| Summary: | Service design has widely been used by companies to enhance their innovation capabilities. In this study, the service design approach was used to enhance companies' innovation capabilities within the cultural and tourism sector in the South Karelia and Uusimaa region in Finland and St. Petersburg area in Russia. Idea generation sessions were set up with the bachelor students of LAB University of Applied Sciences to provide fresh ideas for the participating companies. As the student innovation suggestions were seen as insufficient, outside experts were involved to further facilitate idea generation modules. The companies were introduced to the service design methods and were offered online 1-on-1 mentoring sessions with the project experts. The assumption was that the companies would generate and adapt radical innovations faced with the Covid19 crisis. However, the study found that innovations, in general, were incremental rather than revolutionary and were centred around customer satisfaction and the customer path. Using online working sessions to apply service design as a problem-solving tool was also a new approach to the participants. The operational side rather than the radical innovation aspect emerged as the most viable path for the companies due to the lack of human and financial resources.
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