"Innovation" within the context of design thinking refers to the process of generating and implementing new, creative solutions to problems by deeply understanding user needs and utilizing a human-centered approach, often through the iterative stages of empathize, define, ideate, prototype, and test, to develop solutions that are both desirable and feasibleessentially, design thinking is a methodology that actively encourages and facilitates innovation by prioritizing user-centric thinking and rapid prototyping to test and refine ideas.