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User innovation refers to
innovation
Innovation is the practical implementation of ideas that result in the introduction of new goods or services or improvement in offering goods or services. ISO TC 279 in the standard ISO 56000:2020 defines innovation as "a new or changed enti ...
by intermediate users (e.g. user
firm
A company, abbreviated as co., is a legal entity representing an association of people, whether natural, legal or a mixture of both, with a specific objective. Company members share a common purpose and unite to achieve specific, declared ...
s) or
consumer
A consumer is a person or a group who intends to order, or uses purchased goods, products, or services primarily for personal, social, family, household and similar needs, who is not directly related to entrepreneurial or business activities. ...
users (individual
end-user
In product development, an end user (sometimes end-user) is a person who ultimately uses or is intended to ultimately use a product. The end user stands in contrast to users who support or maintain the product, such as sysops, system administrato ...
s or user
communities
A community is a social unit (a group of living things) with commonality such as place, norms, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given geographical area (e.g. a country, village, to ...
), rather than by suppliers (producers or
manufacturers
Manufacturing is the creation or production of goods with the help of equipment, labor, machines, tools, and chemical or biological processing or formulation. It is the essence of secondary sector of the economy. The term may refer to ...
). This is a concept closely aligned to
co-design
Participatory design (originally co-operative design, now often co-design) is an approach to design attempting to actively involve all stakeholders (e.g. employees, partners, customers, citizens, end users) in the design process to help ensure t ...
and
co-creation, and has been proven to result in more innovative solutions than traditional consultation methodologies.
Eric von Hippel
Eric von Hippel (born August 27, 1941) is an American economist and a professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management, specializing in the nature and economics of distributed and open innovation. He is best known for his work in developing the ...
and others observed that many products and services are actually developed or at least refined, by users, at the site of implementation and use. These ideas are then moved back into the supply network. This is because products are developed to meet the widest possible need; when individual users face problems that the majority of consumers do not, they have no choice but to develop their own modifications to existing products, or entirely new products, to solve their issues. Often, user innovators will share their ideas with manufacturers in hopes of having them produce the product, a process called free revealing. However, user innovators also generate their own firms to commercialize their innovations and generate new markets, a process called "consumer-led market emergence." For example, research on how users innovated in multiple boardsports shows that some users capitalized on their innovations, founding firms in sports that became global markets.
Based on research on the evolution of Internet technologies and open source software
Ilkka Tuomi
Ilkka Tuomi (born 26 September 1958), is a Finnish computer scientist, noted for writings on the subject of the Internet.
Works
Ilkka Tuomi has written books, including ''Networks of Innovation: Change and Meaning in the Age of the Internet'' whi ...
further highlighted the point that users are fundamentally social. User innovation, therefore, is also socially and socio-technically distributed innovation. According to Tuomi, key uses are often unintended uses invented by user communities that reinterpret and reinvent the meaning of emerging technological opportunities.
The existence of user innovation, for example, by users of industrial robots, rather than the manufacturers of robots is a core part of the argument against the
Linear Innovation Model, i.e. innovation comes from research and development, is then marketed and 'diffuses' to end-users. Instead innovation is a non-linear process involving innovations at all stages.
In 1986 Eric von Hippel introduced the
lead user method that can be used to systematically learn about user innovation in order to apply it in
new product development
In business and engineering, new product development (NPD) covers the complete process of bringing a new product to market, renewing an existing product or introducing a product in a new market. A central aspect of NPD is product design, along ...
. In 2007 another specific type of user innovator, the
creative consumer
A creative consumer is defined as any “individual or group who adapt, modify, or transform a proprietary offering” in a business journal article by Berthon, et al. While traditional consumers simply use and consume products and services, crea ...
was introduced. These are consumers who adapt, modify, or transform a proprietary offering as opposed to creating completely new products.
User innovation has a number of degrees: innovation of use, innovation in services, innovation in configuration of technologies, and finally the innovation of novel technologies themselves. While most user innovation is concentrated in use and configuration of existing products and technologies, and is a normal part of long term innovation, new technologies that are easier for end-users to change and innovate with, and new channels of communication are making it much easier for user innovation to occur and have an impact.
