Introduction
Digital innovation creates new opportunities for citizens, businesses and governments. To fully realize the potential of new and emerging technologies, it is essential to identify both the barriers to and the drivers of their adoption and deployment. Furthermore, businesses, academic institutions and governments must develop strategic scientific networks to analyze these opportunities and associated risks, as well as to assess their potential impact across sectors (education, finance, healthcare, pharma, transportation, etc.) and regions. Such assessments should consider outcomes including productivity growth, job creation, enhanced competitiveness and the promotion of more inclusive societies. These issues raise important questions regarding the transformative potential of digital innovation in the global economy (Cui and Yu, 2026; European Commission, 2026; Jais et al., 2026; Mohandes et al., 2026; Nguyen and Le, 2026; Ordonez, 2004; Zhang et al., 2023).
Contents of the issue
Issue 9 of the Journal of Science and Technology Policy Management features a regular collection of seven papers addressing some crucial issues for businesses like artificial intelligence, business innovation, chatbots, entrepreneurship, m-commerce, open government data and technology. The issue discusses empirical evidence from India, Latvia, Malaysia and Poland, providing interesting knowledge and insights for debate.
The first paper titled “The role of creative entrepreneurs in developing your business” (by Galvão, Marques, Monteiro and Mascarenhas) presents the results of a study that explores “the role of the creative entrepreneur in the development of his business. For the development of this study, primary data were collected through semi-structured interviews with five creative entrepreneurs in the Douro region. To triangulate the information, interviews were also carried out with four heads of local institutions, namely, a university, two municipalities and a business incubator. The results obtained suggest that creative entrepreneurs play an important role in the development of their business, since creativity and innovation are fundamental for the sustainability of their business. However, the results suggest that the main difficulties experienced by this type of entrepreneurs are related to poor knowledge and interest in management. As a rule, poor management knowledge leads to the emergence of several obstacles, related to sales, stocks, production costs and bureaucracy. This study contributes to the existing literature by providing new insights into the main difficulties of creative entrepreneurs, how they overcome these obstacles. The results obtained provide important information for policymakers. The creation of management training programs and cooperation incentives can be important for the growth and development of this type of company. In addition, it shows that it is necessary to create specific policies to encourage and support creative entrepreneurs, since they have different specifications than most entrepreneurs”.
The paper titled “Bibliometric analysis of artificial intelligence in high-to-room temperature superconductors: insights from the Scopus database” (by Pramono and Nurhakim) presents the outcomes of a bibliometric analysis that “aims to comprehensively explore the intersection of artificial intelligence (AI) and high-to-room-temperature superconductors. Focusing on scientific literature, the study investigates trends, collaboration patterns and impactful publications in this interdisciplinary field. The research employs an advanced search query in the Scopus database, targeting articles on the development of superconductors using artificial intelligence. Data collection involves executing the query, saving the results as a CSV file and analyzing it using R-Studio and VOSviewer. Statistical tools, T-tests, regression analysis and Python coding are utilized to enhance the depth of analysis. The analysis spans various dimensions, including the overview of bibliometric characteristics, annual scientific production, average citations per year, sources of publications and source production over time. Noteworthy findings include a sustained growth in annual scientific production, a peak in average citations in specific years and the identification of influential journals shaping the field. While the analysis provides valuable insights, limitations include the potential influence of research biases and the exclusion of non-English articles. Further exploration is encouraged to address these limitations and gain a more nuanced understanding of the field.”
The paper titled “Revitalizing SMEs’ performance: unleashing the dynamics of Technology- Organization-Environment factors for M-Commerce adoption” (by Hanifah, Lee and Abdul) affirms that “strategic leveraging of Mobile Commerce (M-commerce) holds immense potential for augmenting firm performance within the realm of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in Malaysia. This study seeks to unravel the important role played by specific factors, namely, relative advantage, security, complexity, firm performance, organizational competence, M-commerce knowledge, competitive pressure, customer value and information intensity in influencing M-commerce adoption and its subsequent impact on SME performance. Drawing on the Technology-Organization-Environment (TOE) framework, the study posits that technological factors (relative advantage, security and complexity), organizational factors (organizational IT competence and M-commerce knowledge) and environmental factors (competitive pressure, customer value and information intensity) collectively shape M-commerce adoption, thereby influencing SME performance. The study employs a quantitative approach, engaging SME owners in Malaysia as participants, with a sample size of 150 selected through an online survey. Analysis was conducted using Smart PLS, revealing crucial insights. The investigation revealed a positive relationship between relative advantage, security, complexity, competitive pressure, customer value and information intensity, and the adoption of M-commerce within SMEs in Malaysia. Moreover, a positive relationship was identified between M-commerce adoption and firm performance among Malaysian SMEs. Intriguingly, there was no discernible relationship between Organizational IT competence, M-commerce knowledge and the adoption of M-commerce.”
