Artificial Intelligence: The key to innovation and business success!

Artificial Intelligence: The key to innovation and business success!

The upcoming TIE annual conference, organized by the Chair of Entrepreneurship & Technology Transfer of the Faculty of Construction and Environment, will take place from September 24th to 26th, 2025 at the Bauhaus University Weimar. This event has established itself as one of the largest of its kind in the DACH region, focusing on innovation, entrepreneurship and technology management. This year, more than 55 contributions were submitted by scientists, covering a variety of subject areas, including entrepreneurship and technology and innovation research.

The conference's particular focus is on artificial intelligence (AI), open innovation and science-based startups. These topics reflect current trends in the innovation landscape. Renowned guests, including Prof. Frank Piller from RWTH Aachen and Prof. Carolin Häussler from the University of Passau, are expected. Prof. Piller's keynote entitled "An Open Innovation Ecosystem Approach For A Radically New Electric Grid" will take place on Thursday, September 25th at 9:30 a.m. and promises to offer exciting insights into the interactions between innovation and technological change.

Artificial intelligence at the center

Artificial intelligence plays a central role in the current innovation discussion. It has evolved into self-adaptive neural networks capable of recognizing patterns and predicting behavior. These technologies allow companies to use external data to identify trends and better estimate future needs. According to the Boston Consulting Group, 91 percent of innovation leaders use AI to identify new business opportunities and 92 percent use it to support innovation decisions. This shows how crucial AI is for companies’ strategies.

The research of Xavier Ferràs, Dr. Petra Nylund and Prof. Alexander Brem present seven key areas in which companies can use AI:

• Geschäftsmodell-Innovation: Echtzeitdatenbanken identifizieren erfolgreiche Geschäftsmodelle.
• Technologieerkennung: Wissenschaftliche Datenbanken zeigen aufkommende Wissensfelder.
• Technologietrends: KI bewertet die Ausrichtung von Sektoren und Investitionen.
• Strategische Erkennung: Analysen von Nachrichten- und digitalen Netzwerken identifizieren Wettbewerberstrategien.
• Ergebnisvorhersagen: Historische Branchendaten optimieren Verkaufsprognosen.
• Marktforschung: Social Media-Analysen liefern Einblicke in Markenwahrnehmung und Trends.
• Ereignisvorhersagen: Gesundheitsdatenbanken verbessern die Vorhersage von Gesundheitsereignissen.

Integration of AI in innovation management

The potential of AI to transform innovation processes is enormous. It improves the efficiency and effectiveness of innovation activities and can offer companies access to new insights. AI plays a central role in innovation management because it can analyze large amounts of data, recognize patterns and make forecasts. This supports the development of new products, services and business models. The challenges of using AI and the practical possibilities of its integration were discussed in the book “Innovation Management and Artificial Intelligence” by Prof. Dr. Gordon Müller-Seitz addresses important aspects of classic innovation management.

The course of the TIE annual meeting promises an intensive exchange on these topics and offers a platform for discussing the latest findings and challenges in the field of innovation and its management through artificial intelligence. For those interested, the full program is available on the website Bauhaus University Weimar available.

Registrations for the conference dinner are available from Jun.-Prof. Nikolaus Seitz, who can be reached by email. An intensive exchange at this event will further advance the discussion about innovation, entrepreneurship and the use of artificial intelligence.