Blanche Segrestin

Towards a New Logic for Front End Management: From Drug Discovery to Drug Design in Pharmaceutical R&D

Under pressure to innovate and be cost-effective at the same time, R&D departments are being challenged to develop new organizations and processes for Front End activities. This is especially true in the pharmaceutical industry. As drug development becomes more risky and costly, the discovery departments of pharmaceutical companies are increasingly being compelled to provide strong drug candidates for efficient development processes and quick market launches. It is argued that the Fuzzy Front End consists less of the discovery or recognition of opportunities than of the building of expanded concepts: the notion of concept generation is revisited, suggesting the need for a new logic for organizing Front End activities in order to support sustainable innovative product development. Based on an in-depth empirical study at a European pharmaceutical company, this paper contributes to improved understanding of the actual management practices used in the Front End. Using a design reasoning model (the C-K model), it also adds to the growing body of literature on the management of Front End activities in new product development processes.

Analyzing the Design Process of Farming Practices Ensuring Little Bustard Conservation: Lessons for Collective Landscape Management

Effective solutions for integrating development of agriculture and conservation of biodiversity at a landscape scale remain to be identified. This article presents a case study on an intensively farmed French cereal plain, where the reintroduction of grasslands has been proposed to protect the Little Bustard, a threatened European bird species. Although this solution may seem trivial at first glance, we analyze the design reasoning from which it resulted in order to highlight the innovative paths it opened. We apply C-K theory, a design theory that distinguishes concepts (i.e., unknown proposals) from knowledge. Our analysis reveals the links between the production of scientific knowledge and the generation of various solutions. It also highlights that specifying the ecological functions of grasslands facilitates their management. In the cereal plain, some of these functions give grasslands the status of common goods. This consideration opens new possibilities for managing agricultural landscapes in a way that reconcile agriculture and conservation.

The role of design regimes in the coordination of competencies and the conditions for inter-firm cooperation

More and more work is being done on cooperative design operations in which collective learning processes are closely related to product dynamics. Coordination models conveyed by project management, modularity and platform strategies are also being designed with the aim of improving inter-firm coordination. This paper shows that these models are based on restrictive hypotheses in terms of knowledge and the design function. By studying concrete design functions, we demonstrate the need to differentiate between the different design regimes, which we characterise by three product-related aspects knowledge, breakdown into sub-units and the objectives prescribed to the different sub-units. We then go on to examine three different design regimes, namely for new products with a stabilised architecture, common semi-designed products and innovative products. This analytical framework serves to demonstrate that coordination mechanisms between firms involved in a joint development or innovation process must be adapted to the design regime in question, and therefore helps us establish a number of conditions required for inter-firm cooperation.

The shortcomings of the corporate standard: towards new enterprise frameworks?

As corporate governance is more driven by shareholder‐oriented principles, managers are expected to adopt new attitudes and to be more accountable to shareholders in terms of their strategies and decisions. Yet, when governance is seen primarily as a ‘corporate matter’, it exclusively concerns the coalition of shareholders. This convergence towards the model of the public corporation raises major questions as it leaves aside collective activities and their value creation processes. Coordination, capabilities development and innovation are omitted in the prevalent representation of the corporation. This omission is symptomatic of the confusion between the legal corporate model and the actual activities of the firm. In their own ways, both shareholders’ and stakeholders’ approaches of the firm refer to the legal framework of the public corporation. This article argues that the concept of the firm should be distinguished from its corporate forms. Going back to the basic nature of the firm, it suggests that a firm is a collective endeavour whose activities are directed by management to create new potentials. By challenging the public corporation as a relevant model for the governance of the firm, it indicates new possible and pluralist norms of governance.

Applying ecological knowledge to the innovative design of sustainable agroecosystems

The design of sustainable agroecosystems is crucial to meet contemporary environmental challenges such as biodiversity loss and global change. Ecological knowledge, although expected to be an important component of such an endeavour, is to date mainly used under a problem‐solving paradigm. Applying recent design theories, which highlight the differences between innovative design and problem solving, we assess the potential of using ecological knowledge in agroecosystem design in three contrasted French case studies representative of agricultural intensification world‐wide. In all cases, a design approach generated unexplored agroecosystem configurations and management alternatives. This analysis highlights that ecological science is critical for designing sustainable social‐ecological systems, because it orients the design process by identifying key ecological properties to maintain, while opening the range of management options stakeholders can explore. Synthesis and applications. Participatory design approaches of agroecosystems based on ecological knowledge might be key for planning and change: they allow a diversity of stakeholders to contribute to building solutions, thereby strengthening their sense of ownership and responsibility. Infrastructures in support of participatory design processes, set up in close relation to ecological research centres, have the potential to become new cornerstones of innovation for sustainable social‐ecological systems.

Towards a new form of governance for inter-firm cooperation? Lessons from the Renault-Nissan Alliance

The Renault-Nissan Alliance is representative of forthcoming challenges of inter-firm cooperation. Based on an in-depth case study on this case, the paper expands the evolutionary perspective to examine the processes through which the firms jointly investigate their potential partners to build business opportunities. This exploratory process can either come to a standstill or end up in a merger or in other form of alliance. In order to learn potential common projects and the possible form of governance, firms need to manage simultaneously the coordination and the cohesion mechanisms. The paper also discusses the relevance of a special form of governance to provide firms with an appropriate legal framework.

L’innovation a-t-elle joué un rôle dans la naissance de l’administrative science ?

Parmi les transformations profondes que connait le monde industriel a la fin du XIXe siecle, l’introduction des activites de recherche scientifique et les enjeux de l’innovation ont vraisemblablement plus marque la carriere et la theorie de Fayol qu’on ne l’a jusqu’a present reconnu. Dans quelle mesure, au-dela du cas de Fayol, l’innovation a-t‑elle joue un role dans la naissance des sciences de gestion ou de l’administrative science ? Quelles etaient l’etendue et la realite des liens entre sciences et industrie au debut du XXe siecle ? Et comment se sont organises – a cette epoque – les liens entre le management, devenant une science, et la recherche scientifique plus generalement ?

Towards new R&D processes for sustainable development in the automotive industry: experiencing innovative design

In this chapter, we shall discuss the design processes of environmentally friendly and profitable competitive products.