Service Innovation and Design

Results from co-creation

Publisher
Laurea University of Applied Sciences Vanha maantie 9 FI-02650 Espoo

Service Innovation and Design

Results from co-creation
Preface.............................................................................................................. 4 Katri Ojasalo and Virpi Kaartti
Theory

Editors
Katri Ojasalo Virpi Kaartti Outi Kinnunen

CoCo - Value co-creation: why & how? ............................................................ 6 Krista Kernen DiYSE - Designing service experiences for intellectually disabled people ....... 8 Rob Moonen and Sami Kauppinen ServBis and SISSI Revised mind: revised ways to operate and to think ....... 10 Pivi J. Tossavainen Massidea.org A colorful way to learn and innovate ...................................... 12 Teemu Santonen Renderfarm.fi - Making movies with a screensaver ......................................... 14 Julius Tuomisto Finlab - Accelerating Finnish innovativeness and competiveness by Living Labs concepts ........................................................... 16 Seppo Leminen

Graphic design and illustration

Petra Boije

methods

photos
Joni Nurmi Sami Kauppinen Niko Suomalainen Susanna Ba Studio Lumikuu ISBN 978-951-799-261-9 January 2012

business

Koulii - Cracking the coconut in the Suurpelto region ..................................... 18 Pekka Matvejeff CONNECT - Helping Finnish SMEs to increase the use of renewable energy solutions in Africa ........................................................... 20 Birgit Aurela eReading Services - Developing business models for publishing industry........................................................................................... 22 Seppo Leminen and Anu Nousiainen

safety & security management

Guarantee - A safer home environment ........................................................... 24 Rob Moonen and Heikki Seppl MOBI Mobile object bus interaction ............................................................. 26 Hanna-Miina Sihvonen and Jyri Rajamki SATERISK Risks of satellite-based tracking.................................................. 28 Robert Guinness, Jyri Rajamki and Seija Tiainen

hospitality management

MMP - Measuring multiple senses in service experiences ............................... 30 Leena Alakoski and Satu Luojus Local Food Sustainable business for Uusimaa Region .................................. 32 Janne Huuhtanen, Aira Sevn and Ritva Jttel Laurea Service Innovation and Design............................................................. 34

Preface I

t is our great pleasure to introduce this new Service Innovation and Design publication. After years of intensive development work in the field of Service Innovation and Design (SID) at Laurea University of Applied Sciences, it is rewarding to see how much has actually been achieved. After launching the first SID publication in Laureas first Service Innovation & Design seminar in 2007, a great body of knowledge and RDI networks has been created. During this period four successful SID seminars and dozens of projects have been carried out at Laureas SID unit in Espoo (known as LaureaSID). Currently, the volume of RDI work at LaureaSID is over 7 million euros. LaureaSID has also been a prime mover in the field of Service Innovation and Design education: it was the first institution in the world to provide the Master of Business Administration degree programme in SID starting in 2009. The third SID Masters group will start their studies in September 2012. In total, Laurea University of Applied Sciences has app. 8000 students. In February 2012 LaureaSID is proud to organize the third ServDes Conference, the premier research conference within service design and innovation. This event belongs to the World Design Capital Helsinki 2012 programme. Today, service innovation and design are globally at the forefront of research and practice priorities. The term service is currently being approached broadly meaning holistic solutions provided for and created with the customers/users. According to this view, every business is service business. The core competences of SID lie in understanding the growing complexity of service systems and the crucial role of customer value and experiences. These competences have created an emerging need to

develop interdisciplinary approaches and methods in the field of SID. The RDI work of LaureaSID is leaning on four competence strongholds: 1. Service Science theories, 2. Creative methodology in designing services, 3. Business and ICT competences in service innovation and design, and 4. Industry specific competences when designing service systems, concepts and processes in the fields of Safety & Security Management and Hospitality & Facility Management. Service Science aims at an interdisciplinary approach to research, development, and innovation in service. It provides the systems thinking to understand, model and design holistic service systems, concepts and processes. Creative methodology in service design provides a co-design and user-centered perspective to open up the boundaries for service innovation. Innovation is powered from a thorough understanding of customers/users, their contexts, values and needs. Deep business and ICT competences are needed to translate this understanding into effective and efficient service systems, concepts and processes and competitive new business models. LaureaSID aims to synthesise the service science approach, co-design and user-centered methods and practical business and ICT competences to foster service innovation and renewal especially in the growing industries of safety & security management and hospitality & facility management. In a university of applied sciences the challenge how to combine research knowledge across disciplines when researching, developing and innovating is much smaller than in any other type of a research organisation. This is

due to its closeness to the practical business world. At Laurea all the RDI activities are closely integrated with the teaching and the staff with various backgrounds across disciplines are working closely together in the projects. This publication presents altogether 14 projects of LaureaSID. They are all funded by an outside source and carried out in interesting networks. These RDI projects focus on four competence strongholds of LaureaSID in the following way: 1. 2. Developing Service Science theories: CoCo project, Creative co-design and user-centered methodologies: DiYSE, ServBis & SISSI, Massidea, Renderfarm/ ORE and FinLab projects, Business and ICT competences in service development: Koulii, CONNECT and eReading projects, and Industry specific competences in the Safety & Security Management: Guarantee, MOBI and SATERISK projects, and Hospitality & Facility Management: MMP and Local Food projects. Katri Ojasalo

3. 4.

It should be noted that in addition to the projects described in this publication, plenty of other interesting and important SID activities and RDI projects are being carried out at LaureaSID. We hope you will have an inspiring learning experience when reading this publication. We thank all the contributors and everyone who helped us to put this publication together. We also thank Laureas SID Advisory Board, which has impressive knowledge not only by academic standards but also by measure of business competence and experience. Katri Ojasalo and Virpi Kaartti Editors of this publication

Virpi Kaartti

Today, service innovation and design are globally at the forefront of research and practice priorities.

4 | Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation

Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation | 5

CoCo Value co-creation: why & how?

Krista Kernen Doctoral student, Project Manager

ustomers role has changed dramatically. Today, customers are taking a more active role in value creation, and the focus of the value creation processes is rapidly shifting from a supplier company centric view to a more customer centric approach that aims to support customer experiences and joint value co-creation. Still, relatively little is known about how customers engage in value co-creation. Especially in B2B businesses, it is crucial to thoroughly know ones customers, their business models and processes, and on this basis to develop new ways to create value with customers and other stakeholders. The CoCo (From co-production to co-creation) research project aims at identifying and developing co-production/ co-creation activities and roles in B-to-B service relationships. The CoCo project (20102012) is funded by How? - In addition to creating new scientific Tekes, the Finnish Funding Agency for Techknowledge, an important aim of the project nology and Innovation, and the case comis to develop service design methods and panies. It is a parallel project to VTTs A tool for a virtual platform for co-creation to be (Technical Research Centre of Finland) analysing the applied in companies offering B-to-B ServChange project. The CoCo project co-creation approach services. The CoCo research uses an is carried out in conjunction with five in B-to-B action research approach. In the first companies. phase of the empirical research, the curcompanies rent state of business approach has been Why? - Companies are moving from busianalysed by interviewing the personnel and ness models in which value came mainly customers of the case companies. The second from physical goods to models where value phase of the research is based on the needs identified comes more or less from intangible things such as services, knowledge and relationships. In this shift customers in the current state analysis and it includes several develshould be seen as co-creators of value rather that as pas- opment rounds in the case companies. Then, more creasive recipients of goods and services. The CoCo research tive service design methods will be applied. project focuses on creating new knowledge in the service science by studying the development of competitive value As the first concrete result of this study, a tool for analysing the current state of the co-creation approach has been co-creation approaches in services.

