Sustainable Innovation 04

[martin charter <101336.3560@compuserve.com>]

EXCUSE ANY CROSS POSTINGS

C O N F E R E N C E   A N N O U N C E M E N T   A N D   C A L L   F O R  P
A P E R S

**REVISED DEADLINE FOR ABSTRACTS + SUBMISSIONS FOR THE LIVING LABORATORY:
29th MARCH 2004**

Sustainable Innovation 04
Creating and developing sustainable and responsible new business models
Towards Sustainable Product Design 9
9th International Conference
25th – 26th October 2004
Bush Hotel
Farnham
Surrey
UK

Background
Companies face a plethora of questions related to their responsibilities in
a No Logo, post ENRON, ‘CNN’ World. A diverse range of issues 
fly at companies at the 'speed of light' and getting it wrong can affect
corporate and brand reputation - which may ultimately affect share price.
Many of these issues are not 'black or white' e.g. child labour and
solutions are complex. Determining the extent of a firm's responsibilities
to its internal and external stakeholders in the economies and communities
that they operate in - locally, nationally and internationally – is
becoming a key issue. Globalisation means that business models for many
products and services are changing significantly with manufacturing and
operations moving to South and South-East Asia. Customers, designers and
marketeers, are increasingly geographically separated from producers and
this is creating a new set of supply chain challenges for companies that
want to act responsibly. A range of leading companies are now starting to
explore new business models in an attempt to open-up markets for the 4.6
billion people (75% of population) that consume only 25% of the earth’s
resources.

Global sustainable and responsible innovation will require the creation of
more sustainable and responsible markets - and to achieve this will require
multi-stakeholder actions, with a policy-orientation focused on earlier
stages of the product or service lifecycle. However, in many
markets this is getting more difficult as there is an increasing blurring
of the edges of product and services e.g. many products include services,
and services included products. The challenge is how to enable and
accelerate more sustainable and responsible consumption patterns amongst
domestic consumers (B2C), business-to-business (B2B) buyers and government
purchasers (B2G). Change will require a more coordinated implementation of
demand and supply-side policy toolbox. At present, sustainable markets are
small niches for consumer products. However there is need to broaden the
discussion from a narrow B2C viewpoint to the much larger B2B and B2G
markets. Environmental and social considerations need to be integrated into
all markets and this will create new opportunities for sustainable and
responsible entrepreneurs. Creativity and innovation, coupled with a
significant reduction in resource and energy consumption will generate a
range of opportunities. Thinking in terms of resource productivity and
'closing the loop' rather waste will become the clarion call. The
implementation of 'producer responsibility' laws in Europe and Japan may
act as a stimulus to acclerate the implementation of new business models
and may further open up opportunities for remanufacturing, reconditioning
and reuse to extend
product life.


Concept
What is a sustainable and responsible new business model? Sustainable
Innovation 04 has been designed as a way through the labyrinth of issues
related to sustainability, Corporate Responsibility (CR) and new business
models. Sustainable Innovation 04 will aim to explore new approaches to
sustainable product, service and PSS development by providing a platform
for discussion over best practice and new ideas. The event will analyse the
problems, barriers and obstacles to new sustainable and responsible
business models and will highlight opportunities. A unique feature will be
The Living Laboratory that will showcase sustainable business, product,
service and PSS concepts. Sustainable Innovation 04 will be about new
thinking, different perspectives and will be a key learning experience.

Sustainable Innovation 04 will include invited and refereed papers covering
new models for sustainable business, product, service and PSS
development from designers, inventors, academics and managers. A core
element of the event will be a number of interactive creative processes on
day 1 and 2 designed to enable delegates to think, (re)think and create new
sustainable and responsible business models. Delegates will come from
creative industries, innovation, venture capital, academia, government and
NGOs, as well as large companies, entrepreneurs and SMEs. The learning
objectives of the event will be to raise awareness and understanding of the
opportunities for and barriers to sustainable business innovation by
providing best practice and new ideas. The conference is supported by an
leading-edge international Advisory Board.

Conference topics
Sustainable Innovation 04 welcomes conceptual and research-based papers
covering environmental, sustainable and responsible business innovation in
the context of a range of issues:
* Market development
* Technology development
* New business models
* Entrepreneurship
* Stimulating innovation 
* Products and service development
* Product Service Systems (PSS)
* Marketing and communications
* Business development
* Co-development
* Network management

Living laboratory
Sustainable Innovation 04 welcomes blue-sky, thought-provoking, radical
concepts and ideas with an emphasis on new business models rather than
solutions focused on 'business as usual'.
* Products
* Services
* Product-service-systems (PSS)

Submission details

Conference topics: please email, fax or post 500 words describing your
proposed paper by 29th March 2004. The paper will then be sent to the
Advisory Board for evaluation and authors will be given feedback by the end
of April. 

Living laboratory: please email, fax or post 2 pages that a) visualise, b)
describe your proposed sustainable business, product, service or PSS
concept and c) outline the financial, social and environmental impacts
(both positive and negative) of your idea. Please send your outline by by
29th March 2004. Proposals will then be sent to the Advisory Board for
evaluation and feedback will be returned by the end of April with
successful entrants asked to present their concepts at the event. A
template is downloadable from www.cfsd.org.uk/events/tspd9

For more information on Sustainable Innovation 04 please contact:

Professor Martin Charter
Director
The Centre for Sustainable Design
The Surrey Institute of Art & Design, University College
Tel:  + 44 (0) 1252 892772
Fax: + 44 (0) 1252 892747
Email: mcharter@surrart.ac.uk
Website: www.cfsd.org.uk


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