitude of the changes that would be required. The recent performance of the U.S. economy with respect to decarbonization and energy intensity is shown to fall far short of future needs in low-carbon scenarios. The MARKAL model is used to estimate the magnitude of the capital investment required to transform the U.S. electric power sector. A comprehensive treatment of the innovation process must consider not only research and development but also the 'downstream' stages of demonstration, early adoption, and evolutionary post-commercialization improvements. Under greenhouse gas reduction scenarios, investments will be needed in low-carbon technologies when there is still considerable uncertainty and risk associated with their performance, and when they may not be competitive with incumbent energy systems. No less than investments in research and development, these are investments in innovation. A two-stage model of the innovation process is used to estimate the investment needed to bring a new technology to a competitive cost level. The model is used to explore the contributions of early-stage and later-stage investments in innovation, and illustrates the importance of the technological learning process. A case study of innovation in the nuclear energy industry is used to evaluate the effectiveness of alternative policies for driving investment in energy technologies more generally. The case study reveals a pattern of erratic policy that discouraged private investment. The use of technology-push rather than market-pull policy tools is found to have encouraged technology lock-in and discouraged market-driven innovation.
by Ashley E. Finan.
Ph.D.

The research presented in this thesis is focused on innovation in the health goods logistics process managed by hospital companies, with particular reference to the systems for the evaluation of its performance. It can be seen as an initial observation of the current knowledge in the context of healthcare goods logistics innovation within hospital companies (chapter 1); an initial deduction, from the literature, and explanation of a model for the healthcare goods logistics innovation performance measurement (chapter 2); an initial testing of the validity of this model and comparison with other systems of evaluation that emerge from the analysis of a case study (chapter 3). The thesis has the objective to offer a managerial support for the innovation performance evaluation of the healthcare goods logistics process managed by hospital companies. In particular, the purpose of the first article is to present a theoretical framework of the healthcare goods logistics process and its innovation within hospitals, that is, the process which includes all the activities from receiving healthcare goods until their delivery to patients. In contrast to other contexts, in healthcare the strategic importance of this process has only recently been recognised: it is essential for service differentiation and quality improvements, playing a central role in supporting the efficient operational functioning of hospitals. Although this is an important issue both theoretically and in practice, there has so far and to the best of our knowledge been no attempt to systematically review the literature examining hospital logistics process and its innovation. Therefore, in order to address this deficit, a Systematic Review of selected peer-reviewed articles is presented, providing a more complete understanding of the theme and focusing on concepts and definitions, process organisation, models, types of innovations and their conditions. The second paper aims to define a measurement system for the evaluation of innovations in the logistics process within hospitals. Driven by the need to contain costs and improve the quality of services provided to patients, hospitals are dealing with the complexities of business process reengineering of their critical processes, among which are the logistics of health goods. However, against the growing diffusion of these initiatives, there are still very limited attempts to propose and apply models to assess the performance of these innovations. The work differs from previous examinations of logistics performance measurement in that it uses a broader scope, following a Systematic Review of the literature, and its suggestion that a logistics innovation evaluation system must consider different performance dimensions, including costs, benefits, quality and safety. From a practical point of view, the work provides an important tool for the management of hospitals involved in logistics innovation evaluation, which are currently supported with inadequate systems of analysis. The objective of the third study is to identify any problems and inefficiencies in the logistics innovation evaluation system adopted by a hospital company and to define possible paths for improvement. The study is undertaken through combining a review of the literature and an empirical exploratory investigation, the latter conducted through qualitative methodology based on a case study. The focus of the case study is the Azienda Ospedaliero Universitaria Cagliari, a hospital affected by the experimentation of new organisational and technological solutions for the management of the healthcare goods logistics process. The results of the analysis document how the performance of the new method of management of healthcare goods logistics can be defined in terms of benefits to the economic, organisational, quality and process safety aspects. From the research conducted, and on the basis of a comparison with more complex approaches and measurement systems, it is clear that a logistics performance evaluation system which is based on only a limited set of indicators has evident criticalities. This study provides suggestions and guidelines for the design of a more articulated and complex tool to monitor the performance of the healthcare goods logistics process in order to improve the approach and the evaluation system currently adopted by the hospital management. It also contributes to the literature on hospital management through adopting a current research perspective.

The intention with this thesis is to examine the preparation for commercialisation of industrial innovations. Both in the industry and in the academic perspective there is a common need for support of the commercialisation process of innovations, especially concerning the preparation phase. A preparation model for commercialisation has consequently been designed. The propeller of commercialisation incorporates a perspective of parallel preparation concerning the three critical aspects technology characteristics, environment scanning and preparation of the venture. Generally the model can thus contribute with a structured way of evaluation and preparation and reduce the risks by limiting the budget needed in the early phase of commercialisation through the use of subsequent steps incorporating all three critical perspectives. To demonstrate the model and to provide a basis for evaluation, the Propeller of Commercialisation was applied on the specific commercialisation preparation of the SMB technology at Johnson Pacific Pte Ltd in Singapore.

