Design thinking impact on value creation and value capture on innovation projects

Abstract

Design thinking has proven to be an effective approach to driving innovation in diverse contexts and has attracted increasing interest from scholars and practitioners. However, the plurality of points of view about design thinking can bring diffuse understandings and hinder a cohesive perspective on the construct. This work continues the research stream to provide greater specificity about design thinking practice. The paper focuses on new solution development projects, investigating how design thinking contributes to advance from value creation to value capture—which are two fundamental achievements of successful innovations. Based on three in‐depth case studies of new product development conducted in healthcare innovation projects, this work indicates that design thinking is more prone to promoting value creation rather than value capture. Design thinking principles work as a compass that guides the development team, getting clues from users to direct the value creation. In addition, the study shows the importance of complementing design thinking with specialist knowledge to build solutions that can create value. Finally, the study shows that value capture is not an immediate outcome of design thinking. Therefore, this work indicates the need to complement design thinking with business‐oriented approaches to provide market‐related results.