Since China embraced the “Open Door” policy in 1978, innovation has been an increasingly important factor for the Chinese economy. China is now the third largest country in the world league table of patent applications. China has also received large amounts of foreign direct investment, much of it from major Western innovative companies. In the earlier years of the Open Door policy, much of the involvement of Western companies was through joint ventures. International joint ventures are still important, and it is believed have substantially enhanced China's innovative capability. It is the contention of this research that there is a direct correlation between the arrivals of Sino-Western JVs and China's increased innovation capabilities. This is an important area of study as China moves towards becoming a developed economy. The gap in research at present is in applying innovation theory to China and to JVs. The thesis explores the contribution of Sino-Western JVs to the development of China's innovative capabilities. A model of the innovation process is developed, and eight important factors that are considered to enhance a company's innovative capacity, are derived from the model. The factors, expressed as propositions, are: 1: Becoming part of a wide innovative network in its industry 2: Taking part in an open innovation system in its industry 3: Relating closely to universities, and particularly their research laboratories 4: Relating closely to research institutions 5: Developing a social atmosphere conducive to innovation 6: Developing a strong strategic planning system with innovation as a focus 7: Having innovation as a primary objective of both partners at the outset of the joint venture 8: Focusing on developing intellectual property To investigate whether these propositions were accepted by Sino-Western joint ventures, 40 semi-structured interviews were conducted in ten international (Sino-western) joint ventures in China. In general the interviews provided support for the propositions. However, some reservations were expressed. Executives were reluctant to engage in open (collaborative) innovation, preferring to seek patents for developed intellectual property. They also perceived the main objective of the Western partners to be commercial success rather than innovation, although the Chinese partners were very much innovation-orientated. The research contributes to our understanding of the contribution of Sino-western JVs to the innovative capability of Chinese companies, and provides support for most of the propositions identified in the literature. Respondents remarked that most of the propositions would apply also to self-standing companies in China, and suggested that joint ventures could stimulate innovation in indigenous Chinese companies. In addition to providing a historical overview of the development of innovation in China, developing an innovation process model and testing it in the Chinese context, the thesis makes important policy and practical recommendations to Chinese organizations.

<p>This thesis examines innovation and design processes in small established companies. There is a great interest in this area yet paradoxically the area is under-researched, since most innovation research is done on large companies. The research questions are: How do small established companies carry out their innovation and design processes? and How does the context and novelty of the process and product affect the same processes?</p><p>The thesis is built on three research papers that used the research method of multiple case studies of different small established companies. The innovation and design processes found were highly context dependent and were facilitated by committed resources, a creative climate, vision, low family involvement, delegated power and authority, and linkages to external actors such as customers and users. Both experimental cyclical and linear structured design processes were found. The choice of structure is explained by the relative product and process novelty experienced by those developing the product innovation. Linear design processes worked within a low relative novelty situation and cyclical design processes worked no matter the relative novelty. The innovation and design processes found were informal, with a low usage of formal systematic design methods, except in the case of design processes for software. The use of formal systematic methods in small companies seems not always to be efficient, because many of the problems the methods are designed to solve are not present. Customers and users were found to play a large and important role in the innovation and design processes found and gave continuous feedback during the design processes. Innovation processes were found to be intertwined, yielding synergy effects, but it was common that resources were taken from the innovation processes for acute problems that threatened the cash flow. In sum, small established companies have the natural prerequisites to take advantage of lead-user inventions and cyclical design processes. Scarce resources were found to be the main factor hindering innovation, but the examined companies practiced several approaches to increase their resources or use existing scarce resources more efficiently in their innovation and design processes. Examples of these approaches include adopting lead-user inventions and reducing formality in the innovation and design processes.</p><p> </p>

This Dissertation presents a comprehensive Process Map for innovation [the Map], based on a comparison and synthesis of the reported steps for creating in many disciplines, including Engineering Design and Buddhist Meditation. The Map is presented in three stages and seven detailed steps, following a review of the status quo of innovation in Engineering Design from literature and Industry surveys, and can be said to provide the first natural and common language for innovation. The application of Buddhist Methods is a key feature in the development of the Map, introducing a consistency and hierarchy, as well as co-evolutionary and eco-systemic aspect to academic understanding of innovation and its management, which has been lacking in models proposed in literature and Tools such as TRIZ in the past. Presentation of the Map theory and Map itself is followed by reports of its testing and proof of concept with an Industry Collaborator from 2006-10, including: [i] benchmarking of ‘Systematic Innovation’ [ii] an Industry Pilot Test comparing teaching of TRIZ with the Innovation Map and [iii] results of four nine-month periods of application in training, coaching, workshops, Games and GameDays. The Map is shown to improve high-end technical innovation in corporate environments, by streamlining the way questions are asked, and answers found and evaluated. It is directly responsible for unprecedented solutions achieved by Engineering Design teams addressing long-standing problems in very short time frames. Facilitated sessions using the Map achieve an ROI up to 2847% in each session and are estimated to have contributed billions of Euros value to the Industry Collaborator over four years of testing. In comparison with other options, the Map provides cheaper, simpler and more elegant innovation incorporating Tools, process and potential culture for any kind of User - Company, Consultant, Innovation Manager or Academic.

