Navigating in the Waves of Digital Transformations

Center for Knowledge and Innovation Research (CKIR) Workshop in August 2015

Digitalization continues to transform our society in ever-accelerating pace. The impacts cover all aspects of human life from individual level to the functioning of organizations, to industry development and policy making. The implications of digitization in terms of increasing connectedness but also creating digital divides call for new dynamism in relationships, interactions and institutional arrangements shaping the relation between companies, public sectors and citizens. Companies’ ability to sense demand shifts, create coalitions and proactively build on emerging opportunities becomes the basis of innovation, competitiveness, entrepreneurship and value creation.

In order to fully benefit from the ongoing digitalization, we need to understand the technological, societal and regulatory drivers and their interplay, as well as their implications. At the technological level, commoditization and servitization pave the way to virtualization, open standards and new business models. Changing patterns of consumption and customer participation in development processes challenge the traditional ways of innovation, product and service development and buyer-seller roles, and shifts in market regulations create opportunities for both dominant players and niche providers. The anticipated challenges of digitization relating to human behavior, business-consumer communication, privacy and security, knowledge gaps and institutional arrangements call for investigation and awareness.

In this workshop we will discuss the critical implications, opportunities, decisions and actions for digitalization from both corporate and public sector viewpoint. The overarching question is how to navigate through the continuous and frequent transformations and disruptions in technologies and markets, and create winning strategies and partnerships.

The workshop program is available on the CKIR workshop website.

For registrations and further questions, please visit the registration page or send an email to ckir-workshop-biz(at)aalto.fi.