Abstract
Discovering technology opportunities from the opinion of users can promote successful technological development by satisfying the needs of users. However, although previous approaches using opinion mining only have classified various needs of users into positive or negative categories, they cannot derive the main reasons for their opinion. To solve this problem, this research proposes an approach to exploring technology opportunity by structuring user needs with a concept of opinion trigger of objects and functions of the technology-based products. To discover technology opportunity, first, an opinion trigger is identified from review data using Naïve Base classifier and natural language processing. Second, the opinion triggers and patent keywords that have a similar meaning in context are clustered to discover the needs of the user and need-related technology. Then, the sentimental values of needs are calculated through graph-based semi-supervised learning. Finally, the needs of the user are classified in resolving the problem of vacant technology to discover technology opportunity. Then, an R&D strategy of each opportunity is suggested based on opinion triggers, patent keywords, and their property. Based on the concept of opinion trigger-based methodology, a case study is conducted on automobile—related reviews, extracting the customer needs and presenting important R&D projects such as an extracted need (cargo transportation) and its R&D strategy (resolving contradiction). The proposed approach can analyze the needs of user at a functional level to discover new technology opportunities.
Highlights
Technology innovation has accelerated the growth of the economy by enabling the development of new products and services
Technology opportunity discovery by structuring user needs approach refers to needs of users for a product or technology that brings in innovation to satisfy their needs
To discover technology opportunity based on opinion triggers, a framework that consists of three modules is suggested
Summary
Technology innovation has accelerated the growth of the economy by enabling the development of new products and services. Since two opposite approaches, such as technology push and demand pull, are the main sources of innovation, most traditional studies on technology forecasting started their arguments by choosing their position in two approaches. While technology push means that a new technology catalyzes impactful innovation by utilizing and commercializing the technology, the demand-pull. Technology opportunity discovery by structuring user needs approach refers to needs of users for a product or technology that brings in innovation to satisfy their needs. Other researchers advocating a demand-pull approach concentrate on user needs, investigating a diverse set of market features [1]. While users do not always need a high technology product, they just want to satisfy their needs at a reasonable price and performance. Previous studies proposed an R&D framework that reflects users’ needs through opinion mining [3, 4]
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