Development of a Tool to Support the Sustainable Management of Urban Living Labs as Platforms for Co-Creation

Fumiya Akasaka (), Mika Yasuoka, Momoko Nakatani, Hiroko Akiyama and Ryuichi Nambu
Additional contact information
Fumiya Akasaka: Human Augmentation Research Centre, National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, Kashiwa 277-0882, Japan
Mika Yasuoka: Department of People and Technology, Roskilde University, 4000 Roskilde, Denmark
Momoko Nakatani: Department of Information and Communications, Institute of Science Tokyo, Yokohama 226-0026, Japan
Hiroko Akiyama: Institute of Gerontology, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo 113-8656, Japan
Ryuichi Nambu: Actant Inc., Tokyo 169-0051, Japan

Sustainability, 2025, vol. 17, issue 10, 1-24

Abstract: This study focuses on living labs as ‘platforms for co-creation (i.e., platform-level living labs)’, in which multiple co-creation projects on diverse social issues are promoted through mutual interaction. The long-term operation of such a platform-level living lab is important for achieving social innovation and transformation through the living lab approach; however, methods and tools to support its sustainable management and operation have not been developed. Therefore, this study aims to identify key elements and develop a tool for the sustainable operation and management of platform-level living labs. It undertakes a qualitative analysis of data collected from in-depth interviews conducted with experts who have organised actual cases of long-term practising platform-level living labs in Japan. We also conduct a case-based application of the developed canvas tool and find that it enables us to consider various perspectives that are important when setting up and managing a platform-level living lab. This study also provides a ‘first step’ for further discussions on a methodology for the integrated use of multi-level canvases in the sustainable management of platform-level living labs.

Keywords: platform-level living labs; canvas tool; sustainable management; urban living labs; co-creation; social transformation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/17/10/4357/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/17/10/4357/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:17:y:2025:i:10:p:4357-:d:1653581

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().