The current socio-economic and political challenges, globalisation, introduction of information technology and competition with private firms are challenging the way governments operate. In recent years, the UAE Government have thus invested heavily in the innovative projects to achieve the UAE vison 2021, which is to become one of the most innovative governments globally. Developing a better understanding of how innovation happens in governments appears to be gaining increased traction among policy makers and researchers alike. This study examined the relationship between Transformational leadership (TL), Innovation process (INN) and Knowledge sharing (KS) within public sector organisation the case of the UAE Ministry of Interior (MoI). There are several models of innovation available, however, most of them are based on product innovation and derived from private sector experiences. Moreover, there is a lack of models linking transformational leadership, knowledge sharing, and innovation within public organisation of developing countries in general and the UAE in particular The main research objective is to investigate the impact of the four main components of transformational leadership on knowledge sharing and innovation process within the public sector organisation, and the impact of knowledge sharing on the innovation process. To achieve the research objectives, a positivist paradigm is used throughout the research process. Using deductive approach, ten hypotheses were tested in the MoI context. Respondents no. The survey was administered to employees of the ministry of Interior as a method of data collection. Applying SPSS 23 and AMOS 23, the data was analysed and a structural model was developed, which can be serve as a predictive model for workplace innovation. Paragraph3 The findings of this research reveal that inspirational motivation (IM) has non-significant influence on the innovation process within the MoI, while the other three components of transformational leadership were found to have a significant influence on innovation process. Similarly, inspirational motivation (IM), and idealised influence (IF) were found to have non-significant influence on knowledge sharing. In addition, knowledge sharing (KS) was significantly associated with the innovation process. Finally, demographic variables specifically position and level of education were found to have a significant difference in terms of the respondents' views towards the innovation process within the MoI. This study contributes to the field of organizational innovation in public sector as the outcome of the research provides a specific framework for the conditions and needs of the public sector organisation. The study contributes to the theory by providing new insights into the factors that influence innovation process in the MoI. The study identifies four factors that directly and indirectly affect innovation process; these factors based on the degree of their importance are IC, IS, KS and IF. Moreover, the study contributes to the knowledge by investigating the mediating role of knowledge sharing in supporting the relationship between transformational leadership and innovation process. Finally, one major contribution of this study is the development of a 33-item instrument which measures factors affecting innovation process, particularly in the context of public sector of the UAE. From a practical perspective, MoI leaders trying to implement innovation can use the final model and set of recommendations provided to implement innovation effectively.

Research focusing on service innovation has seen a significant growth in the last two decades, yet the research on KIBS innovation - and especially on innovation in the creative industries, like advertising - remains rather limited. Due to the increasingly competitive business environment, how KIBS firms co-create with their clients to develop more innovative products or services is becoming more important. Therefore, this research uses the UK advertising industry as a basis to explore the nature of advertising innovation, the service innovation process and the co-creation within it, and how KIBS project innovativeness influences new service development. The literature on service innovation, co-creation and innovativeness involved in developing services or products provides the theoretical foundation for this research. It uses multiple case studies methodology and is based on 45 interviews with advertising managers. The findings of this thesis can be divided into three key areas. First, this study conceptualises the advertising innovation and advertising innovation dimensions and identifies the importance of content innovation and two-sided interface in advertising innovation. Second, the innovation process in the advertising industry can be divided into five phases: the problem diagnosis phase, the creative process, the production phase, the commercialisation phase, and the evaluation and learning phase. (In more detail, the innovation process can be divided into fourteen development stages: client brief, understanding client business, problem diagnosis, strategy planning, creative briefing, idea generation, idea testing, idea selection, idea amplification, production, testing, launch, evaluation, and learning.) This research examines what is meant by co-creation, and identifies how co-creation changes over the course of the service innovation process - where co-creation activities and tasks, and the roles of service firms and their clients, vary across stages of service production. It finds that co-creation between advertising companies and their clients follows a 'W-shaped' curve pattern, with the most intense co-creation in the problem diagnosis phase and the least in the production phase. (The practitioners in these KIBS assert that having too much co-creation activities in the idea generation stage tends to develop uncreative ideas.) Third, as the tasks of KIBS are to fuse generic knowledge with local and special knowledge related to specific problems, to develop problem solutions for their clients, this study conceptualises KIBS project innovativeness as involving two parameters: (1) the knowledge and experience of the problem itself (which relates to problem novelty); (2) the knowledge and experience of developing innovative solutions (solution innovativeness), and explores how KIBS project innovativeness influences new service development. Based on the analysis of KIBS project innovativeness, this study develops a typology of project development in KIBS firms, which includes four types of projects: routine project, new project, solution-led project, and innovative project. This research contributes to understanding the nature of service innovation and co-creation by providing a more thorough understanding of the role of co-creation in the overall new service development process. It also shapes our understanding of KIBS project innovativeness and how it influences new service development.