The paper titled “ChatGPT Technology Contribution in Business Innovation, Policy, and Management” (by Alzoubi and Mishra) studies “a novel artificial intelligence (AI) model known as Generative Pretrained Transformer (GPT), specifically ChatGPT, and its potential applications in the corporate sphere. It highlights the significance of ChatGPT in the realms of corporate innovation, management and policymaking. ChatGPT is explained as an AI language model produced by OpenAI, using the GPT framework and extensive training on natural language data. This paper addresses the model’s capabilities to respond to natural language queries resembling human interactions by reviewing the available literature as well as the professional websites. This paper discusses the advantages of ChatGPT in a business context, emphasizing its potential benefits. It also critically examines the limitations of ChatGPT, including ethical considerations, data interpretation challenges, reliability and privacy-related issues. This paper contributes to the discourse surrounding ChatGPT’s role in business innovation, management and policymaking. It highlights both the potential and limitations of this AI technology, offering insights into its implications and future research directions for corporate applications”.
The paper titled “Grassroots innovations in agriculture innovation systems: Insights into Seabuckthorn (Hippophae rhamnoides) in Ladakh, India” (by Kumar, Bhaduri, Saikia, Ali and Sharma) states that “agriculture innovation systems (AIS) examine the complex socio-technical and institutional aspects affecting sustainable agriculture. However, it is predominantly constrained to the formal sector activities in the high-income countries (HICs). The informal sector actors play a major role in the agricultural sector of low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), such as India, by innovating and disseminating grassroots innovations (GI). This study aims to explore the role of different GI, both by the informal and formal sectors, within an emerging AIS focused on seabuckthorn in Ladakh, India. This study used a qualitative methodology, using semi-structured interviews and focused group discussions to gather data from the stakeholders involved in seabuckthorn value chain. The data was analysed using the AIS framework’s a priori themes and was validated through data triangulation with secondary sources. This study reveals the existence of GI, by both the formal and informal sector actors, and their complex interaction within the seabuckthorn value chain. It highlights the importance of co-existence of these GI to make it a sustainable seabuckthorn AIS. This study offers noteworthy perspectives for governments, policymakers and agricultural practitioners with respect to the assimilation of GI into AIS. These insights could help improve agricultural sustainability and viability, particularly in LMICs where the informal sector plays a significant role.”
The paper titled “Analyzing behavioral intention of open government data adoption across Latvia, India and Poland: does national culture matter?” (by Sarantis, Rizun, Alexopoulos and Saxena) affirms that “given that there are cultural differences among countries, there is a scant understanding as to how the cultural differences among these countries get reflected in the intention to adopt and use open government data (OGD). The purpose of this study is to underscore the possible differences in OGD engagement based on the differences in the national cultures. This study seeks to contribute toward OGD-focused literature as well as the technology adoption and usage literature by comparing the analyses across three countries, namely, Latvia (individualist) (n = 173), India (collectivist) (n = 174) and Poland (individualist) (n = 107), wherein the adapted unified theory of technology adoption and use model is invoked for drawing inferences with an extension into the group-wise analysis. Findings from the analyses show that apart from the moderating effects of the country’s national culture across system quality-behavioral intention, data quality-behavioral intention and trust-behavioral intention, it is evidenced that Indian users show voluntary use and concern for data quality in comparison with Latvia’ users. Both Indian and Latvian users are concerned about the trustworthy and reliable OGD; users from both India and Poland seek high data quality; and, finally, users from both Latvia and Poland seek reliable and trustworthy OGD. Despite the fact that national culture has been known to have a significant bearing on the OGD initiatives’ rollout and implementation, the behavioral intention of adoption and usage propensities among the users has not been empirically validated: this study seeks to contribute to the extant literature by focusing on this aspect.”
The paper titled “AI feel millennials: prioritizing the intentions towards adoption of AI-enabled chatbots using fuzzy-AHP approach” (by Gupta, Arora, Singh and Jain) affirms that “in the present era, artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming and redefining the lifestyles of society through its applications, such as chatbots. Chatbot has shown tremendous growth and has been used in almost every field. The purpose of this study is to identify and prioritize the factors that influence millennial’s technology acceptance of chatbots. For the present research, data were collected from 432 respondents (millennials) from Punjab. A fuzzy analytical hierarchy process was used to prioritize the factors influencing millennials’ technology acceptance of chatbots. The key factors considered for the study were information, entertainment, media appeal, social presence and perceived privacy risk. The findings of the study revealed media appeal as the top-ranked prioritized factor influencing millennial technology acceptance of chatbots. In contrast, perceived privacy risk appeared as the least important factor. Ranking of the global weights reveals that I3 and I2 are the two most important sub-criteria. Data were gathered from the millennial population of Punjab, and only a few factors that influence the technology acceptance of chatbots were considered for analysis which has been considered as a limitation of this study. The findings of this study will provide valuable insights about consumer behaviour to the business firm, and it will help them to make competitive strategies accordingly. Existing literature has investigated the factors influencing millennials’ technology acceptance of chatbots. At the same time, this study has used the multi-criteria decision-making technique to deliver valuable insights for marketers, practitioners and academicians about the drivers of millennials’ technology acceptance regarding chatbots which will add value to the prevailing knowledge base”.
