Artificial intelligence and organisational change

This chapter examines how artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming innovation management by analysing the interplay between human and AI capabilities across the five stages of the new product development (NPD) process – opportunity identification, concept generation, project evaluation, development, and market launch. It argues that AI’s capacity to process vast, complex datasets enables new forms of organisational learning and creativity, while also demanding new governance approaches to manage hybrid human–AI systems. AI technologies such as machine learning, deep learning, and natural language processing extend human cognition by accelerating market analysis, trend detection, and idea generation. In early NPD stages, AI’s analytical power helps firms uncover unmet needs and generate novel product ideas, while humans contribute contextual understanding and creative interpretation. During project evaluation, AI enhances decision-making through data-driven insights, but human intuition remains vital in dealing with ambiguity and ethical considerations. In product development, AI accelerates prototyping and testing, reducing costs and time to market, whereas at the market launch stage, AI-driven analytics and personalisation improve marketing precision and supply-chain efficiency. The chapter concludes that AI currently serves mainly as an augmentative force, enhancing human decision-making and efficiency, though it is beginning to assume substitutive roles in data-intensive, early-stage innovation activities. By mapping these evolving roles, the chapter offers a framework for understanding human–AI conjoint agency in innovation management and highlights the need for governance structures that ensure synergy, transparency, and responsible deployment of AI within the NPD process.