At MediaFutures, innovation is at the core of everything we do. As a research-based innovation centre (SFI), we focus on advancing media technology and related AI applications, continually pushing the boundaries of what’s possible. To stay at the forefront, we have developed a model for how we drive innovation at the centre. Behind these efforts is our innovation coordinator, Dr. Christopher Senf.
Q: Dr. Christopher Senf. What makes your role so important for MediaFutures?
A: Many people think of innovation as just a technological output. While that’s not entirely wrong, it’s only the result of a broader process. Innovation is about how organisations develop new solutions to address both existing and emerging challenges across various fields, including societal issues such as mis- and disinformation. At its core, innovation means renewal or change. The key lies in structuring how these solutions are created, and that’s where my role comes in.
A: As the innovation coordinator, I’m not the one building the media technology. Instead, I ensure that our organisation is capable of innovating—by making sure, for instance, that we have the right skills and persons, organisational structures, and cultures in place. Our aim is to help our consortium partners tackle broad challenges such as fake news, polarization and fragmentation of the public sphere, and intense competition by applying research insights. My role is to organize and guide the processes that enable these solutions to take shape.
This highlights why MediaFutures has an innovation coordinator. Dr. Christopher Senf acts as a bridge between academia and industry partners, fostering strong relationships with companies that drive innovation. His primary focus is on supporting the centre’s researchers in translating their work into practical outputs, including demos, prototypes, datasets, and code repositories, as well as potential spin-offs and patents.
Dr. Christopher Senf, Innovation Coordinator at SFI MediaFutures
Q: How does your work look like?
A: One key aspect of my role is organising and moderating meetings, tailoured innovation workshops, and brainstorming sessions between our researchers and industry partners. We engage with both current and potential partners, pitching our ideas and showcasing new digital tools. During these events, we aim to identify collaboration opportunities and determine where our expertise can support the various partners of our research centre.
A: Another important aspect of my work is facilitating the development of new prototypes. For instance, PhD candidate Pete Andrews is working on an automated fact-checking tool for broadcasted political panel debates. In this context, I coordinated interdisciplinary innovation workshops that brought together political scientists, theorists, broadcasters and journalists to define the potential core functions of this tool. This exemplifies a core dimension of innovation understood as a process: uniting diverse perspectives to brainstorm ideas for new digital tools and address specific challenges, such as misinformation in political debates. Additionally, I track and evaluate innovation results within our center, providing reports on our progress.
As a guideline for our research centre, Senf developed an innovation model. This model shows how MediaFutures facilitates and organizes the collaboration.
Figure 1: New Innovation Model of SFI MediaFutures
A: We have transformed our innovation model into a user-centered innovation model. At the heart of this model is the emphasis on close collaboration and joint ideation. This means our research projects are based on collaborative input and insights from our industry partners, rather than merely developed in the academic ivory tower. Researchers are actively involved in problem-solving alongside partners. To facilitate this, we encourage our researchers to begin their roles with secondments, allowing them to closely engage with the workflows of our industry partners and better understand their tasks and challenges.
Q: Can you give an example?
A: One of our PhD candidates, Sohail Khan, designed his research project based on a secondment with Faktisk.no. During this secondment, he collaborated with the team at Faktisk.no to identify how he could best support them. By engaging closely with journalists, he gained valuable insights into their workflows and the issues they encounter. For example, they faced the task of identifying and classifying images of military vehicles in war coverage on social media. Sohail recognized that he could develop an AI-based image recognition tool to automate this identification process. This exemplifies innovation, showcasing how emerging technologies can simplify existing work tasks, support professionals and improve problem-solving for users.
Q: What challenges do you have in the process of innovation in MF and how do you solve them?
A: Our researchers continuously juggle two roles: excelling in their research—which we take great pride in—and effectively collaborating. However, pitching research results to people outside the academic community can often be a challenge. That’s where I come in. One of my roles is to support researchers in networking beyond academia .
Projects within the centre that have the potential to evolve into startups receive additional support from our cooperation partner, VIS.
VIS - Vestlandets Innovasjonsselskap
VIS is one of Norway’s largest innovation consultancy organisations. They support entrepreneurs, researchers, students, and established businesses in developing the services, products, and workplaces of the future.
VIS is a result of collaboration between the University of Bergen, Helse Bergen, the Institute of Marine Research, Siva, Western Norway University of Applied Sciences, and NHH – Norwegian School of Economics, aimed at solving key societal challenges through innovation and creativity.
VIS – Vestlands Innovasjonsselskap is Senf’s cooperation partner in evaluating the value of research results and prototypes developed by MediaFutures employees. Recently, VIS secured 6 million Norwegian kroner from Agenda Vestlandet to develop an innovative researcher entrepreneurship program aimed at transforming the region’s researchers into tomorrow’s entrepreneurs.
VIS has crafted a comprehensive plan for this program, which includes three main work packages: developing infrastructure, enhancing skills, and fostering internationalization, alongside investment through an academic spinout fund. With backing from both public and private entities, VIS anticipates that the program will lead to the establishment of 25 to 30 new companies based on groundbreaking research over the next five years, creating potential benefits for SFI MediaFutures.
Q: What is your aim for MediaFutures for the next four years?
A: I aim to support MediaFutures in fostering creativity and embracing experimental risk-taking to develop new digital tools and conduct research that assists all the partners of our centre in addressing societal challenges. These challenges include tackling issues such as fake news and the proliferation of manipulated and generated images and videos online, as well as mitigating political polarization in news and social media by creating responsible recommender systems and automated fact-checking tools. In the long term, I also aim to help the centre maintain strong collaborations and secure additional external funding to ensure the ongoing success and sustainability of MediaFutures.