Value comes from intangible things such as services, knowledge and relationships

New ways to create value with customers

developed. The tool consists of 15 criteria and analyses a companys value co-creation from three angles: 1. Strategic thinking and the business model, 2. Customer interactions and relationships, and 3. Service design processes. The tool has been developed and tested in the case companies and presented in three different conferences in its different development stages. The CoCo research project is playing a major role in the PhD research of project manager Krista Kernen at the University of Cambridge, UK. Krista Kernen will work as a full time CoCo researcher two months per year in the Cambridge scientific community as part of the Design Management research group. Project related expertise will be imported from Cambridge, for example, as aspiring speakers for seminars and workshops.

Laureas aim through the Learning by Developing (LbD) model is to offer a real development environment to the students. So far, altogether over 200 Laureas students have been working in the CoCo project. For example, a few SID Masters students have been analysing the current state of the case companies business approach as part of their Masters thesis.

Some publications
Kernen, K. & Ojasalo, K. (2011), Value co-creation in b-to-b-services, Paper presented at Campus Encounters Bridging Learners Conference Developing Competences for Next Generation Service Sectors, Porvoo, April 1314, 2011. Ojasalo, K. & Kernen, K. (2011), Designing a tool for analysing the current state of a companys co-creation approach, Paper presented at Cambridge Academic Design Management Conference, September 7-8, 2011.

6 | Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation

Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation | 7

DiYSE Designing service experiences

for intellectually disabled people

Rob Moonen BBA, SID Masters student, Project Manager

Sami Kauppinen MA, Service Designer

in which end-users and support people took part. Video eb-based services and applications are a norobservations and probes were also used to gather more mal part of everyday life. The virtual and physical information about the intellectually disabled peoples world is increasingly interconnected by smart objects and motives, attitudes, habits, experiences, knowledge environments also known as the Internet-of-Things and expectations of future technologies. phenomena. The DiYSE Do-it-Yourself Smart Experience project (20092011) has been Empowering Interviews were considered useful for getfocusing on enabling non-technical endintellectually ting an understanding of the end users users to easily create, setup and control basic needs. This particular method can meaningful services in their smart living disabled people to be sometimes challenging since some end environments and in the public Internetcommunicate and users like autistic persons have difficulties of-Things (IoT) space. The project is a part express answering questions. The probe methodof the European ITEA2 program and incluology, where end users could explain their des 40 companies and research partners (for needs and wishes by taking photos and writing example Philips, Alcatel-Lucent Bell Labs and diaries, gave better insights about the latent needs. VTT) from seven different countries. Video observation on the contrary allowed users to show and tell what they are doing in their natural surroundings. In Finland the project focus has been on empowerCombining above mentioned methods resulted in good ing intellectually disabled people to communicate and insights about the kinds of service experiences that would express themselves in an optimized way. Intellectually be beneficial for the end-users. disabled (ID) people have a limited capability to physically and mentally experience services, since most of the services are meant for the mass market. The following shows how latent needs of intellectually disabled people are identified and service concepts are co-created with the various stakeholders. Laureas role within the project focuses on user centered research, conceptual design of the service experience, evaluation, and business modeling. We started our project within the Finnish consortium with qualitative research with Rinnekoti-Sti, a foundation for disabled people that produces healthcare and social services to municipalities. Ten users with a mild or moderate intellectual disability, varying in age from 21 to 50 years, participated in the study. Interview sessions were conducted

The findings were utilised during several workshops where Another scenario in Finland, the easy music creation we co-created service concepts and scenarios together experience, makes it possible for intellectually disabled with the project partners. The scenarios visualised how people to create music in an easy and intuitive way. intellectually disabled people could experience a variety A sensor based application allows users to make music of services that would empower them to communicate by moving different body parts. While its important to and express themselves. Several of these scenarcreate service experiences that meet the specific ios were implemented in Finland as well as in needs of the end-users, its crucial to look at Belgium. One of the pilots created in Finland the exploitation perspective of the solution as Designing is the symbol-based chat application called well. Laurea conducted a business feasibility service SymbolChat. This application allows intelanalysis by utilizing the business model canexperiences lectually disabled users and their support vas. During a workshop with VTT (Technical personnel to send short symbol-based mesResearch Centre of Finland), Music Makers, sages in real time. The application can be easand Delicode we developed and crystallized a ily configured for persons with specific needs and common integrated business model. abilities, making it possible to personalize the interaction style with the application. Laurea evaluated the appli- The DiYSE project allowed us to utilise various RDI methcation in cooperation with University of Tampere and odologies while looking at different aspects of the service Rinnekoti-Sti. design process.

Some publications
Utilising various RDI methodologies in the service design process
Moonen R., Kauppinen S., Iyer A. & Ojasalo K., (2010), Methods and challenges of doing research with intellectually disabled people: an ongoing empirical study, UMADR 2010. Kauppinen S., Kotimki T., Heimonen T., Turunen M. & Laivo T., (2011), Chataamista ilman kirjoitustaitoa in english: Chatting without writing abilities, Ketju Magazine, 1, 2011. Iyer A. & de Roeck D. (2010), Empowering people to connect & create with smart technology, Sixth Swiss Design Network Conference, 28.10.2010.

8 | Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation

Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation | 9

the second work package, based on the current state analysis of the service approach each firm received a project plan and selection of service design tools to be tested. Further development of the toolset continued. The third work package focused on improvement activities and dissemination of new knowledge. Altogether eight service design tools and two methods were tested and developed further. Students were also involved in the project; for example, Masters students as part of their study course revised the toolset and improved its visualization and usability. The third work package ended with the collection and analysis of the research project results. Several articles are being written or in progress. The ServBis project also participates in organizing the final seminar with the other projects funded by the same program of Tekes in March 2012.

Companies need easy-to-use tools to take the first steps towards service dominant logic

ServBis and SISSI

Revised mind: revised ways to operate and to think
(SMEs) to adopt a service business approach and mindset. ServBis is a 1-year (2011) service business project partly funded by Tekes, the Finnish Funding Agency for Technology and Innovation. Its a cooperative project of three universities of applied sciences: Laurea, HaagaHelia and Metropolia. Further, this project engages eight case companies from different industry sectors: ATEA Finland Oy, Atlas Copco, Aussie Bar Oy, Care IT Oy, Experiri Oy, Finnair Flight Academy Oy, RapidBlue Solutions and Tietomitta Oy. The ServBis project has three overlapping phases. The first work package focused on the recent research on the developed tools and theoretical background. First, a common framework for evaluation purposes was developed. Each case company was evaluated and their current state in service business was analysed with the framework. In

The results of the ServBis project indicate that most firms have room for improvement in understanding the service dominant logic and service mindset. To reform firms towards service driven business approach and customer centricity faces challenges. The main obstacle seems to be the attitude of Using learning and building new competences. collaborative Lack of time and motivated resources methods when pose further challenges. It was also evident that firms need practical guidance designing and easy-to-use tools in order to take the services first steps towards service dominant logic. The ServBis project has enjoyed the multiparty collaboration and networked co-creation of service mindset and service design toolbox. SISSI - Service Innovation through Strategic Stakeholder Integration (SISSI) project continues the service innovation and design RDI tradition of LaureaSID. This project is also funded by Tekes and it is carried out in cooperation with LaureaSID and Hanken Swedish School of Economics. The objective of the SISSI project is to research and develop methods to integrate strategic stakeholders in firms service innovation processes. The projects duration is 2,5 years (autumn 2011 spring 2014). Four Laureas Masters students have started their Masters theses in the project, one of them as a full-time research assistant. From both LaureaSID and Hanken, three faculty members participate in the project. Through research and the engagement with firms such as Lassila & Tikanoja and Skanska, SISSI enhances the service business field with effective participatory stakeholder integration.

