ID2: A New Tool to Foster Innovation During the Early Phases of Design Projects

Innovation has been extensively studied both in the social sciences and in the engineering design field. In this paper we present the specifications and features of a new tool designed to coordinate the development of new solutions during the early phases of design projects. It is the result of 18 months of fieldwork within industrial companies during which we played an active role in the development of an innovative solution. We were also able to closely analyze the activities of certain actors (in this case materials experts) who are often behind proposals for new materials and processes. The Innovation Development and Diffusion (ID²) tool is geared to help innovative solutions emerge, on the one hand, and consolidate these solutions by circulating them to the company's different specialists on the other. The tool is based on a concepts/criteria table enabling the viewpoints of the different actors involved to be summarized during the design phase. In this paper we shall show how functional features such as links, questions, alarms, information enquiries, and the possibilities for exchanging information between actors can contribute to developing solutions for these different professionals. We will also see how the “innovative” solution proposed can be developed further by comparing and assessing it in relation to a list of criteria which is gradually drawn up by the actors involved in the project. This tool is designed to be managed by a coordinating actor who may also, depending on his/her strategy, consolidate the proposal by involving an increasing number of people.