Recent research has focused on Web-based forums that facilitate user (or customer) innovation - referred to as
virtual customer environment, these forums help companies partner with their customers in various phases of product development as well as in other value creation activities. For example,
Threadless, a
T-shirt
A T-shirt (also spelled tee shirt), or tee, is a style of fabric shirt named after the T shape of its body and sleeves. Traditionally, it has short sleeves and a round neckline, known as a '' crew neck'', which lacks a collar. T-shirts are genera ...
manufacturing company, relies on the contribution of online community members in the design process. The community includes a group of volunteer designers who submit designs and vote on the designs of others. In addition to free exposure, designers are provided monetary incentives including a $2,500 base award as well as a percentage of T-shirt sales. These incentives allow Threadless to encourage continual user contribution.
[Magee,Joe.]
The Contribution Revolution: Letting Volunteers Build Your Business
, Harvard Business Review
''Harvard Business Review'' (''HBR'') is a general management magazine published by Harvard Business Publishing, a wholly owned subsidiary of Harvard University. ''HBR'' is published six times a year and is headquartered in Brighton, M ...
, October 2008.
See also
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Creativity techniques
Creativity techniques are methods that encourage creative actions, whether in the arts or sciences. They focus on a variety of aspects of creativity, including techniques for idea generation and divergent thinking, methods of re-framing problems, c ...
*
Crowdsourcing
Crowdsourcing involves a large group of dispersed participants contributing or producing goods or services—including ideas, votes, micro-tasks, and finances—for payment or as volunteers. Contemporary crowdsourcing often involves digita ...
*
Domestication theory Domestication theory is an approach in Science and Technology Studies (STS) and media studies that describe the processes by which technology is 'tamed' or appropriated by its users. The theory was originally created by Roger Silverstone, who des ...
*
Ideas bank
An ideas bank is a widely available shared resource, usually a website, where people post, exchange, discuss, and polish new ideas. Some ideas banks are used to develop new inventions or technologies. Many corporations have installed internal id ...
*
List of emerging technologies
This is a list of emerging technologies, in-development technical innovations with significant potential in their applications. The criteria for this list is that the technology must:
# Exist in some way; purely hypothetical technologies ca ...
*
Open-design movement
The open-design movement involves the development of physical products, machines and systems through use of publicly shared design information. This includes the making of both free and open-source software (FOSS) as well as open-source hardwar ...
*
Participatory design
Participatory design (originally co-operative design, now often co-design) is an approach to design attempting to actively involve all stakeholders (e.g. employees, partners, customers, citizens, end users) in the design process to help ensure t ...
*
Professional amateurs
Amateur professionalism or professional amateurism (shortened to pro-am) is a blurring of the distinction between professional and amateur within any endeavour or attainable skill that could be labelled professional in fields such as writing, compu ...
*
Prosumer
A prosumer is an individual who both consumes and produces. The term is a portmanteau of the words '' producer'' and ''consumer''. Research has identified six types of prosumers: DIY prosumers, self-service prosumers, customizing prosumers, coll ...
*
Science and technology studies
Science and technology studies (STS) is an interdisciplinary field that examines the creation, development, and consequences of science and technology in their historical, cultural, and social contexts.
History
Like most interdisciplinary fie ...
*
Toolkits for User Innovation
Footnotes
Sources
* Bilgram, V.; Brem, A.; Voigt, K.-I.: User-Centric Innovations in New Product Development; Systematic Identification of Lead User Harnessing Interactive and Collaborative Online-Tools, in: International Journal of Innovation Management, Vol. 12 (2008), No. 3, pp. 419–458.
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* Braun, Viktor R.G. (2007): Barriers to user-innovation & the paradigm of licensing to innovate, Doctoral dissertation: Hamburg University of Technology
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External links
New York Times on User Innovation (2007) available under the
creative commons
Creative Commons (CC) is an American non-profit organization and international network devoted to educational access and expanding the range of creative works available for others to build upon legally and to share. The organization has release ...
license.
Innovation CultureVisionXThe Contribution Revolution wikicollects information about user contribution systems in the business world. It is based on th
Harvard Business Review article of the same nameby Scott Cook
{{Science and technology studies
Innovation
User interfaces
Science and technology studies