Integrating strategic stakeholders in service innovation processes

Pivi J. Tossavainen D.Sc. (Econ.), Principal Lecturer

Some publications
Kaski, T., Ojasalo, K. & Toivola, T. (2011) Service Business Development in Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SMEs): A Case study on methods and tools enhancing SMEs transformation to service dominant business logic. Paper presented in the Naples Forum on Service in June 2011, Anacapri, Italy. Tossavainen, P. (2011) ServBis palveluosaamista pk-yrityksiin. Palvelumenetelmist uutta potkua liiketoimintaan in Tekes (2011) Tutkimustuloksista arvoa liiketoimintaan. Serve Palveluliiketoiminnan edellkvijille -ohjelma 20062013. Tutkimusprojektijulkaisu 2011, pp. 107-108.

he transformation of business towards service dominant logic and the increasing awareness of service business opportunities change the competence needs of firms. It is crucial to understand service driven business approach and to learn to use collaborative methods when designing services. LaureaSID is focusing on this issue through two separate projects: ServBis and SISSI. ServBis transferring service knowledge and competences to SMEs aims to develop, test, and disseminate practical tools that ease small and medium sized firms

10 | Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation

Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation | 11

Massidea.org A colorful
way to learn and innovate
From 2008 to 2011, the European Social Fund (ESF) funded project (1.1 MEUR) was founded and coordinated by LauTeemu Santonen reaSID in order to develop and implement Massidea.org Ph.D., Principal Lecturer as a part of the Finnish national open innovation system. Officially the Massidea.org project consortium included a dozen partner universities from Finland covering geonnovations are and have always been an important graphically most of Finland. During the project, the partbuilding stone for achieving a business success in a ner network was expanded via collaboration with Forehighly competitive global business environment. How- Massi 2025 a project forecasting educational needs for ever, according to open innovation thinkers, in the future the wellbeing and security sector and EU-VIP a project business success will depend more and more on exploring the possibilities that virtual mobility can the ability to utilize external resources via offer in the area of international work placeopen innovation processes. Due to Interments. International collaboration was A free of charge net and especially the rapid growth of the conducted with National Institute of Techopen innovation recent online social network phenomenology, Hamirpur from India, Lillebaelt non, these technological and behavioAcademy of Professional Higher Educacommunity where ral changes have created the most protion from Denmark and Ple Universitaire people can share mising platform for global collaboration. Lonard de Vinci from France. their ideas With the help of todays online technology, we can relatively easily and cost effectively A majority of all development and implecombine people even from geographically dismentation activities including content producpersed and distant cultures as one virtual intercultution to the Massidea.org website were performed by ral team. Therefore, in the future it is vital to understand university of applied sciences students via course coland learn how to innovate in a virtually supported inter- laboration, project studies, internships or final thesis. cultural open innovation environment. Most importantly, development activities followed a virtually supported distributed development process in When a wide range of people and their different but com- which development was carried out in multiple Finnish plimentary insights are brought together, novel ideas and foreign locations, while working generated by thinking outside the box are possible. Some collaboratively towards the comauthors call this mass collaboration or crowdsourcing, mon outcome. As a result one of Business success yet we prefer the term mass innovation. Massidea.org is the most important outcomes will depend more on a free of charge open innovation community where peo- of the Massidea.org project the ability to utilise ple can share their ideas, discuss todays challenges as besides the website and idea, well as visions of the future; key factors when creating challenge and vision of the external resources new innovations. By intelligently connecting people and future descriptions, is the virvia open innovation their insights with the help of content recommendation, tually supported distributed processes a creative space that can boost individual and communal development process. creativity is constructed. In Massidea.org, public, private and educational sector organizations and individual users Besides a of series of bachelor theses, and citizens can collaborate with the wide and global project results also include 10 peer-reviewed range of masses of people. Technologically Massidea.org scientific publications, which introduced the preliminary is grounded on open source solution. concept, content recommendation support to individual

Massidea.org concept was rewarded as the best school related innovation

creativity, integration to the Triple Helix model, definition of the digital business ecosystem (DBE) for Massidea.org and generic success measures for the mass collaboration rewarding model. Implementation success publications evaluated Massidea.org from a historical timeline point of view, using a Profiting From Innovation (PFI) approach, defining Massidea.org as a business model innovation from the Stage-Gate Process point, evaluating students motivation to participate in online mass innovation and describing how intercultural virtual student teams open innovate via online social networks. Green Technologies in Food Production and Processing, a book published by Springer (2012) will include Massidea.org greener way to innovate, a chapter which summarises the theoretical concept development of Massidea.org. In the year 2008 Massidea.org concept was rewarded as the best school related innovation by the Finnish Inventor Support Association.

Some publications
Santonen, T. & Schallmo, D. (2011), Evaluating Industry Business Model Innovation Stage-Gate Process: Case Massidea.org, The XXII ISPIM Conference Sustainability in Innovation: Innovation Management Challenges, Hamburg, Germany, 12-15 June, 2011. Santonen, T., Kaivo-Oja, J. & Antikainen, M., (2011), National Open, Innovation System (NOIS): Defining a Solid Reward Model for NOIS, International Journal of Innovation and Regional Development (IJIRD), Vol 3., No. 1. Santonen, T. & Karhu, K., (2010), Massidea.org: Defining a digital business ecosystem (DBE) for massinnovation, The 3rd ISPIM Innovation Symposium - Managing the Art of Innovation: Turning Concepts into Reality, Quebec City, Canada, 1215 December, 2010.

