Open trial chal­len­ges

Real-life chal­len­ges ope­ned by the City or anot­her body, solu­tions for which are tried out in the genui­ne envi­ron­ment.

In the trial chal­len­ges, the City, anot­her orga­ni­sa­tion or a com­pa­ny opens their real-life deve­lop­ment topics for com­pa­nies and teams to sol­ve. Examples of this are the pro­gram­mes of fast trials in which the City seeks trials to be car­ried out through a bid­ding con­test. In this case, the trials are con­duc­ted as com­pen­sa­ted, i.e. the trial execu­tor gets a small com­pen­sa­tion for cove­ring the expen­ses of the trial.

Chal­len­ge-dri­ven events

The open inno­va­tion ser­vices pro­vi­de the oppor­tu­ni­ty for com­pa­nies to gene­ra­te new ideas and solu­tions from out­si­de the com­pa­ny. Inclusion, fast inno­va­tion and agi­le trials are at the focal point when the chal­len­ges are sol­ved. BusinessOulu’s rea­dy-made ope­ra­ting models, sche­du­les and concept make open inno­va­tion easy and success­ful.

Par­ticu­lar­ly begin­ning com­pa­nies or small and medium-sized enterpri­ses do not need to own eve­ryt­hing them­sel­ves, but they can get resources and bene­fits by col­la­bo­ra­ting and sha­ring. New pers­pec­ti­ves fore deve­lop­ment and results can be obtai­ned by inclu­ding others open­ly and bold­ly.

Agi­le met­hods speed up and boost the inno­va­tion process. This way it can meet the user’s needs bet­ter and pro­vi­de a quick res­pon­se to the demands of a chan­ging busi­ness envi­ron­ment. As the cycle of pro­duct deve­lop­ment gets fas­ter and fas­ter, it is bet­ter to try things out alrea­dy at the pro­duct deve­lop­ment pha­se than to do it after mar­ket ent­ry. Fast inno­va­tion leads to fast success or fai­lu­re!

Pro­duct deve­lop­ment and mar­ke­ting are inse­pa­rable. Mar­ke­ting invol­ves fin­ding out cus­to­mer needs and acqui­ring infor­ma­tion about the tar­get mar­ket and the ope­ra­ting envi­ron­ment. Pro­duct deve­lop­ment needs data gat­he­red by mar­ke­ting all along the line.

Success demands a good chal­len­ge

A well set, unders­tan­dable chal­len­ge is an impor­tant basis for success­ful inno­va­tion. A good chal­len­ge not only high­lights the problem but also pre­sents a genui­ne oppor­tu­ni­ty for solu­tion and inno­va­tion.

A good chal­len­ge is easy enough to unders­tand, ins­pi­ring, and arouses curio­si­ty. Chal­len­ges sui­ted for ordi­na­ry users have been made even with dif­ficult deve­lop­ment topics pre­sen­ted by research groups – such as poly­mers. In addi­tion to the chal­len­ge, it is impor­tant to defi­ne the expec­ted results: what is expec­ted from the event and what is the user group from which solu­tions are sought. Uni­ver­si­ty stu­dents are a user group often used by Business­Oulu as inno­va­tors and solu­tion pro­vi­ders. It is rela­ti­ve­ly easy to form mul­ti­discipli­na­ry teams with them.

The best ope­ra­ting model for eve­ry situa­tion

When the chal­len­ge has been comple­te­ly thought out and its sol­vers have been selec­ted, Business­Oulu finds the best ope­ra­ting model for the inno­va­tion process. This could invol­ve an IdeaSprint, a co-crea­tion process, a fast trial, a hac­kat­hon, or a com­pe­ti­tion.

One of the ope­ra­ting models for uni­ver­si­ty stu­dents is sOU­LU­tions – the oppo­si­te of an indi­vi­dual and ran­dom inno­va­tion event. SOU­LU­tions is an event concept in which cer­tain type of events are repea­ted as a sequence – the pre­dic­ta­bi­li­ty of the concept lowers the thres­hold for com­pa­nies to par­tici­pa­te. Ase­mat­hons focus on Busi­ness­A­se­ma as an envi­ron­ment for trials and deve­lop­ment. The IdeaSprint events offer the chal­len­ge pre­sen­ter with a bunch of new ideas and solu­tions in a rea­so­nably short time.

The open Patiolla.fi user forum enables deve­lop­ment with users free of time and loca­tion. Exact­ly the right people can be sought as tes­ters and deve­lo­pers from among the group test users. The Patiolla.fi ser­vice can be used for deve­lo­ping all kinds of pro­ducts and ser­vices.