Life science manufacturing is a major driver of the Finnish economy, in particular in the region of Southwest Finland where Turku is located. Production of pharmaceutical products and medical devices retains and creates and retains jobs, generates exports, and provides a fertile ground for regional development. If Finland can keep or even strengthen its attractiveness as a manufacturing location for the life science sector, local and national economic benefits are substantial. A key enabler of this future path is the development and deployment of novel digital and technological solutions that can ensure an innovative, forward-looking, and competitive Finnish industry.

To boost this, Finland Futures Research Centre coordinates a large Finnish consortium of pharma manufacturers, manufacturers of medical devices, technology companies, and university partners in the LifeFactFuture project. The consortium brings together a wide range of competences and perspectives across both technological and manufacturing excellence.

At the core of the project is the creation of a joint Future Factory Concept that serves to explicate the consortium’s shared vision. The Future Factory Concept is based on a systematic technology foresight process that includes horizon scanning relevant industry and futures reports, an extensive series (N>15) of semistructured focus group interviews qualitatively coded, and a series of evaluation and validation workshops testing and elaborating preliminary findings. With the many different types of stakeholders involved, novel technologies effectively function as boundary objects. An integral function of the joint visioning process is therefore to align stakeholders towards shared understandings that also allow for tighter and more effective future collaboration between various partners.

The draft Future Factory Concept is launched at day 1 of the Futures Conference. For this presentation, we highlight the process and the methodological approaches, as well as provide perspectives on how methodological and content related insights derived from project might inform the field of futures studies.