12 | Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation

Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation | 13

Renderfarm.fi

screensaver ovies with a Making m

resolutions when rendering. Equally importantly, it enables its users to participate in the rendering of stills and animations, regardless of whether or not they themselves are able to or even interested in learning about 3D modeling and animation. The stills and animations created can then later become parts of a movie that the users have helped to create. Renderfarm.fi encourages everybody to take part in both the online community and the collaborative rendering. We also advocate open licensing (Creative Commons), open values and sharing of resources over geographic borders. The adoption of open values has garnered the team a lot of approval. In Autumn 2010 Renderfarm.fi won the national competition to represent Finland in the UN and UNESCO sponsored and highly regarded e-content competition World Summit Award. Following its success in the national competition, picked from a line of 460 other registrants from 106 UN member countries, the service went on to win the International World Summit Award in the category of E-Science and Technology in June 2011. The ORE project also led to the creation of Studio Lumikuu, the worlds first completely Blender based open movie and 3D production studio. Founded as a co-operative (instead of the usual limited company) by five Finnish micro companies, Studio Lumikuu is also the worlds first studio to adopt the completely open, volunteer computing based rendering pipeline advocated by Renderfarm.fi. Starting from October 2011, Renderfarm.fi and the team behind it started working within the European Union Funding Programme 7 funded SCI-BUS (SCIentific gateway Based User Support) project. Laurea UASs partners

in the SCI-BUS consortium include entities such as ETH Zurich, University of Tubingen, University of Catania and University of Westminster. The SCI-BUS project aims at the creation and maintaining of so-called e-science portals that help their user groups, whether they be scientists, artists or just other interested people, to easily make use of distributed computing for their needs.

renderfarm.FI
Renderfarm.fi has over 6 000 registered users from all over the world and at any one time there are over 500 computers attached for rendering for anyone, for free The What is Renderfarm.fi? feat. Big Buck Bunny has received 25 000 views on Youtube, the video was produced by ORE spin-off Studio Lumikuu The single largest rendering that was done on the service would have taken 3,5 years to render on an average participating computer and cost at least 20 000 on a commercial service, we did it in 14 days for free

Julius Tuomisto Masters student in Degree Programme in IT, Project Manager

tributed rendering. Done in collaboration with Tekes, Otaverkko and Star Wreck Studios, the project was run at the LaureaSID Networks laboratory between 20072009. The project resulted in the creation of Renderfarm.fi, a completely volunteer computing based rendering platform. Within the project, the service was directly integrated with Blender, the worlds most popular open source 3D suite. This coupled with the fact that Renderfarm.fi is and always will be a completely free service that enables its users to render their animations and stills by using the computing power of volunteers from around the world, has made the service the most popular of its kind in the whole world. All in all, students and thesis workers had a significant part in early concept development. By using Renderfarm.fi, 3D artists and animators benefit from being able to use higher image quality and higher

n 2005 a young Finnish film producer Samuli Torssonen released his first full-length feature film Star Wreck: In the Pirkinning. The movie, created with a budget of just 10 000, featured near-Hollywood level Visual Effects which were rendered in some 1.5 years in Samulis mothers kitchen using five old computers computing in parallel. Inspired by the proven need for an affordable solution to the computation of complex 3D graphics by students, independent movie-makers, small 3D studios and other actors, the ORE project (Open Rendering Environment) was created to research volunteer computing based dis-

14 | Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation

Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation | 15

and competitiveness by Living Labs concepts

Seppo Leminen Dr.(Econ.), Principal Lecturer, Adjunct Professor

Finlab Accelerating Finnish innovativeness

Developing a national Living Lab developer network

he Finlab project was a national initiative (2008 2011) whose mission was to create an active collaboration network between companies and research organisations and make Finland a well-known and recognized testing and validation site world-wide. One of the aims of the national Finlab project was to describe and define the Finlab Living Lab business and service concept and define IPR guidelines of Finlab concept.

Living Labs can be defined as functional regions where stakeholders have formed a partnership of firms, public agencies, universities, institutes and users, which consequently collaborate in the creation, prototyping, validating and testing of new services, products and systems in real-life contexts. Such contexts include cities, villages, rural areas, industrial plants as well as public places such as airports. The main idea is that a Living Lab consists of a real-life environment with access to users and methods, through which the functionality of the product or technology is verified and assessed. (Nystrm and Leminen 2011)

Integrating end-users and customers in a service development process as actual co-developers

development of Living Lab business and service concepts together with the research and business partners. The project was partly funded by TEKES the Finnish Funding Agency for Technology and Innovation and partly by the participating companies.

user and customer involvement and integration to development phases enables a company to understand customers actual behavior, needs and future trends better. By integrating users into RDI processes, a company gains the competitive advantage, which its competitors not necessarily have. By integrating a customer or user in the development, the pitfalls in the launch of a new product or service to the market can be identified and can be avoided. Moreover, the knowledge of the end-users or customers needs may lead to brainstorm, development and creation of new, parallel, and complementary products and services. An integration of the end-user or the customer in the product and service development of companies is not yet everyday practice in industry and service companies. A Living Lab approach gives not only information about the end users experiences of the product or service but enables to co-develop and even co-create with users.

Some publications
Leminen, S. & Westerlund, M. (2011), Innovation co-creation with customer and user networks, Proceedings from the 26th IMP Conference, September 13, 2011, Glasgow, Scotland Leminen, S. (Ed.) (2011), Co-creation with Users and Customers in Living Labs Integrating users and customers in companies business processes, Laurea Publications A76 61 p., Vantaa. Nystrm A-G & Leminen, S. (2011), Living Lab A New Form of Business Network, Proceedings from the 17th International Conference on Concurrent Enterprising (ICE2011), 20 - 22 June 2011, ISBN: 978-1-4577-0772-8. 10 p. Aachen, Germany. http://ieeexplore. ieee.org Westerlund M. & Leminen S. (2011), Managing the Challenges of Becoming an Open Innovation Company: Experiences from Living Labs, Technology Innovation Management Review. October 2011.

Another aim of the project was also to develop a national Living Lab developer network, which Why it is important to integrate users and cusdevelops and executes open innovation tomers in companies business processes? Living Lab development services, and a customer netIn spite of market research and customer is a real-life work, which exploits developed services. analysis, the majority of the new products environment The Finlab project had several research and services fail when launching them into with access to partners: Laurea University of Applied markets. This is often due to the fact that Sciences, University of Turku, two research products and services do not correspond to users institutes of Aalto University (Medialab and the user needs related to the price, properCKIR Center for Knowledge and Innovation ties, functionality or usability, or often the prodResearch), VTT Technical Research Centre of Finuct or service is launched too early or too late in the land, as well as business partners Nokia, Digita, Dimes market. Therefore, the need for integrating end-users and Octopus Network. Laurea was responsible for Living and customers in a new product and service development Labs activities in the Finlab project and focused on the process as actual co-developers is important. A deeper

16 | Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation

Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation | 17

Planning the new shopping mall by collecting innovative ideas for the development process

Koulii Cracking the coconut

in the Suurpelto region

Pekka Matvejeff M.Soc.Sc (Management), MBA (Henley), Senior Lecturer

vative urban environment focusing on life-long learning, intercultural and family orientation, sustainable development and new service concepts is established.

With the help of the City of Espoo the main stakeholders in the Suurpelto region were invited to develop and experihe title of the article refers to a song written by a ment the services and products suitable for the needs and famous Finnish singer and composer. It tells about life situations of users interacting with them in Suurpelto. the difficulties encountered, when trying to break the In order to find new ways to produce learning and to intecoconut shell. When attacking the traditional bounda- grate their learning processes in real-life urban developries in change processes we face situations simiment, Laurea University of Applied Sciences and lar to cracking nuts. This is also very often the Vocational College Omnia established a the case in service design processes. The development project called Koulii (2010 Truly listening development process of the Suurpelto 2012), which is funded by the European to various region in the heart of the City of Espoo Social Fund (ESF). So far, it has been a in the Helsinki Metropolitan Area is an fascinating new experience for those stakeholders views example of new ways of influencing the almost 100 students and 40 educators in the development tight and compact networks of stakefrom Laurea and Omnia participating in processes holders clustered around the urban devethe project. lopment processes in Finland. As one of the seven sub-projects of Koulii, the Suurpelto is at the moment one of the biggest housKookos (Coconut) pilot aims to help the Suurpelto ing and business center construction projects in the Hel- stakeholders to search for potential service providers and sinki Metropolitan Area. Within 1015 years a new inno- to design their products and services to meet the end-

user preferences. The main objective of the Kookos pilot is to collect information, produce feasibility studies and surveys, take part in stakeholders planning processes and support them in designing their services targeted at Suurpelto end-users, entrepreneurs and other actors.