Global healthcare systems are united by their desire to widen patient access to safe and effective clinical services in the face of increasing demand and financial constraints. In low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), a variety of ingenious product and process solutions, termed frugal innovations, have been able to deliver services at a fraction of the cost. It is the broad proposition of this work that such ideas could be applicable to high-income countries (HICs), a concept labeled reverse innovation. Using a conceptual model of innovation scouting derived from the causal mechanism of critical realism, this work examined the development and testing of a tool to deductively identify frugal innovations in healthcare (FIH-ID tool) and then evaluated methodology to assess the reversibility of potential of frugal innovations. The FIH-ID tool demonstrated consistently acceptable inter-rater reliability scores using different methods of application and different raters, moreover, construct validity was shown by its ability to identify well-known frugal innovations. With respect to the assessment of the reversibility potential, the results of the present study highlighted the challenges of undertaking such a complex evaluation process using a simple scoring system. Raters achieved poor levels of inter-rater reliability and only 2 innovations were thought likely to reverse to a HIC. This study presents the first application of a critical realist approach to innovation scouting. It has identified a cohort of 76 potential frugal innovations in healthcare suggesting that the FIH-ID tool is likely to be a valuable asset for similar studies in the future. It has highlighted the challenges of assessing the reversibility potential of innovations from LMICs. It has documented the emergence of the global innovation curator, entities that seek to identify, curate and promote innovations from LMICs, and it proposes a conceptual model for the role of global innovation curators in the diffusion of innovation.

The purpose of this study is to identify the role a business model plays for Venture Capitalists (VCs) when analysing a new venture proposal for funding. The primary data for this research was collected through six qualitative interviews conducted during a two month period. Furthermore, the gathered data was evaluated in accordance with the information found in current literature which describes de term "business model" as well as specific criteria for it. The findings from this research demonstrate that the perception of the role of a business model is strongly similar among the VCs whom were interviewed. They all argued that a business model plays a secondary role in the evaluation process and see it as part of the business plan. At the same time, this research could could pinpoint the fact that no specific instrument including explicit evaluation criteria is currently being implemented by the VCs in question in order to evaluate a business model. Notwithstanding this study cannot be generalized since the pool of applicants included only six Investment Manages working in Venture Capital Funds in Sweden and Mexico. At the same, even though the geographical differences exist, the evaluation process resulted quite similar amongst them. Evidence from this study has demostrated that the current ambiguity of the meaning of the term "business model" is the most frequent perceived challenge to the evaluation of these. Therefore, our interest to shed more light into the topic was encouraged.

The diploma thesis deals with the impact of innovative assets on the foreign trade of a selected food business. On the basis of theoretical part, an analysis is made of the selected company, which consists of a financial analysis, PESTE analysis, Porter's analysis, competition analyses and analyses of specific innovations. At the end of a thesis, the results achieved are evaluated. At the same time, solutions are proposed to improve the current state of innovation in the company under observation.

