Christoph Trattner, Director and Founder of SFI MediaFutures, has published a new opinion piece in Teknisk Ukeblad (TU) on why promising research results so often fail to make the transition into practical and lasting innovation. Illustration image: Unsplash
SFI MediaFutures Director and Founder Prof. Christoph Trattner has published a new opinion piece in Teknisk Ukeblad titled “Innovasjon stopper i overgangene” (“Innovation stops in the transitions”).
In the article, Trattner addresses a familiar question in Norwegian research and innovation policy: Why do so many promising research results fail to progress from an initial idea or prototype to lasting use?
Trattner argues that the main challenge is not necessarily a lack of contact between researchers and industry. Norway already has strong links between research environments and businesses. The difficulty lies in what happens after they meet. Innovation is often organised as a relay race in which research results are passed from universities to technology transfer offices, businesses, investors or public-sector organisations. At each transition, valuable context, momentum and ownership can be lost.
Drawing on experiences from SFI MediaFutures, the article presents a different approach. Researchers and industry partners work together from the beginning, starting with a concrete challenge and developing the problem, prototype and potential solution jointly. Testing takes place in realistic environments, with feedback continuously brought back into the research and development process.
The piece highlights secondments, bridge-builders with experience from both academia and industry, and internal champions within partner organisations as particularly important. These elements have helped MediaFutures prototypes move beyond experimentation and into practical use, including verification tools developed with Faktisk.no and adopted by newsrooms internationally.
Trattner argues that users must be involved before research questions and solutions are fixed, that prototypes and pilots should be recognised as part of the research process, and that responsibility for the transitions between research and implementation must be clearly assigned.
The article contributes to a broader discussion about how Norway can build innovation processes in which collaboration survives the entire journey from idea to practical and lasting use.
Read the full article in TU: Innovasjon stopper i overgang