Authors of TRIZFest 2014 in Prague

The full list of authors whose paper abstracts were accepted for preparing full papers for TRIZFest 2014 Conference to be held  in Prague, Czech Republic on September 4-6, 2014 is available at http://matriz.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/TRIZfest-2014-Accepted-Authors-Eng.pdf

TRIZ Future 2008

Finally, after a quite intensive November filled with travel and training courses, I have some time to write few lines about the TRIZ Future 2008 Conference.

This year's edition of the conference in Enschede gathered around 90 participants from 20 countries including China, Japan, Korea, US. The number of people was slightly less in the previous year in Frankfurt, however in my opinion, quality of presented papers was quite high. It also has to do with the fact that this year we applied a set of stricter criteria to the paper selection and edition process. It probably reduced the number of participants, but I personally learned a number of very interesting things.

As usual, a daily report from the conference is available in the online TRIZ Journal, prepared by the Journal editor, Ellen Domb:

TRIZ Future 2008 Day 1

TRIZ Future 2008 Day 2

TRIZ Future 2008 Day 3

We also hope that as always, Toru Nakagawa will publish a very detailed report on the conference, including review of presented papers.

The atmosphere during the conference was very warm and friendly. After 8 years of conducting the event, we already have a "core group" of those who visit each edition of the conference. It is great to meet each year, discuss last year events and share new ideas. A team of organizers from the Department of Design, Production and Management of the University of Twente did a great job to ensure the highest quality of the event. I am very thankful to them. And especially pleasant surprise was a conference dinner in a village restaurant "Hanninkshof", which featured wonderful gourmet meals and selection of beautiful wines.

What was a little bit frustrating, although the conference was conducted in the Netherlands, not much of Dutch industry visited the conference. I am curious what were the reasons - current economic crisis, or reducing interest in the front-end of innovation? Or too many innovation-related events this year? At the same time I talk to (and work with) many people from the Dutch industry and business, and most of them are very much interested in TRIZ and use it. One of the reasons was, probably that the conference was "too academic", most of papers were from universities. We have to think how to boost industrial participance at future conferences.

Some highlights from the conference:

Opening by Gaetano Cascini, ETRIA president.

During paper presentations

During my tutorial on TRIZ for Business and Management

Keynote talk by Harry Rutten, DSM

During conference dinner

A larger image gallery is available at http://etria.net/img/TFC2008/

Thanks everyone for making the conference success!

Next year edition of the conference will be held in October-November 2009 in Timiosara, Romania. Details will be posted soon at http://www.etria.net/.

TRIZ Future 2008 next week!

Are there TRIZ enthusiasts or those who would be interested in learning more about TRIZ? There is a great chance to meet international TRIZ community next week.

On November 5-7 we conduct the international conference TRIZ Future 2008 in Enschede, The Netherlands hosted by the University of Twente. Although the conference will last 3 days, there is also a possibility to register for the first day only, which will include basic TRIZ tutorials, keynotes, opening, and two tracks with case studies (registration for this day costs Euro 250,-). We expect around 100 people from 20-25 countries.

I will run a tutorial on TRIZ for Business and Management in the morning (from 09:00 till 12:00).

More details on the conference and registration are available at http://www.trizfuture.net/ . To see a detailed schedule of paper presentations, visit section "Downloads".

Creativity World Forum in Antwerpen

The summer break is over, and it's time to get back to autumn innovation. My agenda looks quite full for the coming months with a number of countries to visit, which means that the interest in creativity and innovation is still there!

Just wanted to note that on November 19-20, 2008, the next edition of the Creativity World Forum will take place in Antwerpen, Belgium. The Forum is organized by the Flemmish Organization for Entrepreneurial Creativity and will feature such keynote speakers as Steve Wozniak, Dan Heath, Chris Anderson, Tom Kelly, John Cleese.

This event is defenitiely worth to visit. I plan to be there, too.

TRIZ Future 2008: List of Abstracts

The list of 58 abstracts provisionally accepted for the conference TRIZ Future 2008 (Nov. 5-7, 2008, Enschede, The Netherlands) is available at:
http://etria.net/portal/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=58&Itemid=38
as well as at the official conference website http://www.trizfuture.net/ .

This year we decided to split the conference papers and posters to four tracks: scientific, educational, practitioner, and case studies. Seems like there are enough interesting papers to be presented in each section.

A final list of accepted papers and posters will be available in the second half of September.