Abstract: The lecture will give an overview of our research program on the innovative challenges of both start-ups and incumbents in an emerging market as illustrated with research on drone-platform based innovations. I will summarize current research on drones from an eco-innovation perspective –what is supportive in creating an eco-innovation system and what is the role of the universities in facilitating market creation. Then I will present some of the research, we have done on the start-ups and how they face and strategize towards the legislation (which is fundamentally trying to prevent market creation) and how they adjust their innovative activities accordingly. Finally, if time permits, I will talk on how we have developed a multi-dimensional database to research the emerging technology of drones and how these drone-data are used to develop quality publications.

Speaker's Bio: Mette Præst Knudsen is Professor and Center Leader for “Center for Integrative Innovation Management” (CI2M) at the Department of Marketing and Management (IMM) at the University of Southern Denmark (SDU). She has been a research manager since 2005 and was founding director of CI2M, a cross-disciplinary research Centre across the Faculties of Social Sciences and Engineering. She has a PhD in Economics from Aalborg University. Her research integrates market, management, and technological perspectives on the innovation processes. These perspectives are particularly relevant in relation to the creative development of new ideas searching for full commercialization to achieve competitive advantages. The focus on commercialization has proven useful in relation to development of new technologies with unknown market potential (as for instance with innovative drone technologies and green technologies). She is currently senior partner of six research projects interested in specifying and analyzing effects of certain training efforts and motivation of employees on innovation, particularly related to the latest transformative technologies like industry 4.0, technological platforms and additive manufacturing– and how they influence innovative activities, work forms, and work in general. She is the national expert on Research and Innovation Policy to the Joint Research Center’s annual report “Research and Innovation Observatory), since 2016. She is currently the Vice-Dean for Research at the Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of Southern Denmark. She will be visiting CPA Innovation Centre from March 8^th – April 5^th 2019.

For more information on MPK:

https://portal.findresearcher.sdu.dk/da/persons/mpk

For more information on Center for Integrative Innovation Management:

https://www.sdu.dk/en/om_sdu/institutter_centre/i_marketing/forskning/forskningsenheder/ci2m