ILLUMINATING APPLIED SERVICE INNOVATION RESEARCH WITH SMES: THE CASE OF THE RIKON GROUP

Generating absorbable and practical knowledge on the systematic development, design and testing of new and/or improved service offerings, processes and business models, i.e. service innovation, represents a timely and relevant growth area transcending European and Irish innovation, recovery and socio-economic strategies. However, research into the development and practice of service innovation vis-à-vis product innovation is a relatively emerging domain and as such, is at best characterised as emerging. The existing body of research knowledge, derived largely from product innovation, fails to provide concrete processes by which to embed service innovation at the firm-level which has significant implications in terms of industry awareness, deployment and impact. Reflective of this, Irish data emanating from the Community Innovation Survey indicates that small and medium enterprises (SMEs) report the least levels of engagement, expenditure and collaboration with academia in relation to innovation activities, which is a concern when the Irish enterprise landscape is dominated by SMEs. Mindful of the foregoing; this research, which has received ‘New Ideas’ funding from the Irish Research Council for the Humanities and Social Sciences utilises The RIKON Group based in W.I.T as a knowledge provider within Enterprise Ireland’s Innovation Voucher Programme as a lens to disseminate (1) the application areas and methodologies of service innovation and (2) the range and impact of applied service innovation research and knowledge transfer. Through a combination of desk research and multiple case study developments transcending an end-to-end perspective of service innovation including ideation, business development, market analysis, service design and market development this research (1) synthesises the service innovation challenges faced by Irish SMEs; (2) illustrates the methodologies utilised to deliver service innovation solutions to SMEs; (3) highlights the range of applied service innovation research interventions developed by The RIKON Group; (4) profiles Irish service innovation case studies and (5) demonstrates the various impacts associated with implementing service innovation. This research accordingly impacts at various stakeholder levels, most notably in terms of raising industry awareness and practice, informing policy development through evidence based research and contributes to the emerging academic and applied research agenda surrounding the discipline.