The paper presents the research activity developed by the authors in the field of computer-aided inventiveproblem solving: an original model and a dialogue-based software application have been developed byintegrating the logic of ARIZ (Algorithm for the Inventive Problem Solving) with some OTSM-TRIZ (GeneralTheory of Powerful Thinking) models in order to guide a user also with no TRIZ education to the analysisof inventive problems. The paper demonstrates that through a dialogue-based interaction it is possibleto guide the user towards a proper formulation of the problem statement, which is an essential step ofany conceptual design activity. The proposed software system, although still at a prototype stage, hasbeen tested with students at Politecnico di Milano and at the University of Florence. The paper detailsthe structure of the algorithm and the results of the first validation activity; then, it discusses about thepossibility to integrate the proposed approach into a new generation of CAD systems.