Negli ultimi due decenni, l'uso strategico degli appalti pubblici è diventato un tema sempre più centrale della politica europea dell'innovazione poiché può migliorare i servizi pubblici guidando il cambiamento tecnologico verso obiettivi socialmente condivisi. L'applicazione degli appalti pubblici in acquisti innovativi si basa su una triplice logica: (1) il miglioramento dei servizi pubblici; (2) l'incentivo delle aziende a essere più innovative; e (3) il perseguimento di obiettivi o missioni sociali più ampie. Il dibattito accademico ha affrontato, in diverse prospettive, il ruolo degli appalti pubblici come motore dell'innovazione. Dagli anni 90 ', diversi autori si sono interessati al ruolo degli appalti come strumento di politica dell'innovazione, hanno discusso degli appalti pubblici come uno degli elementi critici di una politica di innovazione orientata alla domanda e hanno sottolineato il ruolo dei policymakers nella promozione pratiche favorevoli all'innovazione in tutti i tipi di appalti. Nonostante la crescente consapevolezza che la domanda pubblica può stimolare l'innovazione, gli investimenti dedicati all'adozione di soluzioni innovative in Europa sono appena sopra la metà del livello atteso. uesta tesi affronta il tema degli appalti per l'innovazione concentrandosi sull'attuazione degli appalti Pre-commerciali (o Pre-Commercial Procurement-PCP), un approccio relativamente nuovo per l'approvvigionamento di servizi di ricerca e sviluppo, definito dalla Commissione Europea COM (2007) 799. La tesi considera i tre attori chiave coinvolti l'implementazione della politica di approvvigionamento di innovazione: il decisore politico, l'acquirente pubblico e il fornitore. Analizzando in parallelo (e in qualche modo anche congiuntamente) queste tre diverse prospettive sulle esperienze di appalto PCP, la dissertazione mira a valutare la politica degli appalti per l'innovazione nel quadro politico italiano. A questo proposito, la tesi si basa su tre studi originali: Studio 1- L'esperienza in italiano e nelle regioni italiane; Studio 2- Il punto di vista del procuratore; Studio 3-La prospettiva dei fornitori.L'approccio metodologico per l'intero lavoro si basa sul "Monitoraggio, valutazione e valutazione dell'impatto delle attività legate all'innovazione" (MLE- on Innovation Related Procurement), che incoraggia l'approccio multi-metodo di triangolazione nella valutazione delle politiche di appalti pubblici per l'innovazione. Lo studio 1. adotta principalmente: "analisi della legislazione", "ricerca documentale”. Lo studio 2. applica un approccio di mixed-method basato principalmente su "Survey" e "interviste One-to-one" con attori chiave dal lato del committente (coinvolgendo 12 delle 18 pubbliche amministrazioni che hanno gestito PCP in Italia). Lo studio 3. fa leva sulla metodologia del "caso studio" supportata dalla "osservazione partecipativa"; tale studio ha coinvolto Tech4Care Srl, una start up italiana particolarmente attiva nel campo degli appalti PCP. L'analisi dei tre studi ha portato a diverse considerazioni, che possono essere brevemente riassunte come segue. La politica sugli appalti per l'innovazione, sebbene fortemente promossa, è relativamente immatura per quanto riguarda l'attuazione e la valutazione sia a livello nazionale che regionale. L'appalto PCP potrebbe effettivamente rappresentare un'ottima opportunità di crescita dal lato per l’impresa. Il fornitore può sperimentare un notevole miglioramento riguardo lo sviluppo del business grazie all'esperienza dei PCP. Tuttavia, alcuni requisiti preliminari del fornitore potrebbero essere necessari per sfruttare appieno le opportunità del PCP. Anche l’Ente appaltante subisce generalmente impatti positivi diretti e indiretti. Tuttavia, quando un Appalto di Innovazione non segue l'esperienza del PCP, la conoscenza derivante dall'attività di ricerca e sviluppo rimane non sfruttata dal punto di vista dell’attore pubblico. ​
Over the two past decades, the strategical use of public procurement has increasingly become a central theme of European innovation policy. Public Demand for Innovation can improve public services steering technological change towards socially shared objectives. The application of public procurement of goods and services to innovation has thus a triple rationale: (1) the improvement of public services; (2) the incentive of supplier firms to be more innovative; and (3) the pursuit of broader societal goals or missions. Academic debate has, in different perspectives, dealt with the role of public procurement as an innovation driver. From 90', authors interested on the role of procurement as an innovation policy tool or as a tool of industrial policy, have discussed public procurement as one of the critical elements of a demand-oriented innovation policy and have emphasised the role of policymakers in promoting innovation-friendly practices across all types of procurement. Despite the growing awareness of public demand to spur innovation, the investments devoted to adopting innovative solutions in Europe are just above half of the ambition level. This dissertation addresses the theme of innovation procurement by focusing on the implementation of Pre-commercial procurement, which is a relatively new approach to procuring R&D services, defined by the European Commission's COM (2007) 799. The dissertation considers the three key actors involved in the innovation procurement policy implementation: the policymaker, the procurer, and the supplier. By analysing in parallel (and somehow also jointly) these three different perspectives on the Pre-Commercial Procurement experiences, the dissertation aims to evaluate innovation procurement policy in the Italian policy framework. In this respect, the thesis is built upon three original studies: Study 1- The experience in Italian and in the Italian Regions; Study 2- The Procurer’s perspective; Study 3-The Suppliers perspective. The methodology approach for the whole dissertation draws on the "Monitoring, evaluation and impact assessment of innovation-related" (MLE- on Innovation Related Procurement), which encourages the triangulation multi-methods approach in Innovation public procurement policies evaluation. Study 1. primarily adopts: "Legislation analysis", "documentary desk research". Study 2. applies a mixed-method approach mainly based on "Survey" and "One-to-one interviews" with key actors from the procurer's side (involving 12 out of 18 public administration who has run PCP in Italy). Study 3. leverages the "case study" methodology supported by the "participatory observation"; this study involved Tech4Care Srl, an Italian start-up particularly active in the Pre-Commercial procurement field. The analysis of the three studies led to several considerations, which can be briefly picked up as follow. The Innovation procurement policy, although severely promoted, is relatively immature concerning the implementation and evaluation both at the national and regional level. The pre-commercial procurement could effectively represent an excellent opportunity for growing concerning the supply-side. The supplier can experience a strengthened improvement concerning business development due to the PCPs experience. However, some preliminary requirements of the supply-side may be necessary to exploit the PCP opportunities fully. Concerning the procurer-side, the Procuring Entity (PE) generally experiences either direct and indirect positive impacts. However, when a wider PPI does not follow the PCP experience, the knowledge arisen from R&D activity remains unexploited from the Procurer side. ​

