Sustainability 2022, 14, 7765. https://doi.org/10.3390/su14137765 www.mdpi.com/journal/sustainability Article Design Thinking for Public R&D: Focus on R&D Performance at Public Research Institutes Seonyeong Lim 1 , Minseo Kim 2 and Yeong-wha Sawng 1, * 1 Department of Management of Technology, Konkuk University, Seoul 143701, Korea; asdv728@konkuk.ac.kr 2 College of General Education, Seoul Women’s University, Seoul 01797, Korea; mskim@swu.ac.kr * Correspondence: sawng@konkuk.ac.kr Abstract: Korean public research institutes (PRIs) have shown noteworthy technological innovation over the past years, but they have been lagging in the commercialization of technological results. To ensure sustainable technology commercialization, not only technological innovation but also a shift towards a market-oriented approach is required. As such, it has become even more important for the public sector to have a demand-oriented approach for responding to market failures or demand issues in the private sector. Yet the public sector has been geared to a supply-oriented approach, while adopting a demand-oriented perspective, in its inception. In an ever-increasingly complex society, the process of Design Thinking is necessary in the both the public and private sectors. How- ever, Design Thinking-related studies have concentrated on the latter. Studying the impacts of De- sign Thinking as a demand-based innovation methodology of public institutions, this research aims to expand the traditional scope of the study of Design Thinking to include PRIs—owing to relevant key research experts, PRIs will prompt changes in the overall public sector going forward. With the Design Thinking process requiring empathy, integrative thinking, and experimentalism, this study examines the impacts of Design Thinking on PRIs. This research also aims to demonstrate that De- sign Thinking boosts innovation, specifically through PRIs, promoting higher discourse on Design Thinking. Concluding that Design Thinking improves technology performance in public research institutes, the study evaluates that Design Thinking leads to research innovation in a demand- driven R&D environment, producing innovations in the overall public sector. Keywords: design thinking; R&D performance; public R&D; public research institutes 1. Introduction Studies on the differences between the private and public sectors have long fueled academic debates [1]. In general, private sector entities (both individuals and businesses) in a capitalist market have freely engaged in economic activities, and the market has allo- cated resources most times in a rational way. Nonetheless, whenever the market does fail to distribute resources in a rational way, the government has stepped in by providing public policies, public R&D activities, and public services. Based on this, it can be said that the public sector needs to conduct R&D activities in a way that deals with failures or demand issues in the private market, thereby making it necessary to develop policies and services based on a demand-driven approach. Over the recent years, a demand-oriented perspective has been emphasized in the public sector, as evidenced by the adoption of demand-driven R&D activities, policies, and public services [2,3]. This is a huge shift from the past, when public sector entities focused on policies and services from the perspective of suppliers, or the government. The private sector has long conducted studies to better meet the requirements of the demand side [3]. However, the public sector has been rela- tively slower in realizing the importance of a demand-oriented viewpoint—a develop- ment that explains why the public sector’s innovation-based performance has been Citation: Lim, S.; Kim, M.; Sawng, Y.-w. Design Thinking for Public R&D: Focus on R&D Performance at Public Research Institutes. Sustainability 2022, 14, 7765. https://doi.org/10.3390/su14137765 Academic Editors: Andrea Appolloni and Yuri Borgianni Received: 25 April 2022 Accepted: 21 June 2022 Published: 25 June 2022 Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neu- tral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institu- tional affiliations. Copyright: © 2022 by the authors. Li- censee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and con- ditions of the Creative Commons At- tribution (CC BY) license (https://cre- ativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).