When innovation becomes a driver of resilience

LSC360 structures its innovation approach around internal and external collaborations to develop new solutions tailored to its clients’ needs and to the challenges of building and neighbourhood resilience, in order to anticipate the various crises we may face in the coming years, but also to set itself apart.

Why has innovation become one of your strategic priorities?

Thomas Biendel: Innovation is not a new concept for LSC360. Throughout our 50-year history, we have continually innovated and developed new skills.
Today, this momentum is accelerating due to various factors such as climate change, defence, and shifts in the market, attitudes, and our clients’ needs and expectations. This forces us to evolve more rapidly, and therefore to make innovation a strategic priority.

Marie Pierron: Innovation strengthens our position within the economic ecosystem, as it enables us to anticipate opportunities, consolidate our processes and improve our practices. Beyond these benefits, it brings added value and purpose to our projects, particularly for our staff. It is in this respect that it has become a major strategic driver.

What are the key challenges that could transform your business lines in the coming years?

TB: All our business lines are now impacted in one way or another by two major themes: climate resilience, but also, more recently, resilience linked to defence issues.

MP: Whatever the crisis, resilience depends on our ability to simulate different scenarios and anticipate risks. In this context, artificial intelligence enables us to optimise our approach and working methods, as well as improving the day-to-day operations of every employee. It is also a matter of transformation.

How have you structured your approach to innovation?

TB: To ensure that innovation is understood and championed by all staff, we have set up an Innovation & Development Committee in which all the company’s divisions are represented. We have also appointed an innovation ambassador in each division. They play a central role: ensuring the flow of communication and information in both directions, from the divisions to the committee and from the committee to the divisions.

MP: Outside the company, we are part of an ecosystem that brings together public and private innovation stakeholders – research centres, universities, industries, start-ups, local authorities, etc. – both in Luxembourg and across the Greater Region. In particular, we are members of the Open Innovation Club, where we actively participate in numerous workshops and sessions. These exchanges enable us to test our ideas against those of other members and fuel our own innovation process.

You bring together people from very different disciplines. How does this cross-disciplinary approach foster innovation?

TB: When staff from different professional backgrounds and disciplines tackle the same problem, the combination of their expertise can lead to new approaches, new methods, and even new services or products. LSC360 brings together more than 60 different roles, spread across 9 divisions and 35 departments, which can sometimes lead to silo-based working. But innovation, for us, is specifically intended to be cross-functional and unifying. And for this synergy to take hold, it is essential to communicate and share information. This is one of the roles of our Innovation & Development Committee: to forge links both internally and externally, notably through participation in calls for proposals or consortia.

Among the projects that embody this strategy is SERENE, which focuses on the resilience of towns and neighbourhoods. What does this reveal about how you anticipate the challenges of tomorrow?

TB: An internal audit led us to this conclusion: a weakness was identified in the resilience of neighbourhoods. Everyone shares the same ambitions, but
these are still struggling to be translated into projects. When we plan new neighbourhoods, we often have this slightly frustrating feeling that we haven’t been able to go as far as we’d like in terms of resilience.
It was in response to this finding that we launched the SERENE project, in partnership with LIST and Neobuild. The aim is to develop a certification scheme that assesses the resilience of neighbourhoods. Once the property development and construction sectors in Luxembourg have adopted it, resilience considerations will be integrated more systematically into projects. That is our aim. This approach enables us to be proactive and to play an active role in promoting resilience in Luxembourg. It is an innovative approach for a consultancy firm to position itself as a driving force in shaping the city and neighbourhoods of tomorrow.

MP: SERENE also illustrates that bridging the gap between the field and the world of research is always a positive challenge where we learn from one another, and also a genuine source of innovative proposals. The project is funded over three years. We are halfway through and are already beginning to see guidelines taking shape. LSC360 is also involved in projects centred on Smart Cities, particularly to optimise the management of water, buildings and infrastructure.

What opportunities do these technologies open up for local authorities and project owners?

TB: The major change will lie in data. The Smart City will generate a considerable amount of data that needs to be collected, measured, structured and analysed in order to
understand needs and anticipate uses. At LSC360, however, we have a Geodata division entirely dedicated to data management.

MP: The benefit for cities in becoming smart lies precisely in strengthening their resilience: sensing changes as they emerge, anticipating them and taking action in advance rather than simply enduring them and having to intervene as a matter of urgency. In principle, anticipation remains a better approach to management than remedial action, which often has consequences not only for citizens’ quality of life but also for public finances. Cities therefore have every reason to commit to this approach to guarantee their smooth running and ensure the well-being of
their residents in the long term. We support them in this transition through solutions tailored to their specific challenges.

What benefits do international collaborations within European consortia, such as those supported by the Horizon Europe programme, offer you?

TB: The distinctive feature of these transnational programmes is that they bring together different cultures, experiences, methods and areas of expertise. And this diversity enables us to develop our skills, which we can then put to use for our clients by improving the quality of our services or by offering new ones.
Furthermore, this type of programme helps put Luxembourg on the world map: it is interesting to see that a project led by a small local village can
find its place alongside projects led by European capitals.

MP: These partnerships do not come along every day. So, as soon as a call for proposals matches our areas of expertise and gives us the opportunity to join forces with new players in the European innovation ecosystem, we seek to get involved.
The duration of these programmes (three to four years) allows us to plan for the future and gradually strengthen our position as an
innovative company in the long term.