Titre: Categorisation et évaluation de l'innovation :approche par la théorie des prospects appliquée au cas du vin allégé en alcool.Chaque année de très nombreuses innovations sont proposées sur le marché, mais seul un nombre réduit d'entre elles rencontre le succès espéré. Face à ce constat, l'une des explications avancées par la recherche marketing est la difficulté du consommateur à catégoriser un nouveau produit.Ce travail s'insère dans le courant de recherches sur la catégorisation de l'innovation et suggère de tenir compte de l'incertitude qui caractérise ce processus. L'originalité de cette étude est de proposer un lien entre les recherches sur la catégorisation de l'innovation et celles sur la prise de décision en condition d'incertitude. La Théorie des Prospects (Kahneman et Tversky, 1979) en particulier, et l'un de ses principes, celui d'aversion aux pertes, ont fourni un cadre théorique adapté pour tenir compte du caractère d'incertitude de l'innovation. Notre question de recherche a proposé de vérifier si le principe d'aversion aux pertes pouvait s'appliquer pour expliquer comment la modification de certains attributs d'une catégorie provoque la perception d'une rupture et la création d'une nouvelle catégorie de produits par le consommateur.La partie empirique de ce travail a été appliquée dans le domaine le vin, un produit qui traverse une grave crise de consommation. Nous avons retenu une approche expérimentale à travers six études conduites sur des innovations du secteur vinicole. Les résultats ont permis de mettre en évidence le rôle majeur joué par la nature de l'attribut dans la catégorisation ainsi que son influence sur la perception des ruptures d'une catégorie.Du point de vue managérial, les conclusions de ce travail ont pour objet l'efficacité des stratégies d'innovation qui agissent sur les attributs d'un produit et sur leur capacité à différencier une innovation parmi la concurrence. Cette recherche fournit également des suggestions quant au positionnement et à la communication à mettre en place pour faciliter la compréhension d'un nouveau produit et donc son choix par le consommateur
Title: Categorization and evaluation of innovation: a prospect théory approach applied to the case of low alcohol content wine Every year numerous innovations are available on the market but only a small number meet the hoped-for success. Given this fact, one of the explanations offered by marketing research is the difficulty the consumer has to categorize a new product. This work is part of current research on the categorization of innovation and suggests to consider the uncertainty that characterizes this process. Its originality is to propose a link between research on the categorization of innovation and those of decision making under uncertain conditions. Prospect Theory (Kahneman et Tversky, 1979), in particular, and one of its principles, that of loss aversion, this research has provided a theoretical framework adapted to take into account the uncertainty of innovation. Our research question proposes to determine whether the principle of loss aversion can be applied to explain how the modification of certain attributes of a class causes the perception of a break and create a new category of products by the consumer. The empirical part of this work was conducted on wine, a product that is going through a major crisis of consumption. We chose an experimental approach across six studies conducted on innovations in the wine sector. The results were used to highlight the major role played by the nature of the attribute in the categorization and its influence on the perception of breaks in a category. From the managerial point of view, the conclusions of this work relate to the effectiveness of innovation strategies that affect the attributes of a product in their ability to differentiate an innovation from competition. This work also provides suggestions for the positioning and communication set up to facilitate the understanding of a new product and therefore its choice by the consumer

Submitted by Synthia Santana (synthiak@gmail.com) on 2016-08-25T02:11:00Z No. of bitstreams: 1 tese_synthiasantana_fgv_2016.pdf: 773575 bytes, checksum: da0b6a9c0a54bdbdaf151d619733b1b9 (MD5)
Rejected by Letícia Monteiro de Souza (leticia.dsouza@fgv.br), reason: Prezada Synthia, Favor alterar a ficha catalográfica para o tamanho padrão, pois em seu trabalho ele se encontra diminuído. Atenciosamente, Letícia Monteiro 3799-3631 on 2016-08-25T12:43:35Z (GMT)
Submitted by Synthia Santana (synthiak@gmail.com) on 2016-08-25T13:53:29Z No. of bitstreams: 1 tese_synthiasantana_fgv_2016.pdf: 772567 bytes, checksum: f883200bc436b2dc33ab5879fb3dfaf0 (MD5)
Approved for entry into archive by Letícia Monteiro de Souza (leticia.dsouza@fgv.br) on 2016-08-25T14:01:09Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 tese_synthiasantana_fgv_2016.pdf: 772567 bytes, checksum: f883200bc436b2dc33ab5879fb3dfaf0 (MD5)
Made available in DSpace on 2016-08-25T14:20:42Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 tese_synthiasantana_fgv_2016.pdf: 772567 bytes, checksum: f883200bc436b2dc33ab5879fb3dfaf0 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-07-29
The wide availability of data at the firm level in the past twenty years has opened a new range of opportunities for testing important economic theories. In this thesis we aim to explore the complementarity between international trade and investments on innovation in the Brazilian manufacturing industry. In this framework we recognize that innovation is important for firms both because of the positive externalities that it exhibits as with regard to the social returns it provides. For this reason, governments often subsidize these investments, especially the riskiest ones. However, it is still poorly understood how subsidized firms perform over time as we make clear in the first chapter. Although the Economic Subvention Program (ESP) operated by FINEP has aimed at increase innovation activities and the competitiveness of Brazilian companies, the empirical exercise reveals that between 2006 and 2009 there was no significant impact on variables such as productivity, wages per employee, entry/survival in the international market and other relevant policy outcomes. In the second chapter we show that there are gains after entry into the international market for the exporters in the period 1998-2011. Such learning by exporting effects explore innovation as a relevant channel once newly exporting firms have access to inputs, machineries, processes and higher technological standards as those adopted domestically. In the empirical exercise we show that the starters spend significantly more on innovation after entry, compared with extremely similar but essentially domestic firms. The results are robust to several starters categories and are stronger for the period 2004-2008.
A ampla disponibilidade de dados ao nível da firma nos últimos vinte anos abriu um novo leque de oportunidades para o teste de teorias econômicas importantes. Nesta tese pretendemos explorar a complementaridade entre a inserção internacional das empresas e os investimentos em inovação na indústria de transformação brasileira. No arcabouço que exploramos a inovação é importante para as firmas tanto em virtude das externalidades positivas que exibem quanto em termos dos retornos sociais proporcionados. Por este motivo, os governos subsidiam parte desses investimentos, especialmente aqueles que envolvem maior risco. Entretanto, ainda se sabe pouco com relação a como as firmas subsidiadas se comportam ao longo do tempo conforme fica evidente no primeiro capítulo. Embora o Programa de Subvenção Econômica operado pela FINEP tenha por objetivo o aumento significativo das atividades de inovação e o incremento da competitividade das empresas, o exercício empírico revela que entre 2006 e 2009 não houve impacto expressivo em variáveis como produtividade, salário por trabalhador, entrada/permanência no mercado internacional e outros outcomes relevantes. No segundo capítulo mostramos que há ganhos subsequentes à entrada no mercado internacional para as firmas exportadoras com relação ao período 1998-2011. Tal efeito aprendizado do comércio internacional utiliza a inovação como um canal relevante uma vez que tais firmas passam a ter acesso a insumos, equipamentos, processos e padrões tecnológicos superiores àqueles praticados domesticamente. No exercício empírico realizado mostramos que as empresas estreantes no mercado internacional gastam significativamente mais em inovação posteriormente à estreia, comparado com empresas extremamente semelhantes mas essencialmente domésticas. Os resultados são robustos a diversas categorias de estreia e são mais fortes para o período 2004-2008.