Integrating endusers to the service design process is essential when planning urban areas for housing and business

and thinking of the client also provoked the students to come out with their opinions on this societal development in Finland, which actually is at the same time their visible future.

The first assignment of the Kookos pilot was to help the client to plan the new Shopping Mall by collecting innovative ideas for the development process. This aim was realized through the analysis of customer and end-user needs and end user-analysis. One hundred and thirty-two (132) interviews were executed during the Spring 2011. Several meetings with the client took place and the presentation of the final results to the client was made by students. One conclusion of the analysis was that there is a huge number of potential groups whose input can/should be utilised in the planning processes (Living Labs). The analysis showed how economic aspects and business interests overtake others and the end user perspective often gets blurred. Organisations also seem to put more weight to solutions or decisions for the advantage of their immediate social group. The new approach of the pilot

It is encouraging to see that the results of the Koulii project and the work of its sub-groups have already now motivated the traditional developers and stakeholders to consider end-user approach as an essential part of the service design process when planning urban areas for housing and business. It is as encouraging to see how educational institutions have a strong will to develop their learning processes in such a way that the that educational learning objectives, end-user and working life preferences as well as various stakeholders needs can be met simultaneously. It is important to support opportunities to develop our urban (or rural) environment through truly listening to various stakeholders views in that development process. This results in the design of services which consider end-users preferences without jeopardizing other actors interests. Koulii project has already proved that it is possible to find the tools for cracking the coconut shell.

18 | Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation

Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation | 19

CONNECT Helping Finnish SMEs to increase

the use of renewable energy solutions in Africa

Birgit Aurela Ph.D., Project Manager

eveloping countries need sustainable solutions of renewable energy that Finnish small and medium sized companies (SMEs) can offer. However, both the economic and the psychic distance between Finland and developing countries is large. Typical challenges are legal framework, bureaucracy and the lack of coordination among authorities. Physical presence, knowledge of the local business culture and contacts are vital. Unfortunately technology oriented SMEs often lack the competences needed. Thus, risk to mutual misinterpretation is high.

The CONNECT project starts with the identification of market potential for Finnish SMEs (market and company analyses). Based on that, the need and requirements for local intermediaries can be identified, and the potential intermediaries assessed. Challenges in cross-cultural communication, product and market understanding are in the focus for network development. It is also expected that the continuation of fruitful collaboration requires some form of continuing support to facilitate successful communication and interaction of all stakeholders.

Supporting Finnish companies internationalisation

Creating a generic approach for developing successful and sustainable business networks

To operate on these markets, partnering with local intermediaries is essential. But how to find suitable partners and how to succeed in building sustainable long-term partnerapproach is ship with them? What competences are needed and how can they be developed, The second opportunity lies with the partner new for most both by Finnish SMEs and the intermedinetwork that universities of applied sciences SMEs aries? How to learn to understand and to (UAS) have built with universities and other successfully work with different company and educational institutions in developing countries. business cultures? Is it possible to create a generic Can this network be more efficiently utilized in gaining approach for developing successful and sustainable busi- market and customer knowledge, looking for potential ness networks that would enable Finnish SMEs to enter partners, building and supporting partnerships between and gain presence in developing countries renewable SMEs and intermediaries? energy markets? Cultural differences between technological experts from The CONNECT project aims to answer these questions. SMEs and international students might cause difficulties It is a new 2.5 year (20122014) project funded by Tekes, in communication. A co-creation approach can be used the Finnish Funding Agency for Technology and Innova- to enable and support communication and interaction tion, and carried out in cooperation with the two other between SMEs, students and other stakeholders. The aim FUAS Universities of Applied Sciences: Hme and Lahti. is to combine research and experiential knowledge and The FUAS alliance (FUAS = Federation of Universities of together with SMEs, students and other stakeholders to Applied Sciences) was established by Laurea, Hme and develop new ways to build up value networks to enable Lahti universities of applied sciences to serve students, market entry. In this project the main working method business life and the public sector in an improved capacity will be workshops in which a new co-creation approach as well as to seize hold of the opportunities of a strongly will be used. The co-creation approach is new for most internationalising operating environment. SMEs; as a bonus, participating SMEs will learn to utilize it.

There are several actions and organisations to support Finnish companies internationalisation. One, up till now relatively little utilized resource are the international students and expatriates coming from developing countries. They master their own culture and have learned to understand and operate in the Finnish society. Their value as cultural translators and bridge builders is currently neglected and thus the opportuniThe ties are wasted. This is addressed in the CONco-creation NECT project.

There is a wish that international students would stay in Finland after their graduation, although employment opportunities are rare. Our hypothesis is that the utilisation of international students has a key role in the new model of building networks. Thus, their employment opportunities in Finland and/or in value networks, which benefit Finland, will increase.

20 | Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation

Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation | 21

An innovative future vision for the book industry

institutions in Finland, such as Sanoma, Alma Media, Otavamedia, Talentum, Aalto University, and VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland as well as Metropolia and Laurea. Laurea brings its know-how to this project which paves way for future eReading business models to study viable approaches to developing eReading business models. The research project also enables challenging, and current opportunities for students to complete a thesis.

More service ideas were generated in a multidisciplinary team workshop and by iterative discussions including participants from established businesses, start-ups and creative economy. Stakeholders in the existing value chain were again engaged in the process of filtering the ideas towards potential service stories.

A new value network with new skills to co-produce compelling digital and social experiences

business models for publishing industry

Seppo Leminen Dr.(Econ.), Principal Lecturer, Adjunct Professor Anu Nousiainen BBA, SID Masters student

eReading Services Developing

An example of Laureas Masters thesis The Masters thesis project presented consumer-oriented project within the Next Media e-Readboth an innovative future vision for the ing program is Digital Space. The method for distributing book industry in terms of building a Masters thesis project contributes to digital space ecosystem and planted content on electronic the future vision of book industry by seeds for new services through design reading devices identifying new business opportunities methods. It encourages both optimising for the digital era. Hence, it discusses and nurturing the local culture and pracwhat happens after e-Reading and Social tices of storytelling. It also invites a new value reading concepts have been established in Finnetwork with new skills to co-produce compelling land. The goal is to create a strategic target state for the digital and social experiences. Indeed, in the successful digital space ecosystem by describing its ecology and digital era of storytelling business, the value creation new services through its users and contents. The stake- starts when a specific story (and its originator) meets its holders and contributors for the project are mainly Finn- most beneficial form of delivery. Some of the stories are ish authors, book publishers and book stores. produced as traditional books but more and more stories are told in the form of multimedia and hypermedia where The role of innovation is especially important when the we as readers are able to participate, investigate, play, business is in transition. A call for ideation and creativity learn, and ultimately choose our own path to experience has taken place in the Finnish book industry where efforts the story (or become storytellers ourselves). are already being made to improve the reading experience in mobile devices as well as to produce more diverse content for the digitally literate readers in terms of increasing Some publications the selection of eBooks and utilizing social media features and recommendation techniques. The Masters thesis utilises service design principles. The process of understanding the business context did not only include desk research but also involved experts from various fields to discuss the future of the book and the future generation of readers. Interaction and dialog related practices and needs both in writing and reading were investigated through discussions with different types of writers (fiction, non-fiction, professional, beginners and ambitious bloggers) and through a reading diary study, which invited a specific group of people to analyse their own internal and external dialog. The processes of thinking and ideating resulted in three different storyteller profiles, three paths to deliver stories and three different audiences experiencing the stories. Storyteller profiles, for instance, revealed motivations, challenges, interactions and targets relating to writing.
Huhtala, J., Sihvonen, A. & Leminen, S. (forthcoming 2011), Emerging Business Models in the e-Reading Context, Journal of Digital Marketing (JDM).

