From idea to blah! Understanding mobile services development as interactive innovation

Mobile communications are permeating virtually every aspect of our lives. The market is experiencing rapid improvements in technologies, while mobile operators are trying to figure out new ways their infrastructures can provide services to the customers. Furthermore, user-innovation with new ways of using these technologies generates powerful feedback loops back into the innovation processes. In this turbulent environment it is difficult to capture and conceptualize how newness comes about and what the main characteristics of innovation are. The aim of this paper is to illustrate how the concept of interactive innovation can be applied to explain the development of mobile services. This study adopts the perspective of the developer rather than the user. Moreover, through the social construction of technology lens, the concepts of sense-making and bricolage are applied to explain the innovation appropriation process during the mobile data value chain improvement process. One of the conclusions drawn is that in the rapidly changing and complex context of mobile services development, the traditional notion of ‘interactive innovation’ cannot fully explain this phenomenon that takes place.