How Should Requirements be Defined to Have Real Innovation

Abstract People are generally influenced in their purchasing choices by diverse stakeholders and these influences are often not related only to “use situations”. Learning processes, product diffusion dynamics and externalities in fact frequently complicate innovation processes. “Design for Innovation” means considering that design cannot focus only on buyer's preferences and on “product use” because this could limit diffusion of products, besides bounding in general innovation opportunities. The “Design for Innovation” approach drives to study “beyond use situations” and the influences among the actors involved in the innovation processes. This paper describes through two different case studies how a more original list of needs that would have not emerged with more traditional approaches for the requirement management, can be generated with this approach.