Creating a

he Next Media program is part of Tivits SHOK program (The Strategic Centres for Sciences, Technology and Innovation). The main goal of the program is to thoroughly renew industry clusters and to create radical innovations. The Next Media program brings together research organisations and media sector companies to accelerate media industry research and development activities in Finland. Sanoma plc the biggest media group in Finland coordinates the program. The duration of the Next Media research program is four years and it started in 2010. The Next Media research program consists of several research projects, originated from the

need of media companies. As part of the Next Media research program, the eReading Services project of Finnish publishers and researchers was launched at the beginning of 2010. It aims to create a content- and consumeroriented method for distributing charged newspaper, magazine and book content on electronic reading devices. The eReading project team consists of an internationally remarkable range of businesses from the publishing companies, as well as research institutes. The project members include the publishing companies and research

Huhtala, J., Leminen, S. Rajahonka, M., Siuruainen, R. & Tl, M. (2011), Modular Business Models for eReading Services, the Fourth EUROMA Service Operations Management Forum Workshop (19 - 20 September 2011, Florence, Italy, http://www.som2011.org), pp. 256-258. Leminen, S. & Salo Jari (Eds.) (2011), eReading Services Business Models and Concepts in Media Industry, Laurea Publications A73 165 p., Vantaa. Rajahonka, M., Huhtala, J, Leminen S. & Tl, M. (2011),Digital service offering modularity: An empirical analysis of traditional publishing industry, Proceedings from the 1st Cambridge Academic Design Management Conference, Cambridge, UK September 7 8, 2011.

22 | Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation

Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation | 23

Preventive and reactive solutions Making sure the solution is ethically acceptable

Guarantee A safer home environment

Rob Moonen BBA, SID Masters student, Project Manager Heikki Seppl BBA, User Interface Designer Need for technologies and services to assist in traffic Need for technologies and services protecting intellectually disabled against abuse Need for technologies and services preventing immoderation of pleasure giving activities Need for wristband-based technologies and services The findings of this study were translated into requirements for the Guarantee safety solution. While its important for a safety service concept to meet the functional needs of all stakeholders, its crucial to make sure the solution is ethically acceptable. Throughout the project Laurea created a set of ethical guidelines and questions that each of the international use case and demonstrator leaders were required to address. Peoples privacy, beneficence, accuracy of the solution, and security of the data are some of the issues that were taken into consideration. LaureaSID facilitated several workshops with companies and end-user representatives to co-create different use cases that form the core for the safety solutions. The use cases were based on personas that characterized the intellectually disabled and elderly persons. On international level our use cases were used to create an overall safety scenario. We continued with a design of the overall service experience by utilising blueprinting to illustrate and pinpoint the service process steps involving the end-users, technology providers and service providers. A safety solution is currently undergoing a test phase were the idea is to increase the residents quality of life and the feeling of safety. The present support tool, a web based portal and an interactive TV, are targeted at families living with a person who has intellectual disability. The pilot utilizes a distance support service to connect the residents with their caregivers or other residents and ease the possible anxiety that they might experience in their day to day activities.

n increasing number of elderly and intellectually disabled people prefers or is forced to live independently without external support. This tends to result in more incidents in the home environment.

The Guarantee project (20092012) aims to research and develop technologies and the overall services for elderly, children and intellectuWe started our research in Finland with a service ally disabled people to create a safer home detailed literature study which gave us a environment. The project includes prevengood understanding of the kinds of acciexperience tive solutions (like behavior monitoring) as dents that are happening in the home enviwell as reactive solutions (like fall detection). ronment. After this we conducted a stakeholdThe results of the project are expected to enable ers analysis with intellectually disabled people direct support and advice to people in unsafe situations as and support personnel from Rinnekoti-Sti, the founwell as enhancing their capability to live independently. dation for intellectually disabled people. This particular study gave some valuable insights about the needs and Guarantee is part of the ITEA2 framework, a strategic concerns for safety of intellectually disabled people. We pan-European programme to promote Software-inten- conducted interviews and analyzed the results by using sive Systems and Services. The consortium consists of an affinity diagram. Six main factors emerged from the strong and complementary partners like small compa- study: nies, research organisations, universities, service providers, and industrial partners. The positive attitudes of intellectually disabled towards using safety technologies and services Laureas role in the project is strongly focused on user The juxtaposition of safety vs. privacy can be allevicentered research, design of the overall service, and ated with right technologies and services

international collaboration with partners like Philips Research. Our stakeholders analysis assures that the design and development of the various Guarantee solutions are based on real identified needs. Our social and ethical analysis, on the other hand, makes sure that the services are morally sound. Designing

Some publications
Ojasalo J., Moonen R., Seppl H. & Suomalainen N. (2010), Designing Services and Systems for Safety of Elderly People at Home; An Ongoing Empirical Study, SEDE 2010. Moonen R., Ojasalo J., Seppl H. & Suomalainen N. (2010), Designing Services and Systems for Intellectually Disabled People at Home: Preliminary Findings from an Ongoing Empirical Study, UMADR 2010. Ojasalo J., Seppl H., Moonen R. & Suomalainen N. (2010), Better Technologies and Services for Smart Homes of Disabled People: Empirical Findings from an Explorative Study, ICSTE 2010.

24 | Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation

Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation | 25

Creating a foundation for an emergency vehicle concept for export

MOBI Mobile object bus interaction

Hanna-Miina Sihvonen M.Sc., Project Manager Jyri Rajamki D.Sc. (Tech.), Principal Lecturer, Head of Laureas Data Networks Laboratory

ne of the most important tasks of police, fire and number of different user interfaces. All this has generrescue services, customs and border control agen- ated some new problems, for example vehicles airbags cies is to deal with emergency situations on land, have less room to fill. Also technical problems, sea and air. The vehicles they use and devices especially in power supply and cables, have Need installed to these vehicles must be suitable been reported. Documentation of applied for new for very demanding and variable conditions. solutions has been variable and there has Changing of seasons increases the amount been no standardization needed in this field, business of requirements. partially because of the diversity of the equipmodels ment suppliers. Yearly delivery volumes and During a few decades the number of technical the culture of purchasing have not been helping devices and different applications has been increasthe development of standardization. That is the ing in authorities vehicles. This has also increased the reason for the need of new business models.

in emergency vehicles

LaureaSID initiated the MOBI project originally in 2008 in cooperation with the Finnish police. Currently, LaureaSID coordinates the MOBI project in tight collaboration with Finnish industrial partners and authority organisations. The project is funded by Tekes, the Finnish Funding Agency for Technology and Innovation. The project started in autumn 2010 and will end in autumn 2013. The MOBI project aims at ICT integration in emergency vehicles and to ICT creating a foundation for an emergency integration vehicle concept for export. Laureas students have participated in projects related to MOBI user requirements, communications, integration and business models work packages. The progress of the MOBI project has been reported in various publications, conferences and seminars. Eleven articles and reports have already been produced. A few publications are included in the reference list below. LaureaSID will be co-organising the Public Safety Communications Europe forum meeting in Espoo May 2012, which among other topics deals with MOBI project related authority communication and collaboration issues.