A premier distinction of liberal democracy is its praise of novelty and change, in the form of technological innovations and new expressions of personal liberty. To understand and critique our dedication to innovation, I study classical, medieval and early modern views on what the most important changes are for human beings—the changes of political regime and the changes of the soul. The philosophers from Plato to Machiavelli studied the desirability and possibility of political preservation, the effects of conversion and its relationship to notions of divine providence, and the changes brought by new religious institutions of a quasi-political character. The classical philosophers emphasize the importance and the difficulty of political preservation. In the Republic, Plato shows that a defensive conservatism results in political change. In the Symposium, while making human desire a major cause of change, he shows the human longing for preservation, as well. The attempt to make a lasting city is an effort to resist the tide of change which overtakes all things. In the fifth book of his Politics, Aristotle shows his expectation that political change will always occur, and that its many different causes make it difficult to master. The Christian revelation praises newness as the quality of conversion, whose difficult political consequences emerge at the beginning of Augustine’s City of God. His initial deprecation of political preservation in favor of conversion gives way to an insistence on preservation’s importance once conversion is widespread. Because the agent of conversion is the Church, a quasi-political institution, Marsilius in his Defender of the Peace revises Aristotle’s account of political change. Machiavelli challenges the possibility of genuine political endurance through a critique of its basis in dubious stories about the past. His praise of the innovating prince considers men’s ambivalent attitudes toward novelty in a way that our casual embrace of innovation does not. By appearing everywhere, innovation has now gone into eclipse. The praise of newness obscures the changes human beings once thought were the most important.
Government

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Technology and Policy Program, 1999.
Includes bibliographical references (p. 146-150).
Today, there are hundreds of new ventures in Silicon valley, and on the route 128 in Massachusetts that were created by French people. However, in France, innovation in high-technology has stabilized and did not significantly take off. Aware of this issue, the French government has been undertaking an intense public program to initiate innovation in France. The following investigation comes from a request of individuals within the French Ministry of Finance. It will examine the specific aspects of the French public program, that promotes innovation in Information Technologies by the means of venture capitalists. Other countries will be evaluated with respect to their public policies. Another important concern is the establishment of accurate methods for evaluating public programs. In order to understand the reason for the shortage of entrepreneurs and venture capitalists in France, the investigation deals with an analysis of economic and social realities, it then proposes a recommendation for a future French public policy with respect to venture capitalists in Information Technologies.
by Frederic J. Hannoyer.
S.M.

Fluorescence microscopy is an essential tool in biomedical sciences that allows specific molecules to be visualized in the complex and crowded environment of cells. The continuous introduction of new imaging techniques makes microscopes more powerful and versatile, but there is more than meets the eye. In addition to develop- ing new methods, we can work towards getting the most out of existing data and technologies. By harnessing unused potential, this work aims to increase the richness, reliability, and power of fluorescence microscopy data in three key ways: through standardization, evaluation and innovation. A universal standard makes it easier to assess, compare and analyze imaging data – from the level of a single laboratory to the broader life sciences community. We propose a data-standard for fluorescence microscopy that can increase the confidence in experimental results, facilitate the exchange of data, and maximize compatibility with current and future data analysis techniques. Cutting-edge imaging technologies often rely on sophisticated hardware and multi-layered algorithms for reconstruction and analysis. Consequently, the trustworthiness of new methods can be difficult to assess. To evaluate the reliability and limitations of complex methods, quantitative analyses – such as the one present here for the 3D SPEED method – are paramount. The limited resolution of optical microscopes prevents direct observation of macro- molecules like DNA and RNA. We present a multi-color, achromatic, cryogenic fluorescence microscope that has the potential to produce multi-color images with sub-nanometer precision. This innovation would move fluorescence imaging beyond the limitations of optics and into the world of molecular resolution.

