Concepts and starting points

This page describes the key concepts and starting points underpinning the work on procurement-friendly innovation management and Demand Acceleration.

Key concepts at a glance

Click on a heading to go directly to a more detailed explanation of the concept.

90% innovation – 10% procurement
An expression of a shift in perspective where the innovation process is placed at the centre and procurement is seen as a tool for driving it forward.

Procurement-friendly innovation management
An approach where innovation processes – in which public-sector demand owners and businesses meet – are designed to actively create the conditions for procurement and implementation of the resulting solutions.

Demand Acceleration
A specialisation within procurement-friendly innovation management with a focus on scalability, market development, and diffusion beyond the first customer.

The Demand Acceleration framework
Four values and four principles that describe the approach.

The Demand Acceleration model
A way of operationalising the approach in concrete procurement processes.

Demand Acceleration Community
A shared arena for exploration, learning, and the further development of procurement-friendly innovation management, including Demand Acceleration.

90% innovation – 10% procurement

With the expression 90% innovation – 10% procurement, we want to describe a shift in perspective. Rather than starting from a procurement process, we place the innovation process at the centre and see procurement as a tool for driving it forward.

Innovation processes are inherently unpredictable. They can begin long before it is known whether they will result in a procurement – of what, or even by whom. And they can continue long after a procurement contract is signed, through development, further development, and diffusion beyond the first customer.

This means, among other things, that the use of procurement as a tool for driving innovation is not tied to a specific procedure. The choice of procedure is an administrative consequence of what you want to achieve and how you want the process to work, determined by context, uncertainty, and the maturity of the solution.

Read more about the perspective shift here (in swedish)

From this perspective, the purpose of innovation processes is not in itself to produce reports, knowledge bases, pilots, or proofs of concept – although these may be milestones along the way. The purpose is to create the conditions for solutions to be implemented, used, and disseminated.

Innovation processes therefore need to be designed from the outset so that legal and organisational conditions do not retroactively create barriers to procurement, implementation, or diffusion – should these become relevant.

Procurement-friendly innovation management

Procurement-friendly innovation management is a way of expressing what the 90% innovation – 10% procurement perspective means in practice.

The term was coined in this article

It was a play on words, building on the reasoning in the Swedish government’s innovation procurement inquiry (SOU 2010:56), where the conclusion was essentially that all public procurement should be innovation-friendly – that is, conducted in a way that does not exclude or disadvantage new, innovative solutions.

If we shift perspective and place the innovation process at the centre, the consequence is that innovation processes also need to be procurement-friendly. They should be conducted in a way that creates the conditions for implementation of the solutions the process generates, including in cases where procurement is required.

This means viewing the fundamental procurement principles – openness, equal treatment, transparency, proportionality, and mutual recognition – as design principles in the parts of the innovation process where public organisations and potential suppliers meet and exchange information.

Making innovation processes procurement-friendly means, for example:

  • Applying the fundamental procurement principles in the design of the stages where public actors and potential suppliers meet and exchange information
  • Ensuring that organisational and legal conditions for implementation are in place
  • Addressing questions of budget, anchoring, and demand
  • Identifying and managing regulatory and other requirements that may affect the possibility of adoption, use, and diffusion

Procurement-friendly innovation management is therefore not solely about procurement, but about how innovation processes in a public-sector context are designed from the outset.

Demand Acceleration

Demand Acceleration is a specialisation within procurement-friendly innovation management with a particular focus on demand development, scalability, and market development.

The starting point is that innovation processes involving the public sector should not merely aim to solve an individual need, but to create solutions with the potential to be implemented, used, and disseminated beyond the first customer.

Demand Acceleration therefore emphasises:

  • Scalability beyond the first customer
  • Market development as part of public innovation practice
  • An active business development perspective

This approach is described in more detail in the Demand Acceleration framework and operationalised through the Demand Acceleration model.

The Demand Acceleration framework

The Demand Acceleration framework describes an approach to how procurement can function as a driver of innovation. It consists of four fundamental values and four guiding principles.

The framework can underpin different types of processes, from early market dialogues to actual procurements. One way of designing procurements so that they drive the innovation process forward in line with the framework is the Demand Acceleration procurement model.

Values

  • Innovation means embracing complexity and unpredictability.
  • Innovation is not limited by supply, but by demand.
  • Public procurement has the potential to become a powerful tool for driving the transition towards a sustainable society.
  • The five principles of public procurement – non-discrimination, equal treatment, proportionality, transparency, and mutual recognition – aim to stimulate competition and should govern all interaction between public buyers and suppliers.

Principles

  • Non-predictive governance – Navigating uncertainty requires processes designed for unpredictability.
  • Iterative and interactive processes – Needs, requirements, and solutions evolve as users and suppliers interact with innovations in their various forms.
  • Integrate procurement into the innovation process, not innovation into the procurement process – When innovation and procurement are integrated, the process must follow an innovation logic while also fulfilling the fundamental principles of public procurement.
  • Scalability beyond the first customer – Scalability increases the shared value for buyers, suppliers, and society and needs to be integrated into every step of the process.

Demand Acceleration model

The Demand Acceleration model is a way of operationalising the framework. It describes how a procurement can be designed to drive the innovation process forward and create conditions for both implementation with the first customer and diffusion in the market.

The model is based on an iterative approach where organisational development and market development run in parallel, with multiple suppliers in the early stages. The purpose of the process is to both meet the organisation’s needs and create a long-term sustainable solution and business case – which in practice means diffusion beyond the first customer. This makes both the solution’s and the supplier’s market potential central aspects to assess throughout the process.

Examples of how the model has been applied can be found on the case pages.

Demand Acceleration Community

The development of procurement-friendly innovation management and Demand Acceleration does not happen solely through individual projects, but through shared learning in practice.

The Demand Acceleration Community is a community for actors who want to explore, apply, and further develop these perspectives in concrete processes.

The community serves as an arena for experience exchange, methodology development, and joint reflection on how public procurement can be used as a tool for driving innovation.

Read more about the Demand Acceleration Community and other communities and learning environments for joint exploration and exchange of experience on how public procurement can contribute to innovation, collaboration, and development across organisational boundaries.