Information sharing for knowledge creation during early design phases

This paper presents the latest development of a new tool named «ID2» or «Innovation, Development, Diffusion». This web tool is dedicated to fostering and supporting innovative projects in the very early design phases, while structuring and capitalising on information for future projects. Our work is based on an ethnographic study that we carried out in an industrial company, and which highlights the complexity and weakness of the innovative process. Relying on the main results of this socio-technical approach, we present in this paper the specifications and the structure of this new tool that provides support for interactions between the different participants. Moreover, the question of the learning processes in the design projects is also discussed. In this way, based on a theoretical model of learning, we propose different support functions to assist the structuring of information oriented towards re-use for improving the learning processes in subsequent projects. To conclude we show how this tool can lead to knowledge sharing thus encouraging co-operation mechanisms in future innovative projects.