L’innovation est un élément efficace pour répondre aux défis et perspectives imposés par les événements contemporains (mondialisation, concurrence, bouleversements politiques…). Des politiques liées aux stratégies d’innovation, des études sur les pratiques et les méthodes pour innover sont conduites par les entreprises et promues par les gouvernements. Afin de consolider la capacité à créer et innover, des recherches sont aujourd’hui axées sur les phases amont du processus d’innovation. Ces phases consistent à générer, évaluer et exploiter très tôt des innovations embryonnaires. Notre problématique de recherche concerne spécifiquement l’évaluation d’idées générées dans les phases amont. Les enjeux de cette action sont d’évaluer des idées très peu finalisées, en grandes quantités. Actuellement, le manque de méthodes adaptées, des restrictions de temps ou encore des budgets limités contraignent cette phase d’évaluation. Afin de pouvoir proposer une méthode d’aide à l’évaluation d’idées, nous réalisons une étude bibliographique puis proposons une démarche et des outils conduisant à une évaluation d’idées formalisée et instrumentée. Notre proposition permet d’appréhender les informations des évaluations réalisées et fournit des éléments de visualisation pour aider notamment les experts lors de cette action. Cette méthode s’est construite à partir d’analyses de situations professionnelles sur le terrain et nous a permis de proposer trois modèles. Ceux-ci ont été testés et expérimentés en milieu académique et industriel. Enfin, cette recherche s’est concrétisée par l’élaboration d’une maquette informatique nommée IdéoVal destinée à aider l’évaluation et la sélection d’idées
Innovation is an effective element to address the challenges and prospects imposed by the contemporary events (globalization, competition, political changes…). Innovation strategies, studies on the practices and methods to innovate are led by several companies and are promoted by the governments. In order to consolidate the capacity to create and innovate, current researches are focused on the early stages of the innovation process. These phases consist of generating, evaluating and exploiting embryonic innovations very early in the process. Our research problematic is specifically related to the evaluation of ideas generated in the early stages. The issues involving this action are to evaluate a large quantity of ideas that are not yet finalized. Currently, the lack of adapted methods, time restrictions or limited budgets constraint this evaluation stage. In order to propose a method for assisting ideas evaluation, we made a bibliographical study, and then we proposed an approach and tools leading to a formalized and instrumented evaluation of ideas. Our proposal enables the capitalization of the information from the evaluations carried out and provides a visualization of elements to, in particular, help the experts carry out this action. This method was built from the analyses of professional situations in the field and allowed us to propose three models. These models were tested in academic and industrial environments. Finally, this research was materialized by the elaboration of a software model called IdéoVal, which purpose is to help evaluate and select ideas

Current SME performance models suffer from a number of disadvantages. The models use intensively a business ratio approach, they look at SMEs as a homogenous group, they consider firms to be closed systems, they do not directly incorporate the impact of an enterprise’s innovation activities, and finally they are complex and rely on sophisticated statistical refining methods making them unpractical to use by SME managers. There are four major challenges when one tries to build SME performance models that lack these deficiencies. The first challenge is that the desired performance evaluation model must optimally incorporate both quantitative and qualitative input. The second challenge is that the model must incorporate non-financial input parameters, such as firm size and age (among others), in the performance evaluation models. The third is that the model must consider the variety of SMEs as concerns their business sectors, nationalities, sizes, and ages. The final challenge is that the model must be able to utilize existing limited information available from the SMEs bookkeeping practices in an optimal way. The thesis addresses three questions related to constructing a better SMEperformance model, namely (1) What are the advantages and disadvantages of the existing models used in evaluating SME performance? (2) What characterizes a comprehensive model for measuring SME performance with acknowledgement of the firm’s innovation activities? (3) How can a firm’s innovation activities be enhanced in relation to the firm’s external environment? To construct a model that copes with these challenges, I used a literature-based selection of parameters as well as a theory-based selection. I used both a conceptual approach and an empirical approach to discuss and propose a model, the Survival Index Value (or SIV) model, as an alternative to the existing performance models for SMEs. The major contributions of this thesis to the field of SME performance can be summarized in three outcomes: the SIV model as a new model of SME performance evaluation, the ASPEM as a new tool for strategic utilization of SME performance models, and a new approach to account for innovation in relation to the external environment of the firm using the IBAM tool. The work adds to the theory of the firm, as it presents a new way of evaluating firm performance. It also contributes to bridging the theory of the firm to organizational theory, by elevating the significance of networking and its impact on SME efficiency.

