Sustainability represents currently one of the main source of innovation for companies. The critical question is if the process, the approaches and the measure of “traditional” innovation are still valid also in the sustainability domain or if it is necessary to re-adapt or re-design these, consistently with the peculiarity of the topic.

This thesis is aiming at identifying the structure of the process of sustainable innovation and at addressing how to adopt participatory approach of innovation (e.g., design thinking) to sustainability. The thesis will be realized through a structured literature review and the conduction of case studies.