users roles for co-creation of innovation in living lab networks seppo leminen

III ENoLL Living labs Summer School

Research Day

20th August 2012

Users roles for co-creation of

innovation in living lab networks

Seppo Leminen, D.Sc. (Econ), Adjunct Professor, Laurea University of

Applied Sciences, [email protected]

Anna-Greta Nyström, D.Sc. (Econ), Åbo Akademi University, School of

Business and Economics

Mika Westerlund, D.Sc. (Econ), Assistant Professor, Carleton University,

Sprott School of Business, Canada

Research gaps

• Only few studies address co–production of services; instead focus is

usually on the co-creation of value. (Chen et al., 2011)

• Living Labs provide a promising research area for studying open

service innovation. (Pascu & van Lieshout, 2009)

• The roles of the actors in Living Labs networks deserve further

investigation. (Nyström & Leminen, 2011)

• Living Labs not researched from a network perspective and there is

lack of rich case descriptions of Living Labs (Leminen & Westerlund,

forthcoming)

Living Labs (1/2)

Experimentation environments, where stakeholders form public-

private-people partnerships (4Ps) to create, prototype, validate, and

test new products, services, and technologies in real-life contexts.

(Ballon et al., 2005)

Products, services, and technologies are developed and tested in

physical or virtual regions, where users are informants/co-

creators. (Kusiak, 2007)

Different from: (Ballon et al., 2005; Schaffers et al,. 2007)

• test beds for controlled testing in a laboratory environment.

• field trials for testing in a limited but still real-life environment.

• other forms of open innovation that have no concrete setting.

Living Labs (2/2) Participants’ roles: Living Lab is a real-life test and

experimentation environment, where users and producers co-

create innovations, and which connects them with utilizers and

enablers. (Leminen & Westerlund, 2008)

Global networks: many Living Labs join regional or global

networks of Living Labs: e.g., European Network of Living Labs.

(http://www.openlivinglabs.eu/)

Different types: i) narrow but sizable communities of expert

users; ii) whole bounded populations; iii) Living Labs for technical

service development; iv) Living Labs for non-technical research

using a service platform. (Stewart, 2007)

Customer participation (customer contribution to co-production)

and interaction (dialogue between customer and business) vital in

service innovations. (von Hippel, 1986)

• Today’s organizations need a constant flow of ideas while competing

through emergent technologies and fast NPD. (Kao, 1997)

• Integrating customers and users to learn from and with them in

the innovation process is a key success factor for firms in all

industries. (Edvarsson et al., 2010).

• Firms involve consumers in the co-production of brands,

experiences, design, marketing strategies, and even product or

service development. (Jeppesen & Molin, 2003; Zwick et al., 2008)

Users as innovators

Objectives of the study

• Describe Living Labs as open innovation networks

• Identify the distinct structures of Living Labs networks

• Analyze users’ roles in diverse Living Labs networks

Customer involvement: two

different approaches

7 (Leminen, Kortelainen & Fred, 2010)

Methodology

Primary data

• A multiple case study among the staffs of 26 Living

Labs in Finland, Sweden, Spain, and South Africa

during 2007-2011 (a total of 103 semi-structured

interviews).

Secondary data

• Web sites, bulletins, magazines, and case reports

• Data collection aimed at identifying and

categorizing roles in Living Labs networks

Activity based user roles

• Four principal activity based user roles in Living Labs

found:

• Informant

• Tester

• Contributor

• Co-creator

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Living Labs: The network view

10

Enablers Innovation

development

Users

Providers

Utilizers

(Mod. Leminen & Westerlund, 2008)

A Living Lab network Network of Living Labs

Different types of Living Labs

• Utilizer-driven Living Labs

• Enabler-driven Living Labs

• Provider-driven Living Labs

• User/User community-driven Living Labs

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User

Utilizer

Enabler

Developer

(Kortelainen, Leminen & Fred, 2011)

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Utilizer driven

User driven

Provider driven

Enabler driven

Living Lab actors

Co-creator, Contributor


Co-creator, Contributor, Informant, Tester

Co-creator, Contributor User

Contributor 6, Informant, Tester

Co-creator, Informant

Co-creator 18, Contributor 15,16,18,19, Informant 15,16,17,18,19, Tester 15,17,18,

Contributor, Informant

User

Informant Contributor 4, Tester 2,4

Contributor, Tester

Contributor 11,12,13 Informant 13,14, Tester 11,12,14

Informant Tester

User

User’s roles in Living Labs networks

Activity

based

roles

Business networks: structure

• Business network can be classified according to the

firm’s position in the network and the

configuration of the network (Doz, 2001).

• The company may act as the engine, or hub, in the

focal business network, or it is one of the many

actors having a minor role as a partner with whom

the hub company cooperates.

• Networks centralized, decentralized, or distributed.

Barbasi (2002, ref. Möller and Svahn, 2003)

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Roles in networks

• Heikkinen et al. (2007)

• Webber, instigator, gatekeeper, advocate,

producer, planner, entrant, auxiliary

• Facilitator, compromiser, aspirant, accessory

provider

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15

Utilizer driven

User driven

Provider driven

Enabler driven

Living Lab actors

Orchestrator, Facilitator

HUB





Webber, Builder, Facilitator

HUB


Coordinator (focal net), Co-creator, Informant


Coordinator (focal net), Contributor, Informant

User

Facilitator, Integrator

HUB


Contributor, Tester


Informant Tester

User

Centralized

structure

Distributed

structure

Distributed

Multiplex

structure

User’s roles in diverse Living Labs networks

Position (structure)

based roles

New position (structure) based

roles for user found

• Builder

• Facilitator

• Orchestrator

• Integrator

• Coordinator (focal net)

16

17

Utilizer driven

User driven

Provider driven

Enabler driven

Living Lab actors

Orchestrator, Facilitator

HUB





Webber, Builder, Facilitator

HUB


Coordinator (focal net), Co-creator, Informant


Coordinator (focal net), Contributor, Informant

User

Facilitator, Integrator

HUB


Contributor, Tester


Informant Tester

User

Centralized

structure

Distributed

structure

Distributed

Multiplex

structure

User’s roles in diverse Living Labs networks

Activity

based

roles Position

based roles

Main conclusions

We suggest that either

actors actively shape the environment they act in

or

they are restricted by predetermined social structures (e.g. business networks)

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Main arguments

• Innovation is the outcome of cooperation between actors in business networks

• Roles and positions of users are tools to manage the network

Found users roles

in Living Lab network

Position (structure)

based roles for users

• Builder

• Facilitator

• Orchestrator

• Integrator

• Coordinator

• Webber

Activity based user roles

• Informant

• Tester

• Contributor

• Co-creator

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… and the journey continues

continues.

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...Looking for partners

• Scale-up LL (Scale-up innovation mechanisms in Living

Labs) project focuses on the role of users and consumers

in up‐scaling innovations from local and regional Living

Labs experiments to global practices.

• Please contact to: Dr. Seppo Leminen

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22.8.2012

23

Are you

innovating

together with

your customers?

Perspectives on

Living Labs

(in Finnish)

Thank you!

[email protected] [email protected]

Questions?

[email protected]

Comments?

users roles for co-creation of innovation in living lab networks seppo leminen

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