Consécutivement au développement des politiques de soutien aux réseaux d’innovation, notamment des politiques de clusters, cette thèse entend tester empiriquement l’un des fondements théoriques de ces politiques selon lequel la structure des réseaux d’innovation aurait un impact sur la production d’innovation dans les territoires. Ce faisant, elle apporte des éléments de réponses à une question fondamentale en géographie de l’innovation et contribue à porter un nouveau regard sur les politiques de clusters en les évaluant au regard de leur rôle dans la structuration des réseaux d’innovation. Le premier essai (Chapitre 2) analyse ainsi dans quelle mesure l’innovation régionale est influencée par la structure des réseaux d’innovation. Bien que le développement des politiques de soutien aux réseaux d’innovation laisse sous-entendre l’existence d’une potentielle relation entre structure de réseaux d’innovation et production de connaissances dans les territoires, les preuves empiriques de cette relation sont encore rares. Partant du cas français, les résultats du Chapitre 2 mettent en évidence l’existence de cette relation, confirmant ainsi que la structure des réseaux d’innovation a un impact sur la production régionale de connaissances. Ce résultat renforce donc la pertinence des politiques de soutien aux réseaux d’innovation et souligne leur importance pour l’optimisation des réseaux d’innovation. Partant de ce constat, le second et le troisième essais de la thèse (Chapitres 3 et 4) proposent une évaluation des politiques de clusters. Ces chapitres se démarquent de la littérature évaluant les politiques de clusters en mettant l’accent sur les défaillances de réseaux
This dissertation presents three essays on innovation networks, cluster policies and regional knowledge production. Following the development of policies aiming at supporting innovation networks, especially cluster policies, this thesis intends to empirically test one of the theoretical foundations of these policies suggesting that the structure of innovation networks would have an impact on the knowledge production within regions. In doing so, it provides answers to a fundamental question from the geography of innovation literature and brings a new perspective to the analysis of cluster policies by evaluating them regarding their role for the structuration of innovation networks. The first essay (Chapter 2) thus analyses the extent to which regional innovation is influenced by the structure of innovation networks. Although the development of policies supporting innovation networks suggests the existence of a potential relationship between the structure of innovation networks and knowledge production within regions, empirical evidence supporting this relationship is still scarce. Based from the French case, the results of Chapter 2 highlight the existence of this relationship, confirming that the structure of innovation networks has an impact on regional knowledge production. This result therefore reinforces the relevance of policies supporting innovation networks and underlines their importance for the optimisation of innovation networks. Building on this result, the second and third essays of the thesis (Chapters 3 and 4) propose an evaluation of cluster policies. These chapters stand out from the literature evaluating cluster policies by focusing on network failures

There is an increased need for innovation activities in companies today due to mounting pressure from external factors increasing the urgency for renewal and agility. Digitalisation of processes, products and services sets completely new requirements for competence but also changes the value creation and competitiveness. In recent years, management focus has shifted from optimization of production processes, logistics and supply chains, to being more oriented towards an innovation focus, promoting business renewal and innovative business models. The purpose of this study is to examine how board evaluations are used to improve board work and to study how well boards guide the innovation ambitions of their companies. Furthermore, the aim of this study is to develop a framework that can provide a holistic perspective of both control and strategic innovation aspects. Results from a comprehensive literature review and analysis of board evaluation data indicate that there is a lack of innovation inclusion in board evaluations and a clear lack of statistical approach when constructing surveys. The result of the study is a proposed framework that provides guidance for designing an innovation inclusive board evaluation tools and recommendations for providing actionable insights to clients, backed up by statistical models such as regression analysis and consistency analysis that has the possibility to scale into a digital assessment tool.
Ett flertal omvärldsfaktorer ökar innovationsbehovet i många företag idag vilket således ökar brådskan för förnyelse och mer agila förhållningssätt. Digitalisering av processer, produkter och tjänster ställer helt nya krav på kompetenser men ändrar också värdeskapandet och konkurrenskraften hos dagens företag. Under de senaste åren har managementfokus skiftat från renodlad optimering av produktionsprocesser, logistik och försörjningskedjor, till att inrymma innovation och förnyelse genom ett flertal förändringsarbeten så som formella ledarskapsroller med innovation som fokus, förnyade processer och innovativa affärsmodeller. Syftet med studien är att undersöka hur styrelseutvärderingar används som ett verktyg för att förbättra styrelsearbetet och att studera hur väl styrelser vägleder innovationsambitionerna i ett företag. Fortsättningsvis är målet med denna studie att utveckla ett ramverk som kan ge ett helhetsperspektiv av balansen mellan både kontroll och strategiska innovationsaspekter. Resultatet från en omfattande litteraturgranskning och analys av styrelsens utvärderingsdata visar att det saknas innovationsintegration i styrelseutvärderingar och ett bristande statistiskt underlag vid konstruktionen av frågebaserna för utvärderingen. Det föreslagna ramverket ger vägledning åt alla som behöver utvärdera styrelser med ambitionen att utforma ett utvärderingsverktyg som är mer innovationsorienterad och som möjliggör rekommendationer med konkreta insikter till styrelser, grundade i statistiska modeller så som linjär regression och intern konsistens analys som kan möjliggöra utvecklandet av en skalbar digital utvärdering.

