Conference spotlight: ICT 2010

I just got back from an EU event called ICT 2010 (held 27-29 September in Brussels). It’s run every two years and in fact it is more of a business event rather then a scientific conference.

The goal is to gather people connected to ICT innovation and research in Europe though participation in Europan Commission funding programs.

Throughout the first two days of the conference in which I participated there were a number general talks connected to fostering innovation in Europe (eg. quite interesting keynote & panel on “Driving societal change, opportunities for all“) but also focused panels and so-called Networking Sessions that were run in smaller groups of interest and on particular topics (eg. for one I attended Open Innovation session which unfortunately didn’t really prove that interesting for me). Apart of that large part of the venue was taken by exposition stands that were presenting the projects and research done with EU funding. The interesting part of this was the diversity, the projects showed that ICT research (with some cool outcomes) is being funded in really many areas.

Nevertheless, its worth to note that the key value of this event is not the talks but the opportunity to meet new contacts for future proposals and business. It was very evident that all the participants came there to take out as much value as possible for future funding opportunities. All the time pretty much everybody (over 1k participants) was hunting for new contacts that could later develop into consortiums for EU proposals (2.8 Billion eur for ICT R&D in 2011-2012). This was very clearly visible.

In conclusion the ICT 2010 was quite interesting and indeed a big event. Definitely not to miss for people interested in European research or collaboration with European researchers. From my personal perspective as a PhD student and a university researcher this was a nice opportunity to see what others do and I got some new contacts and collaborations for both academic research and writing/participating in proposals. Oh and an additional bonus: for students the registration is for free making this a truly great opportunity!

Idea Management Systems research – interesting links and articles compilation

Relating to my Idea Management research, I have put together a compilation of interesting articles and websites. Bear in mind that this is primarily done from the point of view of a researcher interested in data structures and mechanics of Idea Management Systems. The content below is byfar not complete and the choice is fully subjective. However, it should make an interesting read in terms of introduction to selected topics. To make browsing easier I aggregated all in categories and also sorted the links by my personal preference.

Do you know any other interesting resources ? Let me know in the comments !

note: please be advised that in a number of sections the criteria by which I list or order publications is subjective to my research interest which is: data, data and once again data in Idea management. (and also my personal likes or dislikes of certain publications)

note2: bibtex infos to come soon ™ 🙂

1. Idea Management Systems – vendor lists

2. Idea Management Systems & Innovation Management- research related to Semantic Web and Ontologies
2.1. Active projects:

  • GI2MO – shamelessly I link my project first ;). The goal of the project is to use Semantic Web technologies to solve a number of problems of Idea Management. The core and entry point is a proposal of an ontology for Idea Management Systems.
  • Idea Ontology – another interesting project with a similar goal to GI2MO. Different approach nonetheless equally interesting.

2.2. Selected Publications:

  • “A Model for Integration and Interlinking of Idea Management Systems”, Westerski et al. [bibtex]
  • “An Idea Ontology for Innovation Management.”, Riedl et al. [bibtex]
  • “Semantic innovation management across the extended enterprise.”, Ning et al. [bibtex]
  • “Innovation and Ontologies.”, Bullinger [bibtex]

3. Idea Management & Innovation Management – research or publications unrelated to Semantic Web
3.1. Idea Management Systems

  • “The A to Z of Idea Management.”, Schwartz [bibtex] – a book that attempts to describe in a systematic way how Idea Management Systems work
  • “Improving idea generation and idea management in order to better manage the fuzzy front end of innovation”, Glassman [bibtex] – a phd thesis focused on the first steps of idea life cycle
  • “Idea Management for organisational innovation”, Flynn et al. [bibtex]

3.2. Innovation Management (additional reading)

  • “Developing a software infrastructure to support systemic innovation through effective management.”, Dooley et al. [bibtex]
  • “Innovation Metrics and Measurment in 2009”, xxx et al. – an interesting publication about what innovation metrics are used companies
  • “Information technology support for the knowledge and social processes of innovation management”, Adamides et al.
  • ….

note: the literature and resources on the particular topic of Innovation Management is very rich, yet often it goes very far away from the specific area of Idea Management. Therefore, I listed only a few positions that can be loosely connected through their study being related to Computer Science or having some influence to Idea Management problems (e.g. innovation metrics paper).

4. Idea Management Systems – interesting news websites, blogs etc.

  • InnovationManagement.se“, online magazine, regularly updated with lots of interesting news posts. However, much broader scope then just Idea Management.
  • Idea Management Systems“, a blog run by Lauchlan Mackinnon. Focused on Idea Management by also posting some short articles on topics loosely connected to innovation.
  • Innovation Tools“, a portal with some info about Idea Management, including news and blog posts. Be advised tho, in my personal opinion the objectivity of some posts here is very doubtful and sometimes looks like sponsored by certain vendors (e.g. to support my claim, take a look at one of their recommended resources: “A Short History of Idea Management“)

5. Idea Management Systems – company blogs, newsletters etc.

note: be advised that the goal of Idea Management vendors is to make profit, so look at the objectivity of all the information with care and keep it mind that it not always might be the full picture what you read.

  • Spigit company blog, Fairly often updated with information not directly related to business but also innovation management theory in general.
  • Imaginatik company blog, contains both reports on company activity (e.g. case studies) as well as some articles on innovation with regard to its connection to Idea Management
  • Mark Turrell blog, a blog of CEO of Imaginatik. Not really that active anymore but contains a number of interesting posts on the topic of Idea Management.
  • Newsletters, contrary to what you might think, its not always only marketing and advertisement. Companies like BrightIdea or Accept sometimes run online presentations where they share their experience or invite some people to talk about innovation topics.