What is ITA?

Innovation and technology analysis (ITA) is the examination of scientific, technical, and organizational innovations and developments, including their socioeconomic prerequisites and impacts, the conditions under which they are achieved, and their interactions with other scientific, technical, and social developments. The objective is to identify fields of socially desired technological progress, to ascertain potential for shaping that progress, and to point out political room for maneuver. Innovation and technology analysis is intended to offer orientation in a high-tech society and to help promote humane, socially equitable, and environmentally compatible technological engineering. Building on the proven methods and results of technology assessment (TA), innovation and technology analysis is a concept for analyzing and evaluating technologies. Its broad approach links research and practice.

ITA studies disclose unused potential in new technologies and inquire into innovative ways to deal with possible risks. Innovation and technology analysis is interdisciplinary and brings scientific, technical, ecological, ethical, social, legal, economic, and political aspects to bear. In order to optimize problem-solving dynamics, innovation and technology analysis begins with the social conditions governing innovation, identifies institutional obstacles to innovation, and advances proposals for overcoming such barriers. The inclusion of business and its instruments for product assessment is intended to lead to synergies with integrated, modern ITA.

In the context of innovation and technology analysis, the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) funds interdisciplinary studies on innovation potential and technological developments stemming from the ints

Focal points of innovation and technology analysis are:

• Fields of technological innovation:

  ITA lays the groundwork for recommendations on the design of innovation systems, especially for studying the conditions and impacts of basic technologies pertaining to information and communication, biotechnology, and genetic engineering.

• Technology acceptance and attitude chang:

  Background information on the determinants of technology acceptance and relevant empirical knowledge is sought, particularly with an eye to understanding the effect that new media have on the possibilities for information, communication, and participation.

• Preview of scientific developments in technology:

  An innovation-centered evaluation of the prerequisites and impacts of technology's development and use is conducted in the early stages of shaping the visions and scenarios behind the research funding provided by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research.

An additional goal of the ministry is to strengthen ITA in Germany and to facilitate its international spread and interlinkage.

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