Living Labs and user-driven innovation are topical in Finland both from the national and the local point of view. A current report Living Labs in Finland reviews Finnish Living Labs and sums up their activities. The report also gives suggestions on how to develop Living Labs.
According to Living Labs in Finland report, Living Lab activities have been more talk than action. As a result, the key question is now whether Living Labs are able to productize their activities and offerings. For the time being, Living Labs haven’t been able to reclaim the best position they could have. There has been some good pilots but proper breakthrough is yet to be seen.
As a conclusion, the report suggests a number of concrete steps. The first finding is that even the basic definition of “Living Lab” should be clarified and simplified. The report also points out that the community around Living Labs should be strengthened -– for example, with face-to-face meetings and an up-to-date web portal. The report also sees that there is a need for one national Living Lab coordinator, who has an overall understanding on the field and its activities. Also, a group of easy and fast pilots would be necessary to make Living Labs more concrete. And finally, there’s a great need for shared standards that enable the comparison between different Living Labs and rate their work.
The report was written by Janne Orava from Javaro Oy. Forum Virium Helsinki’s Development and Project Manager Mia Uronen participated in the survey as a representative of Helsinki Living Lab. The work was done during 2009 as part of a Living Lab pilot in the Innovation and Knowledge Network.
Read the whole report here (pdf file)
