Summary

In a competitive landscape increasingly determined by rapid digital transformation, it is important for incumbent firms to combine the ability to exploit existing knowledge and capabilities (exploitation) with the development and refinement of new knowledge and capabilities (exploration). This capability is often referred to as ambidexterity. New technologies, such as those caught under the banner of Artificial Intelligence (AI), will have a fundamental effect on the way in which ambidexterity can be maintained by firms, for example, by re-shaping the search process through which firms choose which products or strategies to pursue, or alternatively, by changing the speed and ease with which knowledge is implemented in existing processes.

The PhD project aims to study the success factors determining an organizations ability to pursue both exploratory and exploitative innovation, with a focus on understanding the implications that AI has in terms of facilitating or constraining the ability to engage in either of these strategies, the ability to switch between them, or the ability to combine them.  During the research project, quantitative techniques belonging to the field of AI will be employed, along with (semi-)experimental methods, to test the ways in which AI alters the strategic decision-making processes that managers or firm employees can engage in.