As a result of the Covid-19 pandemic, there has been wide adoption of remote work while major companies have started introducing permanent flexible work arrangements. This dramatic shift in the workplace has raised questions regarding the effect this will have on innovation as it is critical for a future company’s success. Based on the literature review we managed to identify six key aspects to the innovative workplace: communication, collaboration, trust, knowledge transfer, company culture and management. We were able to evaluate the impact of remote work on these aspects by using both theoretical findings and empirical data gathered through semi-structured interviews conducted within a Swedish telecommunications company. Our results indicate that despite some advantageous features, communication, trust and knowledge transfer suffered. In management there has been a slightly positive shift. The results in collaboration and company culture appear inconclusive with significant advantages and disadvantages. In order to avoid an overall decrease in innovation we propose the adoption of a hybrid work model to combine the best aspects of these opposite arrangements.
Som en följd av Covid-19-pandemin har distansarbete blivit betydligt vanligare, stora företag har redan infört sådana permanenta arrangemang. Denna dramatiska förändring på arbetsplatsen har väckt frågor angående effekten på innovation eftersom det anses avgörande för ett företags framtida framgång och konkurrenskraft. Baserat på en genomgång av forskningslitteraturen har vi identifierat sex viktiga förutsättningar för företagens innovationskapacitet: kommunikation, samarbete, förtroende, kunskapsöverföring, företagskultur och ledning. Med utgångspunkt i tidigare teoretiska och empiriska forskningsresultat har semistrukturerade intervjuer genomförts med ett svenskt telekommunikationsföretag för att analysera effekten distansarbete på innovation. Våra resultat indikerar att en del positiva effekter kan uppstå men att tyngdpunkten återfinns i den negativa vågskålen. Således verkar ledningsfunktionen påverkas positivt medan andra faktorer viktiga för innovation som kommunikation, förtroende och kunskapsöverföring har försvagats. Vad gäller samarbete och företagskulturen förefaller både positiva och negativa effekter uppstå. För att undvika en generell försvagning av innovationskapaciteten bör en hybrid modell användas som kombinerar de bästa aspekterna av distansarbetet med platsbundet arbete.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the factors influencing restaurant Owner-Managers’ decisions to adopt sustainability innovations in restaurants. A cross-sectional survey research design is used for this study, which entails distributing a survey to restaurants in the City of Richmond, Virginia, to gain an understanding of the factors influencing sustainability innovation adoption. Drawing from both the innovation adoption theory and the theory of planned behavior, the researcher contributes a baseline of the restaurants’ sustainability and the Owner-Managers’ intrinsic motivations. By integrating innovation adoption theory’s perceived innovation characteristics and measuring restaurants’ past sustainability behavior, this study increases the overall explanatory power of the theory of planned behavior. The findings demonstrate the need for new policy that effectively increases the rate of sustainability innovation adoption throughout Richmond’s restaurant industry. This study’s baseline contribution enables policymakers to move from planning to the implementation of the initiatives needed to achieve the economic development goal and first objective detailed in the City of Richmond’s sustainability plan, RVAgreen: A Roadmap to Sustainability (2011).

La diffusion du modèle de co-développement a permis d'optimiser la performance qualité-coût-délai des programmes de développement de nouveaux produits. Aujourd'hui, les entreprises du secteur automobile cherchent à déployer des innovations plus radicales au sein de ces nouveaux produits : systèmes d'aide à la conduite, pare-brise panoramique, télématique embarquée, etc. Pour ce faire, elles expérimentent de nouveaux dispositifs internes ainsi que de nouvelles formes de relations avec les fournisseurs. Notre travail vise à caractériser et à évaluer ces processus de co-innovation, et à en dégager des facteurs critiques de management. Il s'appuie sur une méthodologie originale qui associe une comparaison de cas français et japonais, un accès symétrique constructeurs / fournisseurs, et une recherche intervention qui vient compléter et enrichir les données issues des études de cas a posteriori. La thèse construit un référentiel analytique, le parcours d'innovation, permettant de caractériser la variété des phénomènes. Son application sur cinq cas révèle les principaux facteurs d'efficacité, ainsi que les leviers d'actions susceptibles d'améliorer les dispositifs de gestion existants. La recherche-intervention a permis de tester la faisabilité de ces résultats avec les entreprises partenaires de la recherche. Enfin, un des principaux apports est de montrer l'interdépendance forte entre les formes de relations interfirmes et les spécificités des processus internes pour expliquer la performance des pratiques.

Business Administration/Management Information Systems
Ph.D.
To overcome constrained resources, firms can actively seek innovative opportunities from the external world. This innovation approach, called open innovation (Chesbrough 2003; Hippel 2005; Terwiesch and Ulrich 2009; Terwiesch and Xu 2008), is receiving more and more attention. Facilitated by the global Internet and emerging forms of information technology, it has become very easy for companies to generate large numbers of innovative solutions through the use of online open innovation contests or crowdsourcing contests (Archak and Sundararajan 2009; Terwiesch and Ulrich 2009; Terwiesch and Xu 2008; Yang et al. 2009).For an innovation project to succeed, it is necessary to generate not only a large number of good ideas or solutions, but also to identify those that are "exceptional" (Terwiesch and Ulrich 2009). This dissertation contains three studies that aim to improve our understanding of how best to use contests as a tool to aggregate external resources (collective intelligence) in the generation and evaluation of solutions. The first study views an innovation contest from the innovation seeker's perspective and provides insights on how to improve contest performance. The second study views an innovation contest from the innovation solver's perspective examining the characteristics and strategies of winners and solvers. Finally, in the third study, a new approach to the solution evaluation process is introduced, which is referred to as open evaluation. In this approach, a prediction market is used as an aggregation mechanism to coordinate the crowd in the evaluation of proposed solutions. These three studies make a number of contributions to the literature, addressing core issues in the area of online innovation contests. The analyses, which leverage large-scale empirical data, produce a number of profound results, which can help people to understand how best to use and design innovation contests in an online environment, for idea generation. Further, these studies present a variety of managerial implications associated with the aggregation of individual effort (collective intelligence) to evaluate the ideas that are generated by an innovation contest. We hope that our studies can help open innovation pioneers, such as Google, to systematically generate and identify exceptionally good ideas at much lower costs. By utilizing our findings, we expect that more firms will be able to adopt an open innovation strategy, both systematically and easily.
Temple University--Theses