<p>This dissertation study focuses on reasons and means of industry and university</p><p>collaboration which lead to innovation. Collaboration in this study is viewed as one:</p><p>communication, exchange of knowledge and learning form the innovation process. This</p><p>research has followed a qualitative approach for methodology and the data was collected</p><p>through two interviews. The results of this study show how university research</p><p>collaborates with industry from the university research point of view. The findings also</p><p>reveal that university research can not produce innovation without practical knowledge</p><p>which is provided by company during collaboration. In the same way the company can</p><p>not produce scientifically based innovation without the interactive learning.</p>

This dissertation study focuses on reasons and means of industry and university collaboration which lead to innovation. Collaboration in this study is viewed as one: communication, exchange of knowledge and learning form the innovation process. This research has followed a qualitative approach for methodology and the data was collected through two interviews. The results of this study show how university research collaborates with industry from the university research point of view. The findings also reveal that university research can not produce innovation without practical knowledge which is provided by company during collaboration. In the same way the company can not produce scientifically based innovation without the interactive learning.

Computer products ¡ACommunication products¡Aand Consumer Electronics products are the three main categories of 3C industry . With the trends of technology innovation, consumer¡¦s preference changes, and price¡¦s fluctuation, 3C products now tend to get slimmer, smaller, more easily portable, delicate, and fashionable. Moreover, advanced functions and environmental protection are also the important topics that 3C industry is facing. Accordingly, The housing parts of 3C products need to match up every inch with the above. This study focuses on the key success factors of technology innovation process of 3C housing case industry. In order to verify and refine the fist outcomes of AHP (Analytic Hierarchy Process) analysis, this study did the second AHP analysis and adopts the second outcomes as the conclusion. They are as follows: 1. These are the priorities of the four factors on the second layer: ¡§Technology Innovation Strategy¡¨ goes first, ¡§Organizational System and Culture¡¨ second, ¡§Source of Technology Innovation¡¨ third, and ¡§Investment of Technology Innovation¡¨ last. 2. The top 5 priorities of the sixteen criteria on the third layer are the below: ¡§Active Interaction with Customer¡¦s Needs¡¨ goes first, ¡§R&D Expenditures¡¦ Proportion of Sales¡¨ second, ¡§Patent Technology of Self ¡VResearch and Innovation¡¨ third, ¡§Organizational Culture of Good Communication and Flexible System¡¨ fourth, and ¡§Periodical Participation in International Technological Merchandise Fair¡¨ fifth.

This thesis identifies the enabling factors that are relevant for a company’s BoP innovation process. It aims at visualizing differences and challenges of BoP innovation processes in contrast to generic innovation processes. A literature review which was conducted first identified seven enabling factors for generic innovation processes: customer orientation, rigorous planning &amp; early specification, pre-development activities, formalized project selection, functional competence &amp; cross-functional teams, strong project leader and top management support. These theoretical findings provided the necessary framework for the qualitative, semi-structured interviews that were conducted with two companies, GE Healthcare and Godrej &amp; Boyce, which both recently implemented a BoP project. The empirical results visualized the companies’ BoP innovation processes and suggested the following findings. First, the focus on customer orientation was strengthened as a company’s unfamiliarity with the local context strengthens the importance of exactly understanding the consumers’ needs. Second, rigorous planning &amp; early specification was found not as important as in generic innovation processes due to the novelty of the endeavor and the necessary adjustments in the course of the project. Third, predevelopment activities remain important. Fourth, formalized project selection is found to be one of the most influential factors for a BoP innovation project. Fifth, no difference in significance was found in functional competence &amp; cross-functional team. However, the two dimensions of internationality of the team and proximity to respective decision makers were added. Sixth, the case studies showed that a strong project champion is decisive for a BoP project. Last, top management support was found to be one of the most important factors for a BoP innovation project as adjusting structural factors and strategic orientations is necessary for a BoP project to fully unfold. Furthermore, three additional factors (strategic (re-)orientation of a company, independent business unit and mindsets and work approach) were discussed.

The diplomas thesis is focused on innovation processes in Provident Financial s.r.o., company The main aim of this thesis is analysis of innovation processes and recommendation for its management. The support goal of this thesis is to analyse innovation environment in the company. The benefit from student will be the analysis of specific innovation processes, its assessment and concrete proposal for its managing in company.