Innovation in automotive industry: foresight process in the production area

Abstract

Competitiveness plays one of the major roles for the manufacturing companies. The successful and early implementation of innovations has a great importance in this subject. Therefore, the correct functioning of a Strategic Watch system for the identification and foreseeing of potential innovations is vital. This study meets the objective of presenting a Strategic Watch system proposal for a manufacturing company of the automotive industry. Part of this goal consists on understanding the company’s needs of data and information and describing its Strategic Watch process. Also, this study includes the future objectives of presenting plausible contingency situations and future challenges for the Strategic Watch process. The methods used for achieving the presented objectives consist on analysing the company’s structure, strategy and needs in order to find its potential improvement gaps. In this regard, this paper performs an exhaustive analysis of the current Strategic Watch methods and their role in the processes and strategy in order to find out what gaps are not covered yet. This analysis provides of a better understanding of the Strategic Watch system’s functioning and allows the comprehension of the different company’s needs. This facilitates the improvement of the process by the introduction of new Strategic Watch methods. Also, it presents potential procedures for the contingency situations and future challenges.