Achieving Fractal Innovation Objectives

This blog post is a draft response to “Section 1 Science and Technology Excellence / Section 1.2 Progress Beyond the State of the Art / Section 1.2.2 Objectives” in the technical annex of the planned COST 2019 Open Call Proposal Reference: OC-2019-1-23678 "Open European Network for Enterprise Innovation in High Value Manufacturing (ENTOV-HVM)".

The image shows an example of a Mandelbrot set to exemplify the fractal nature of living systems that the proposed innovation web approach will leverage as it scales over time (see also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fractal).

 

The research coordination objectives are focused on the distribution of tasks, sharing of knowledge and know-how, and the creation of synergies among the key roles assumed by Action Participants to achieve the intended outputs. Achieving these objectives turns the proposed Action Participants from initially scattered groups into one transnational team and leverages existing funded research they are involved in. The Research Coordination Objectives (RCO) are:

• RCO 1: Development of a common understanding of the innovation web space and its purposeful behaviour (based on value network principles)
• RCO 2: Research driven identification / validation of the recipe for successful innovation webs and their archetypes (based on knowledge innovation zone principles).
• RCO 3: Coordination of activities to populate the roles of the innovation web with suitable participants in relevant groupings (using previously identified archetypes as guiding framework).
• RCO 4: Coordination of testing to validate the purposeful performance of the innovation web created with relevant calibration to align with previously identified archetypes).
• RCO 5: Implementation of the innovation web to enable the application of advanced collaboration and simulation capabilities and enterprise innovation networks to the idea of relevance within an international research and industrial context.
• RCO 6: Development of a scalable (international) model suited for automation of the innovation web creation and management process within a web-based service platform capability.
• RCO 7: Generation of input to a variety of (non-) governmental stakeholders on policies suited for nurturing innovation webs at all levels from the individual idea, through regions, nation states and federations.
• RCO 8: Dissemination of research results to the general public and stakeholder groups.

The specific tangible outputs of the research coordination objectives cannot be achieved without significant international coordination because ideas and the advanced collaboration and simulation capabilities, and enterprise innovation networks needed for their acceleration are not focused in specific national regions or manufacturing clusters due to the low level of maturity of the relevant relationships.

 

The capacity objectives are focused on creating dynamic knowledge exchange and the development of a purposeful meta-innovation web among the Action Participants in order to achieve the intended outputs. Achieving these objectives will enable the rapid and effective creating and scaling of individual innovation webs around ideas which are selected to not only drive industry specific innovation processes but also to bridge separate fields of science and disciplines to achieve breakthroughs that require an interdisciplinary approach. The Capacity Building Objectives (CBO) in particular are:

• CBO 1: Identify the successful archetype for successful (meta-) innovation webs
• CBO 2: Create a meta-innovation web as trans-national stakeholder platform and practice community.
• CBO 3: Populate innovation web roles with participants from specific target groups that would particularly benefits from the transnational “web weaving” (i.e. newly established research groups)
• CBO 4: Early Career Investigators, the under-represented gender, teams from countries/regions with less capacity in the field of the Action while ensuring appropriate mentorship and guidance
• CBO 5: Enable purposeful collaborative behaviour among the innovation web participants.  

The next posting will address the specific added value of networking in science and technology excellence, specifically in response to section 2.1.1 “Added value in relation to existing efforts at European and/or international level.

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