Abstract
Living labs are settings for open innovation that offer a collaborative platform for research, development, and experimentation in real-life contexts. The research question is: What are the characteristics of AI projects developed in innovation labs for the public sector? The authors collected data from exploring the innovation labs in Latin America, Europe, and Asia. The selection of the laboratories leads to four cases: the Civic Laboratory of AI in the Netherlands, the Laboratorio de Gobierno in Chile (Government's Lab in Chile), Secretaría de Innovación y Transformación in Argentina (Innovation and Transformation Secretary in Argentina), and the Smart Government Innovation Lab in Hong Kong. This chapter comprises five sections beginning with an introduction describing the context of artificial intelligence in the public sector and innovation labs. The second section presents a literature review with similar studies and a conceptual framework. The third section describes the methodology, and the fourth reports on the main findings. The last section contains conclusions, limitations, and future research.
TopLiterature Review
Livings lab research started early this century. Eriksson (2005) focused on describing the origins and foundations of this research topic. He argued that society's main goal was to innovate, modify the value chain, and change the citizen and the consumer's perspective to address future challenges. Niitamo et al. (2006) described the maturation of the concept and new initiatives and examined the initial essential practices of laboratories in different contexts (business, markets, and public sector).
Key Terms in this Chapter
Machine Learning: Is an artificial intelligence technique that allows to learn patterns and generate answers from the analysis of millions of data and records.
Open Innovation: Is the process of innovation available to citizens, companies, and private organizations to advance more quickly in solutions to specific public management problems.
Innovation Labs: Are laboratories whose objective is to generate answers to complex public sector problems under the premise of innovation, using disruptive technologies and new forms of organization.
Public Innovation: Is the term that refers to the transformations in the public sector because of the use of information and communication technologies to improve its processes and results.
Public Sector Labs: Are laboratories located in a public sector agency to collaborate with citizens or other organizations to solve complex government problems using technology.