Some publications
Rajamki, J. and Villemson, T (2010), Creating a service oriented architectural model for emergency vehicles, International Journal of Communications, Issue 1, Volume 3, pp. 44-53. Sihvonen H-M & Kurki T.A (2010), Role Management Diversity in Emergency Situations, 2010 IEEE International Conference Technologies for Homeland Security, November 8-10, 2010 Westin Boston-Waltham Hotel, Boston, MA. Rajamaki, J., Hult, T. & Ofem, P. (2011), ICT Integration of Public Protection and Disaster Relief: Services for Fire and Rescue Personnel, International Journal of Computers and Communications, Issue 3, Volume 5. Holmstrom, J., Rajamaki, J. & Hult, T. (2011), The Future Solutions and Technologies of Public Safety Communications - DSiP Traffic Engineering Solution for Secure Multichannel Communication, International Journal of Communications, Issue 3, Volume 5, 2011. Tuohimaa, T., Tikanmaki, I. & Rajamaki, J. (2011), Cooperation Challenges to Public Safety Organizations on the Use of Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS), International Journal of Systems Applications, Engineering & Development, Issue 5, Volume 5.

26 | Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation

Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation | 27

SATERISK Risks of satellite-based tracking

Seija Tiainen M.Sc., Project Manager Jyri Rajamki D.Sc. (Tech.), Principal Lecturer, Head of Laureas Data Networks Laboratory Robert Guinness M.Sc. in Space Studies

Satellite-based tracking will increase in importance as localization services become more widespread and more critical to operations

atellite-based navigation and tracking have become can be high if they are not properly addressed. routine features of the modern society. Their use is rapidly growing a recent market research report pre- The SATERISK project has partners and other participants dicts that the Global Navigation Satellite System from the whole value-chain of satellite-based (GNSS) market will likely double by the year tracking, starting from the network operators New like Cassidian (EADS DS) to companies that 2016. The European Commission has launoffer information gathering devices and ched its first two operational satellites for technologies tracking software, and finally to the users the Galileo positioning system in October can create of these tracking systems. Legal aspects of 2011. new risks satellite-based tracking are studied at UniThe idea to study risks of satellite-based versity of Lapland in its own SATERISK cotracking came from Laureas Masters students project. and lecturers of Security Management in 2008. They found partners for the project and got funding from Tekes, Students have participated in many interesting projects the Finnish Funding Agency for Technology and Innova- related to the SATERISK project. One interesting area of tion. The SATERISK (2009-2011) project aims to answer student work has been the evaluation of risks from satthe following questions: Does satellite-based navigation ellite-based tracking in different corporate sectors and and tracking involve risks? Do we know what the risks are for different use cases. Studies of current risks were folnow, and what they will be in the future? Often new tech- lowed by producing risk scenarios for the future. Another nologies will present opportunities for increased interesting area has been developing service innovations that use satellite-based tracking. safety and security and this is certainly true Finally, students have been organising and with satellite-based navigation and trackDeveloping participating in seminars related to the ing but they can also create new risks. It service SATERISK, giving students an opportuis important for the technology developinnovations that nity to interact directly with experts and ers, end-users and authorities to clearly practitioners working in this field. The understand these risks and take steps to use satelliteresults of the SATERISK project have mitigate them. based tracking mainly been featured in various publications, conferences and seminars. More than The SATERISK project also aims to bring thirty articles and reports have been produced, new know-how to the European field of secuaddressing various aspects of the project. rity. The project is creating new methods and development paths for positioning and tracking systems that address the risks and limitations that have already been According to one SME partner, the main impact of the discovered. These include methods related to informa- SATERISK project so far has been that the topic risks of tion security, signal interference, and legal restrictions on satellite-based tracking has received more widespread tracking. A special emphasis has been placed on the use of attention. This intelligence-gathering and surveillance satellite-based tracking amongst security professionals provider was filled with a foreboding of problems to both in the public and private sectors where the risks come with todays commercial satellite-based tracking

services. Because of the SATERISK project and its results, the companys customers have become more aware of the risks that come with using these services. This has increased the demand for their proprietary surveillance products and concepts, designed to mitigate these risks. As a spin-off of the SATERISK project, two new RDI projects will start in 2012. The first aims to facilitate Law Enforcement Agencies (LEAs) activities in remote observation of criminals by improving substantially the LEAs access to audiovisual and location information. The methods developed must satisfy stringent legal, integrity and chain-of-custody requirements, and the results of the SATERISK project pave the way for analyzing how these requirements will be met. The other spin-off project will concentrate on privacy issues with regard to tracking information acquired by LEAs, and the results of the SATERISK project will be very relevant in this project as well. From these developments, it is clear that risk analysis of satellite-based tracking will only increase in importance, as tracking and localization services become more widespread and more critical to operations of safety and security professionals.

Some publications
Happonen, M., Kokkonen, P., Viitanen, J., Ojala, J. and Rajamki, J. (2009), Jamming Detection in the Future Navigation and Tracking Systems, in Proceedings of the 16th Saint Petersburg International Conference on Integrated Navigation Systems, 25 - 27 May, 2009 Saint Petersburg, Russia. Kmppi, P., Rajamki, J. and Guinness, R. (2009), Information security risks for satellite tracking, International Journal of Computers and Communications, Issue 1, Volume 3. Ohisalo, M., Tiuri, O., Urpila, T., Kmppi, P. and Rajamki, J. (2011),Risks and vulnerabilities of future satellite-based tracking systems, International Journal of Geology, Issue 4, Volume 5.

28 | Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation

Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation | 29

MMP Measuring multiple

senses in service experiences
Leena Alakoski Lic.Sc., Project Manager

Satu Luojus Ph.D., Principal Lecturer

ensorial strategies comprise the five common senses smell, sound, sight, taste and touch. Many researchers stress that our entire understanding of the world is experienced through our senses.

