The rise of the “innosumer”—Rethinking older technology users

• Provides new perspectives on aging consumers in innovation processes
• Introduces the notion of the “innosumer”
• Explores challenges of innovation in aging societies
• Outlines a research agenda on older persons as active technology users

Demographic aging is among the most striking challenges industrialized economies face; it will lead to profound changes in consumption structures. How these changes will affect innovation, however, is thus far not well understood. In this paper we make a first step towards closing this gap and establish the challenges associated with demographic aging on the map of innovation scholars. We revisit empirical results of our research into the modes of thinking that underlie design processes targeted at older persons. These modes are limited in two ways—they concentrate on older persons as being characterized by generic, age-related decrements, and they frame older technology users as passive recipients of technology. Current design practices for older persons, therefore, imply a threefold risk. They are likely to generate technology that is unattractive for older consumers, that provides limited cues for meaningful activity, and that suppresses the co-creational inputs of older persons to innovation. To rectify this, we propose a complementary perspective on the relationship between technology and aging that focuses on older persons as active consumers of technology. We discuss implications for further research on technology and aging that revolves around a new concept that we call “innosumer”.