Stronger competitiveness requires more than a focus on technology
Technology can be a way to strengthen companies' competitiveness, but the main focus should shift from the technology itself to the changes that create value, says associate professor Marianne Harbo, a researcher in innovation and technology management.
Technology is not the biggest challenge
Europe produces new knowledge and technological inventions of world-class quality. Even so, European companies often struggle to turn new ideas into innovation, growth and business. That is one of the main messages in the 2024 Draghi report on Europe’s competitiveness, which has led to greater focus on technology development. For associate professor Marianne Harbo, who works with both public and private companies, the challenge is not first and foremost about technology.
- I find that the vast majority of the problems Danish companies face are not technological. A lack of innovation management and the ability to create value more broadly seem to be a bigger challenge, Marianne Harbo emphasises.
”Innovation is often associated with new technologies, and that is certainly important, with an experimental approach and testing of new technologies, which is seen especially in new technology companies and the undergrowth of technology projects in existing companies.
-Technology is only part of the equation. There is, above all, a need to draw the big picture and set a value-creating direction. That requires leadership. It presupposes overview and prioritisation. And it requires an eye for the fact that different actors view what is valuable differently.
Innovation is about creating value for different stakeholders
For suppliers, creating value is about commercialising new solutions. Business leaders focus on how new solutions support efficiency and competitiveness. Users, by contrast, assess value based on whether the solution makes sense in their everyday lives. A good example is in health technology, where artificial intelligence is being tested extensively - and rightly so, because the potential is significant.
AI can help solve several of the challenges facing the healthcare system. But technology is not an end in itself. If AI solutions are to be implemented and scaled successfully, this requires an overview of which changes are needed and which solutions can create the greatest value. It is about understanding the consequences of different choices both here and now and in the longer term.
- If actors cannot see the value and the perspectives in what is new, they will neither buy, use, nor change. Innovation must therefore be based on what will create value for a wide range of actors, Marianne Harbo concludes.
Europe does not lack research - but must become better at turning it into practice
One of the main conclusions of the Draghi report is that Europe lacks neither research nor talent. The problem is, to a greater extent, that new knowledge and new ideas too rarely translate into the establishment of companies, innovation, and growth. A central theme in the report is the need to close Europe’s innovation gap and strengthen the ability to create and scale companies.
Marianne Harbo recognises that perspective:
- Innovation is complex and rarely something individual actors can manage on their own. There is a need for collaboration so that everyone builds stronger capabilities, Marianne Harbo emphasizes.
Innovation will also become a core task for universities in the future. This is the message in the recommendations from the Taskforce for strengthened knowledge and technology transfer from November 2025. Specifically, this applies, for example, to universities’ collaboration with the business community on the commercialisation of knowledge and the ability to create value beyond university walls. SDU Business School is highly focused on contributing to that agenda, and SDU is an internationally oriented university with strong regional roots that already collaborates with Danish companies.
Why don’t companies team up more?
Marianne Harbo points out that innovation is advantageously created in ecosystems in collaboration with a wide range of actors - especially when the goal is value creation based on entirely new technology that is untested but has the potential to become very widespread.
Based on her own and Professor Mette Præst Knudsen’s research and experience with drone companies over the past 10 years, she points out that many small companies still think of growth as something that must be created by the company itself and as a result of an entrepreneurial mindset. But that can be difficult - especially if the customer is large and places major demands on documented applicability, compliance with standards, reliability of delivery, and so on.
Complex challenges increasingly require collaboration across organisations and competencies. And that can strengthen knowledge for each actor.
Marianne Harbo herself has experience with this. She highlights the development of SDU and Børsen’s new board education program as a current example. Here, a universe of knowledge has been created that is new both for the region’s companies and for SDU. At each teaching session, Børsen contributes highly relevant knowledge, which it is accustomed to gathering and communicating hour by hour, while researchers from SDU Business School, the Faculty of Engineering, and the Faculty of Business and Social Sciences communicate scientific and internationally grounded knowledge. Added to this is domain knowledge from the advisers Deloitte, Cedra, Focus Advokater, and Boyden, as well as insights from board leaders who openly share their experience and knowledge in a confidential setting.
A great many different disciplines therefore contribute at the same time, each with its own perspective, and this extensive collaboration has created an innovative learning environment.
Based in part on the experiences from the board education programme, Marianne Harbo wonders why companies do not collaborate more on innovation. In her view, the parties do not need to be “married”, because the goal should simply be to deliver a really strong product together. The board education programme has shown how rewarding this is - both for the participants in the programme and for those who deliver the teaching together, because everyone in the room becomes wiser.
Innovation should be on top management’s radar
If innovation is to succeed, it requires management attention. That applies not least to AI.
Together with research colleagues Tina Lundø Tranekjer, Mette Præst Knudsen and Nina Dietz Legind, Marianne Harbo is currently investigating how board leaders perceive their boards’ responsibilities and priorities, as well as the digital maturity of the companies they represent.
Under the Danish Companies Act, the board must oversee the company’s overall and strategic management, and since AI is expected to change the competitive landscape and thereby the business significantly, the board also plays a central role in ensuring that AI creates value both now and in the longer term. So far, the research shows that boards’ focus on AI varies by sector, but that boards in more digitally mature companies primarily focus on the business opportunities in AI rather than the regulatory and legal aspects.
AI can create new workflows, products and services that challenge existing business models for better and for worse. AI is therefore no longer a technology project, but a strategic leadership responsibility, and for that reason it should be a recurring item on board agendas.
Five leadership focus points
According to Marianne Harbo, top management should focus on five overarching points if companies are to succeed with digital transformation, which she has recently taught on the board education programme.
- Technologies such as AI are a prerequisite for digital transformation and should therefore, of course, receive attention, including technological possibilities, technological maturity, types of data that can be used, and so on.
- The organisation must go through change, and employees must be able and motivated to bring the technology into the company’s products, services and internal processes, which requires a digital mindset, skills development and change management.
- The external environment includes attention to the levels of analysis outside the company, including the political level, citizens and potential consumers, partners and competitors.
- Innovation must also receive attention, because how does the company create something new and valuable? How does it stay sharp? And how does it organise itself in the right way? It is a difficult exercise to both run operations and develop something new. According to Marianne Harbo, mindset is decisive and the need for management support is significant.
- Strategy is needed to frame the first four points, including questions such as what are we facing, where are we headed, and what might the technologies we introduce today mean in the long term?
According to Marianne Harbo, digital transformation requires technological insight, but also a focus on organisational readiness, the external environment, innovation capability and strategic priorities. This brings us back to the current study on boards’ responsibility for and attention to AI, which Marianne and her colleagues are behind. It shows that none of the areas can stand alone.
Greater competitiveness requires stronger collaboration
Back to the recommendations from the Draghi report, which point out that Europe must become better at creating companies that can grow and compete globally. This requires not only investment in technology, but also stronger collaboration between universities, companies, investors and public authorities.
Here, Marianne Harbo points to innovation’s biggest challenge:
”Technology matters. But if we want to create viable change, we need to focus on more than the development and commercialisation of technology, and we need to learn to work together in new ways. To succeed with innovation, we should think in terms of shared value creation.
Meet the researcher
Marianne Harbo is an associate professor at SDU Business School and her research areas are innovation and technology management in public and private companies.