Co-creation based Regional Innovation Platform

Design

Soon-Goo Hong, Hyun Jong Kim and Hyung Rim Choi

Dept. of Management Information Systems, Dong-A University,

Seo-Gu Gudukro 225, Busan 602-706, South Korea

shong@dau.ac.kr, hatdol@gmail.com, hrchoi@dau.ac.kr

Abstract. The participation of residents is regarded as important in the

development of various policies to promote regional innovation and solve social

problems. Social problems often involve complicated interests and sharp

conflicts. Thus, collecting and reflecting the opinions of residents can improve

the success of policies and the satisfaction of residents. To this end, a co-

creation-based regional innovation model has been proposed, but no system has

been proposed to implement the proposed methods and procedures. This study

proposes a conceptual design of a platform to efficiently implement a new

regional innovation model. The primary function of this platform is to support

the step-by-step methods and procedures of the model and the participation of

stakeholders using information technology (IT). This study contributes to the

research and development of the regional innovation platform and its practical

application.

Keywords: platform design, regional innovation, co-creation

1 Introduction

To solve the regional innovation and social problems, the collection of opinions and

the participation of residents are critical. There is an increasing number of cases in

which residents participate in the development and implementation of policies due to

the keen interest of administrative agencies to provide effective policies to residents

and the rising awareness of participation of residents. In the case of severe conflicts

between the administrative agency and residents, such as the construction of nuclear

power plants, both parties discuss their opinions and the public opinion is collected

before making a decision on the policy.

Various stakeholders are involved in the policy for solving regional social

problems and developing the region. It is difficult to fully reflect the conflicts and

various requirements arising from their complicated relationships in the policy. In the

past, a small number of policy developers and experts implemented policies under the

initiative of administrative agencies without regard to the opinions of residents. To

improve this system, the co-creation-based regional innovation model has been

proposed. This model provides procedures and methods for various stakeholders to

participate in policy development and implementation for regional innovation (Hong

et al., 2016).

Advanced Science and Technology Letters Vol.150 (AST 2018), pp.9-12

http://dx.doi.org/10.14257/astl.2018.150.03

ISSN: 2287-1233 ASTL Copyright © 2018 SERSC

There are limitations on time and fund to implement policies after gathering

opinions from all stakeholders. The participation of stakeholders and the application

of the unfamiliar co-creation-based regional innovation model are expected to be

difficult. Furthermore, the support of information systems using IT is required to

facilitate the participation of various stakeholders and utilize the regional innovation

model. Policy tasks can be discovered through big data analysis and stakeholders can

participate in the policy process and their opinions can be collected directly through

online. IT can also be used as a means of monitoring and evaluating the progress of

policy development and implementation (Hong et al., 2014).

In this study, we design a platform to support the co-creation-based regional

innovation model using IT. In other words, we propose the concept of a platform that

supports the development and implementation of policies by policy developers and

stakeholders for regional innovation through the utilization of IT in major steps and

procedures of the regional innovation model and allow them refer to past examples

and similar cases. To this end, we define the IT elements and functions to support the

co-creation-based regional innovation model and present a conceptual design that

defines the platform.

2 Theoretical Background

Co-creation is a management innovation method based on the concept that companies

and consumers jointly create value and share profit (Prahalad & Ramaswamy, 2003).

As a method for promoting regional innovation and solving social problems, the co-

creation-based regional innovation model has been proposed. This model presents the

method and procedure for developing and implementing policies for policy users by

allowing various stakeholders participate in the process of establishing strategies for

regional innovation and developing and implementing policies. This a new way of

engaging and collaborating with various stakeholders, unlike policy decisions in the

past that involved only administrative agencies and some experts. According to Hong

et al. (2017), the regional innovation model consists of seven stages: task

identification, empathy and problem understanding, problem definition, idea

generation, idea formulation, implementation, evaluation and feedback.

3 Design of the Regional Innovation Platform

The regional innovation platform developed in this study is for the implementation of

the co-creation-based regional innovation model. To apply this model effectively, it

needs to be supported by various information technologies. Therefore, the IT

functions required in the platform should be analyzed first through requirements

analysis. To do this, we analyzed the methods that need the support of IT and the

functions that can be supported by the platform in the co-creation method required in

each stage of the regional innovation model. In the regional innovation model derived

from the analysis, the IT functions required in each stage can be categorized into five

Advanced Science and Technology Letters Vol.150 (AST 2018)

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functions: communication, problem solving methodology, stakeholder, external

service interworking, and knowledge storage.

First, the communication function supports the communication between the

participants and provides the e-mail and online conference function. Second, the

problem solving methodology function provides specific methods and procedures of

the problem solving methodology presented by the platform. Third, the stakeholder

function provides the ability to select and set up stakeholders and experts who can be

summoned. Fourth, the external service interworking function enables interworking

with external services such as big data analysis and SNS. Fifth, the knowledge storage

function provides step-by-step examples and similar cases and stores the platform use

process and results as examples. In addition, as subsidiary functions, management

functions for platform operation process and user management are required.

To efficiently manage the main and subsidiary functions of the platform through

requirements analysis, the functions were integrated through modularization. The

elements with similar functions and processes were consolidated into five modules:

management module, service module, knowledge storage module, external

interworking module, and platform DB.

The main functions consisting of communication support, support of problem

solving methodology, and stakeholder setting have been integrated into the service

module. The functions of providing past policy cases and storing platform cases have

been integrated into the knowledge storage module. The management functions of the

subsidiary functions have been integrated into the management module and the

interworking with external services has been set up as the external interlocking

module. Lastly, the data generated by the platform is managed by the platform DB.

4 Conclusion

This study designed a platform to support the co-creation-based regional innovation

model. This regional innovation model requires the participation of various

stakeholders and the collection of ideas. The effective application of these functions

require the use of IT. Therefore, we designed a platform that can efficiently support

the IT elements required by the model.

To this end, the IT functions that can be supported by the platform were

summarized in requirements analysis and the functions that need to be supported by

the co-creation-based regional innovation platform were defined. The functions of the

platform are divided into 4 main functions, 2 subsidiary functions, and 14 detailed

functions. To efficiently manage the functions provided by the platform, five modules

were designed to manage the entire platform.

This study has an academic contribution in that it leads to follow-up studies of the

platform development supporting the co-creation-based regional innovation model

and the data can be used for developing the information system of the policy-related

model. Furthermore, the results of this study have practical implication in that they

can be used by administrative agencies to develop platforms and information systems

based on the regional innovation model.

Advanced Science and Technology Letters Vol.150 (AST 2018)

Copyright © 2018 SERSC 11

Acknowledgment. This work was supported by the Ministry of Education of the

Republic of Korea and the National Research Foundation of Korea(NRF-

2015S1A3A2046781).

References

1. Hong, S. G., Kim, H. J., Kim, N. R.: Development of a Co-creation Model for the Social

Problem Resolution, INFORMATION, vol. 19, no. 8(B), pp. 3395--3400, (2016)

2. Hong, S. G., Choi, H. R., Kim, H. J., Park, C. H., Lee, H. M.: Platform Design for Co-

creation, Lecture Notes in Electrical Engineering, vol. 301, pp. 863--874, (2014)

3. Prahalad, C. K., Ramaswamy, V.: The Future of Competition: Co-Creating Unique Value

with Customers, Harvard Business School Press, Boston, (2003)

4. Hong, S. G., Choi, H. R., Kim, N.R.: The birth of an innovation model for Co-creation,

Uwon Books, Seoul, (2017)

Advanced Science and Technology Letters Vol.150 (AST 2018)

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