Our senses are the link to our memory and can tap right into emotion. People want experiences and to accumulate them during their leisure time and tourism trips. Their experience is more effective when they feel effects of many senses at the same time. For a service company, the management of the service experience is of vital importance. It does not only affect the success of the company, but determines customers level of experience. Customer touchpoints should be planned with all communication aspects in mind, taking into consideration all senses and emotions. The MMP (Multisensory service experience and service design in tourism companies) research project aims at studying how customers experience multisensory service touchpoints. Key themes of the project are measuring and analyzing customers service experience from the multisensory point of view, and applying service design methods in planning and designing services with multisensory elements.

park, Hostel Onnela, Cosy Finland, Magic of Nuuksio, Go Experience, City of Kerava/Circus markets, Ecker line, and Culminatum Oy (one of the main actors in the tourism and experience management cluster in Finland). LaureaSID and VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland are the organisations responsible for research activities in the project. New multisensory Students are the core of RDI activities service touchpoints, in the MMP project; they not only participate in the project but also take the innovative service responsibility as equal members of the concepts and research team.

touch points, by identifying critical incidents, to ensure that the service lives up to anticipated customer experiences. The MMP project produces a service design tool box for companies to support them in measuring and designing services with multisensory elements. Many of the methods have already been tested with the customers, for example assignment notebooks, observation tables, videos, storytelling and photos, empathy tool and multisensory walking.

A service design tool box for designing services with multisensory elements

Service experience is more effective when customers feel effects of many senses at the same time

and individuals. The duration of the CCFE visit is three hours in the evening. The service content involves a visit to a Finnish home integrated with the Cosy Home Dinner. The MMP project developed, tested and evaluated a Cosy Finnish Evening video representing CCFE applying two different sound scapes. The idea of using two different soundscapes and multiple testing-environments is to gain rich data in order to analyze responses from different angles including the impact of multisensory effects and testing environments.

creative ways of producing leisure services

The project is funded by TEKES, the Finnish Funding Agency for Technology and Innovation (Tourism and Leisure Services Programme). Companies participating in the MMP research project are Linnanmki amusement

Companies participating in MMP aim at new innovative service concepts and new ways of producing leisure services. Thus one of the objectives of the research project is to develop innovative, customer-centered service concepts by focusing on designing multisensory service experience. A set of service design methods and tools are applied in the case companies. The service design methods enable to understand the customer perspective as a process and illustrate it as a customer journey through

The Light Carnival is one example of a service concept that has been developed in Linnanmki amusement park. The amusement park has its equipment and rides, but also other services like cafes, restaurants and shops as well as performances and visual elements. Adding multisensory elements to the services and taking the different senses into account have given the service provider a possible area for improving the service experience of their customers. Another example is Cosy Finnish Evening (CCFE) that is a standardized service of Cosy Finland, targeted at groups

publication
Isacsson, A., Alakoski, L. & Bck, A. (2010), Using multiple senses in tourism marketing. Tourismos, An International Multidisciplinary Journal of Tourism. Vol. 4, No. 3, pp. 167-184.

30 | Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation

Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation | 31

Supporting collaboration and networking within the industry

and regional local food development organisations.

Laureas students have been integrated in the project in several ways. To get customer insight, student groups planned and implemented an observation and interview-based comparative consumer study on local food choices in four cities. Integrated in courses, students are working with the producers, for example to improve marketing and customer communication of small-scale farms. Currently several theses are being completed, including subject areas like Customer experiences in a restaurant with local food profile or Improving customer understanding in a local food online shop. The project supports the development of business and networking competencies of local food farmers and producers by: Improving producers knowledge of the preconditions, business models and marketing of local food production Activating and supporting networking, collaboration and competence building among local food value networks Activating and supporting collaboration between development and support organisations Increasing the visibility and recognisability of local food in Uusimaa region

Improving marketing of small-scale farms

business for Uusimaa region

Local Food Sustainable

Furthermore students have a central role in planning and implementing promotional events, such as the Uusimaa department at the Delicacies of Finland event, which took place 26-27.8.2011 in the Centre of Helsinki. The department (tent) was organized by our project and co-designed with the participating local food producers. At the Uusimaa department visitors had the possibility to taste and purchase the delicious products of 16 different local food producers. The successful event attracted over 58 000 visitors from all over the country and it will be reorganized in the year 2012.

Janne Huuhtanen Student, Degree Programme in Business Management

Aira Sevn Co-owner of Gobbas Grd, Legal & Business Consultant, LL.M, MBA

Ritva Jttel M.Sc .(Int. Econ.), Project Manager

The three-year project, Local Food sustainable business, was launched in summer 2011. It is funded from the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development, by the Uusimaa Centre of Economic Development, Transport and the Environment. The purpose of the project is to develop local food as sustainable business in the region. Main beneficiaries are farm producers and local food refiners, who operate in the country side. Other stakeholders include supply chains/sale channels, professional kitchens, consumers and local food developers.

rapidly growing awareness of food, its effects on the body and the environment has led to an increased demand for local food. But how to transform small scale farming into growing supply of local food and sustainable business? In Uusimaa region the previous supporting measures have been unsystematic and fragmental.

From the point of view of the participating producer (Gobbas Grd) it was a pleasure to realize that Laurea was indeed encouraging all the exhibitors of the region to To improve customer and market understanding and to be active participants in the planning process. Producsupport collaboration and networking within the indus- ers needs and comments were listened to carefully and try, the initiation and development of local value net- interpreted skillfully. The designers were able to take the works (producerprocessordistributorcustomer) practice into consideration while keeping the overis supported. Additionally, networking events all design fresh and professional, a result rarely will be organised and small-scale research seen in our industry. Moreover the young and done. The created knowledge is shared with fresh approach of the Uusimaa department Increased the stakeholders though newsletters, webwas conveyed through innovative solutions demand for sites and social media. while facing great restraints. The Laurea local food team could provide the exhibitors such Partnering and division of labor with various added value, service and end-result with supporting organisations is the key to efficreativity, professional approach, teamwork ciency and impact. We work with local food develcapabilities and problem-solving skills. Thus the opers in Uusimaa region and on national level. Regional design, practical approach and the overall result exceeded network includes actors, such as ProAgria, Novia UAS, the producers expectations. The design and realization City of Loviisa and several regional business development of the Uusimaa department gained attention and favourorganisations. Our national network includes Food Fin- able feedback not only from participating producers, but land theme group, Aitoja makuja-project, The Central also from the media, visitors and event organisers and is Union of Agricultural Producers and Forest Owners (MTK) as such a good example of successful co-creation process.

32 | Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation

Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation | 33

Service Innovation and Design Profile of LaureaSID

Laurea Service Innovation and Design L

AT? WH

COMPETENCE FIELD

in designing customer-centered service systems, concepts and processes

Business Competence

aurea University of Applied Sciences produces new competences in the field of service innovations and carries out professionally orientated education, regional development and RDI activities by following the Learning by Developing (LbD) operational model.

? Hy
Theoretical framework

in designing customer-centered service systems, concepts and processes

ICT Competence

ho w

Laureas largest unit LaureaSID in Espoo focuses on service innovation and design. The unit is a hub of research, development and innovation, where various RDI environments provide a dynamic and inspiring learning environment.

service science

Service Innovation and Design Competence

Customer-centered service systems, concepts and processes

METHODOLOGY

research based development creative methods in service design

CONTEXT

wher e?
34 | Service Innovation and Design Results from co-creation

customer-centered service systems, concepts and processes in

security and safety management

customer-centered service systems, concepts and processes in

hospitality and facility management

-Europe-

Helsinki

Fin d lan
Contact
firstname.lastname@laurea.fi LaureaSID Leppvaara Vanha maantie 9, FIN-02650 Espoo Finland www.laurea.fi/Leppavaara

vantaa espoo helsinki