Julia Fehrer

Dr. Julia A. Fehrer is is an Associate Professor of Innovation & Strategy at the University of Auckland Business School in New Zealand. Her research is at the intersection of strategic marketing, service research, and innovation, with a focus on market and ecosystem as catalyst for digital and societal transformation. Her work has been published in journals such as the Journal of Service Research, Industrial Marketing Management, and Journal of Business Research, has been recognized with several international awards, including the Australian & New Zealand Marketing Academy Emerging Researcher of the Year Award. She is on the editorial board of the journals: Journal of Service Management, Journal Service Theory and Practice, and AMS Review, while co-chairing a special interest group on Market Shaping and Innovation. She is also Academic Lead for Innovation and Strategy and Co-Director of the Circular Economy in Business Beacon at the University of Auckland. In this role, she collaborates with international scholars, industry networks and government departments on sustainable innovation issues. With a substantial grant from the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment, she is currently working as part of a transdisciplinary team to transition New Zealand’s plastics industry to a circular economy.

Service Innovation in Social-Cyber-Physical Systems: Investigating Design, Adoption, and Learning Processes for Radical Technological Innovation

The rise of artificial intelligence (AI), soft robotics and social-cyber-physical systems are fundamentally changing social interaction, allowing humans and technology to engage and connect with their environment in a completely new way leading to the disruption of various sectors. Technology continues to radically and rapidly change the nature of service and service innovation. AI, wearables and implants come with a huge variety of application fields, for example in medicine, sport or data exchange to name only a few. This variety makes them unpredictable and scary for most parts of a society. With this research project we suggest to rethink radical innovation by viewing it from a truly systemic perspective, where potential customers, developers, investors, technology and even competitors learn from and with each other. We will explore and experiment with system design methods that support adoption and learning processes of versatile actors to provide guidance for managers and entrepreneurs as to how to successfully facilitate systemic innovations.