KNOW-IT Project


Information About IT-tool Documents General documentation An Introduction to TRIZ Other Contacts Help us! Links	EU-Research Project KNOW-IT Supporting Innovation Process Development Objectives The primary goal of the project is the support of the conceptual development of the innovation process in companies. It focuses on the new product development (NPD) as a core element of innovation in the company. The conceptual development of the innovation process in a company starts with the analysis of the current technical system (TS) that is being inspected. This current state of the TS will be projected on the curve of technological trends which then provides a description of the current situation. From there possible developments of the current TS in a possible future TS according to technological trends and market requirement will be derived and the appropriate development process is selected. The Systematic Innovation approach (TRIZ) will be used as a core methodology. Another key aspect of the project is the mix of the two main drivers of innovation in the NPD field: (1) the technology push and (2) the marketing requirements. Approach The high level framework for the conceptual development of the innovation process applied during the consulting will be centred on the following steps: Outline the current TS-function in a systematic way with respect to technology and market development. Positioning the TS on the technological trends chart using automatic analysis methods on relevant information sources Identify possible developments of the TS using the Systematic Innovation approach with respect to the laws of evolution Evaluate the possible development directions and choose the most appropriate ones. This high level framework should be supported by an IT-tool that provides information and analyses for every step. Results As the outcome of the project, an exemplary methodology has been developed for supporting the innovation processes; a prototype software system supporting the single phases of the methodology has been implemented too. The impact and efficiency of the developed tools have been evaluated and analyzed through many pilot and real world case studies, demonstrating the quality of the theoretical and practical results of the scientific research done during the project duration.