“Managing Innovation and Technology in the Digital and Intelligent Age”

Call for Papers – Special Issue: “Managing Innovation and Technology in the Digital and Intelligent Age”

Journal: Technological Forecasting and Social Change
Publisher: Elsevier
Impact Factor: 13.3 | CiteScore: 26.3
Submission deadline: 31 December 2026

Overview

This special issue explores how innovation and technology are managed in the digital and intelligent age, with a strong focus on the societal consequences of technological change. It is anchored in InnoTech 2026: Innovation and Technology Management Conference (22–24 May 2026, Beijing, co‑organised by Elsevier and the Research Center for Technological Innovation at Tsinghua University) and particularly welcomes substantially extended full papers developed from conference presentations.

All submissions—whether conference‑linked or open call—will be evaluated under Technological Forecasting and Social Change’s standard double‑blind review process, with an emphasis on originality, methodological rigour, theoretical advance, and practice‑oriented implications.

Four Core Research Bureaus

Submissions must align with one or more of TFSC’s four interconnected research areas:

1. Technological Forecasting & Modelling

   • Papers that anticipate emergence, evolution, and societal effects of technologies.

   • Methods include: Delphi, roadmapping, horizon scanning, AI‑based modelling, patent/code‑repository analytics, scaling‑law analyses, system dynamics, and scenario‑based policy analysis.

   • Contributions should show how forecasting insights inform political, economic, social, and environmental decisions.

2. Management of Technology

   • Research on how organisations and ecosystems translate technological potential into value.

   • Topics:

     • Technology selection and portfolio management, capability building, digital‑platform participation, ecosystem orchestration, make‑buy‑ally decisions, and governance of innovation.

   • Encouraged: Micro‑ to industry‑level studies, systematic reviews, and meta‑analyses grounded in robust theory and empirical evidence.

3. Impact & Evaluation of Technology

   • Studies on economic, social, and environmental consequences of technology deployment.

   • Examples:

     • Productivity gains/losses, distributional equity, labour‑market change, organisational transformation, environmental footprints, resilience, and safety.

   • Emphasis on processes of adoption, integration, and long‑term outcomes across diverse settings.

4. Technology Governance & Public Policy

   • Work on institutional arrangements, regulation, and governance models that steer innovation toward societal benefit.

   • Topics:

     • Regulatory sandboxes, innovation‑driven procurement, privacy and data governance, competition and platform regulation, stakeholder engagement, and comparative policy analysis.

Key Thematic Areas (linked to InnoTech 2026)

Submissions must exhibit a clear technological core and connect to one or more of the following themes:

• AI in innovation:

  • AI‑driven R&D, design, and forecasting; implications for safety, bias, transparency, accountability, and governance.

• Platformization of industry:

  • Digital platforms, ecosystems, multi‑sided markets, complementor dynamics, data‑network effects, power, and value capture across sectors.

• Open innovation in the post‑platform era:

  • Open‑innovation logics within platform ecosystems, clusters, consortia, and public‑private partnerships, including IP/data‑sharing and collaboration governance.

• User‑driven and community innovation:

  • Grassroots innovation, citizen science, maker movements, and open‑source communities as sources of technological and social change.

• Mission‑oriented innovation and societal challenges:

  • Climate, health, and mobility missions; portfolios, policy instruments, inter‑organisational collaboration, entrepreneurship, and impact evaluation.

• Strategic foresight and technological forecasting in innovation management:

  • Applications of Delphi, roadmapping, trend analytics, and scaling‑law models embedded in organisational decision‑making.

• Dynamic capabilities and innovation capture in global firms:

  • Sensing–seizing–reconfiguring, ambidexterity, global R&D networks, and investment under geopolitical and supply‑chain turbulence.

• Sustainable futures:

  • Innovation for decarbonisation, adaptation, circularity, and inclusion from firm, ecosystem, and policy perspectives.

• Reinventing industrial policy for the digital age:

  • Strategic investment, standards, regulation, and procurement in interaction with trade and competition policy.

• Global South innovation pathways:

  • Frugal and leapfrogging innovation, South–South collaboration, and political‑economy perspectives on capability building.

• Quantitative technology forecasting and scouting:

  • Text/patent/code‑repository analytics, bibliometrics, ML/time‑series models, and weak‑signal detection for R&D and portfolio decisions.

• Cyber‑physical systems and smart manufacturing:

  • Managing IoT/edge computing, digital twins, robotics, additive manufacturing, and interoperable architectures for agility and performance.

• Decision‑making under deep uncertainty in engineering projects:

  • Robust decision‑making, real options, adaptive pathways, and DMDU frameworks for high‑stakes technology investments.

• Supply‑chain digital technologies and innovation capability:

  • Blockchain, analytics, AI, automation, and digital twins for planning, resilience, and innovation performance in supply chains.

Submission Details

• Submission platform: Technological Forecasting and Social Change Editorial Manager:
  https://www2.cloud.editorialmanager.com/tfs/default2.aspx

• When submitting, select article type: “VSI: InnoTech 2026”.

• Indicate the TFSC bureau (and any secondary bureau) that best reflects the paper’s contribution, preferably in the cover letter.

• Follow the journal’s Guide for Authors:
  https://www.sciencedirect.com/journal/technological-forecasting-and-social-change/publish/guide-for-authors

• Submission window: 1 September – 31 December 2026.

• Conference‑linked authors:

  • Conference abstract deadline: 9 January 2026; notification: 20 February 2026; conference dates: 22–24 May 2026.

Questions on scope and editorial fit may be addressed to Prof. Luca Mora (L.Mora@napier.ac.uk); questions about InnoTech 2026 to content‑INNOTECH@elsevier.com.

Guest Editors

• Luca Mora, Edinburgh Napier University, UK & Tallinn University of Technology, Estonia

• Mei‑Chih Hu, National Tsing Hua University, Taiwan

• Matthias Fink, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria

• Diana Hicks, Georgia Institute of Technology, USA

• Charlotta Sirén, University of St. Gallen, Switzerland

• Yi Zhang, University of Technology Sydney, Australia

Why This Issue Matters

• The digital and intelligent age reshapes how technologies are invented, diffused, governed, and evaluated, with profound implications for economies, societies, and the planet.

• This special issue aims to integrate forecasting, management, impact assessment, and policy into a coherent research agenda, helping scholars and practitioners steer innovation toward responsible, inclusive, and sustainable futures.

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