22 November 10
Innovation Cubed Conference
Have you ever wondered how to better make use of emerging social media tools to discover new internal process or product innovations? As new communication tools gain popularity, we are seeing an increasing number of internal and market driven innovations brought to life. Specifically, an important aspect of social media that is driving this change is crowdsourcing, which acts as a rich repository of ideas coming from both inside of your company as well as your customers. If you are looking to better leverage crowdsourcing tools or want to hear from today’s leading companies on the subject, consider the newest addition to World Research Group’s Open Innovation Series: INNOVATION3: Crowdsourcing, Culture, and Tools Summit. Read the rest of this entry »
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New Business Process | Tagged: Conference, crowdsourcing, innovation, social media | 
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Posted by Doron Yaghoubi
1 July 10
Innovation Centers are popping up around the world. These facilities bring together experts in different fields around a common goal: new product ideation and experimentation. Some of these centers have become enormously successful breeding grounds for new product ideas. These successes, along with the growing awareness of the need to innovate to stay relevant, are driving many organizations to invest tens of millions into these centers. Examples of innovation centers can be found in many different fields.
MIT’s Media Lab, a department within the schools Architecture and Planning division, has been actively pumping out new product ideas since 1985. The Lab is home to product designers, nanotechnologists, data-visualization experts, industry researchers, and pioneers of computer interface. These future minded individuals work side by side to create technology that will enhance the human experience. The Lab produces approximately 20 new patents per year, and is responsible for many commonly known products including computerized prosthetics, Guitar Hero, and the Amazon Kindle eBook reader screen display. Read the rest of this entry »
1 Comment | Healthcare, New Business Process, New Strategic Partnership, Technology, Uncategorized | Tagged: Cargill, Innovation Center, MIT Media Lab, Philips Healthcare | Permalink
Posted by Doron Yaghoubi
29 March 10
futurethink is launching another round of innovator interviews to share insights and best practices from leading innovation practitioners. All of these interviews are free to download once you’ve registered on futurethink‘s website.
Our first interview in this series is with Tony Tomazic, Director of Consumer Innovations at Humana. In his leadership role in the Humana Innovation Center, Mr. Tomazic focuses on developing and implementing programs to engage consumers in their health and promote well-being.
Below is an excerpt from his interview. The full version can be download here. Read the rest of this entry »
1 Comment | Healthcare, New Business Model, New Business Process | Tagged: collaboration, consumer insights, innovation, open innovation | Permalink
Posted by Andrew Der
24 October 08
At the Convergence 2008 conference on automotive electronics yesterday, BMW announced that it is looking for partners with which to collaborate on an open-source car computing platform. No other auto companies have officially signed on to collaborate, though Chrysler, Ford, GM, and Honda have reportedly expressed interest. BMW’s goal, with or without partners, is to have an open-source operating system in a vehicle selling 200,000 or more units over the next five to seven years. Read the rest of this entry »
1 Comment | Automotive & Transportation, New Business Process, Technology | Tagged: android, bmw, bmw open source, google android, innovation, linux, mercedes-benz, open innovation, open source | Permalink
Posted by Joshua Kutticherry
26 August 08
The Curious Capitalist blog over at TIME has a couple of interesting posts (see here and here) on social versus economic norms. The posts, by Barbara Kiviat, are in response to a recent Wall Street Journal article that discusses an ongoing experiment in some U.S. schools that rewards students, with cash, for performing well on Advanced Placement courses during high school.
While the WSJ article and Kiviat’s posts are worth a read if you have some time—the discussion of “norms” is what really sparked my interest because of the implications norms have on innovation. Basically, social norms have been shown to be more effective at eliciting certain types of behavior than economic norms. While financial and other economic incentives have their place in the corporate world, innovation may fare better (in the long term, at least) if the incentive to innovate is a “social” one. Read the rest of this entry »
5 Comments | New Business Process | Tagged: economic norms, innovation, normative behavior, norms, social norms | Permalink
Posted by Joshua Kutticherry
22 July 08
The New York Times ran a great piece this morning about InnoCentive, a company that helps connect companies and their challenges with people who might be able to solve those challenges. This company has been on our radar for a while, as they’ve carved out an interesting niche in the innovation world by providing sort of a marketplace for ideas.
It’s a pretty simple system, really. Companies post specific challenges to InnoCentive’s online database. InnoCentive helps these companies refine each challenge, and a “prize” is attached to it (usually between $10,000 and $25,000). The company posting each challenge is kept hidden. Anyone can log onto InnoCentive’s database and try to solve one of the challenges. Once someone comes up with a solution, they inform InnoCentive, transfer IP rights over to the company who posted the problem, collect their prize, and it’s done.
The beautiful part about this system is that anyone can try to solve the problems in the InnoCentive database. PhD’s, college students, it really doesn’t matter. The company has actually found that most of the “solvers” are people who are completely outside the industry of the challenge at hand. From the Times: Read the rest of this entry »
2 Comments | New Business Process, Services (Other) | Tagged: innocentive, open innovation | Permalink
Posted by Joshua Kutticherry
8 July 08
A redesigned milk jug has been the surprising target of much press attention over the past few weeks. The new jugs; which is slowly being rolled out in U.S. retailers such as Sam’s Club, Wal-Mart, and Costco; is taller, rectangular, and has no real spout. The jug was essentially designed with one goal in mind: reduce the environmental impact of milk.
To that end, the new design allows for jugs to be stacked (they’re flat on top), and eliminates the need for plastic milk crates since the stackable design allows for cardboard dividers and shrink wrap to be used. This translates to reduced packing time, faster delivery to stores (which means fresher milk), and fewer wasted resources along the distribution chain. More milk can fit in each delivery truck and in the grocer’s cooler; and empty trucks don’t need to travel back and forth to collect milk crates. Read the rest of this entry »
2 Comments | Art & Design, Food & Beverage, New Business Process, Retail | Tagged: dairy, milk, milk jug, Sam's Club, wal-mart | Permalink
Posted by Joshua Kutticherry
30 April 08
I don’t say this often and usually look at things with a healthy dose of skepticism. However, this is a such a wonderful idea. It’s called the “HealthCare Innovations Exchange” – a government website that offers visitors a compendium of tried and tested innovations across the healthcare sector. Think of them as case studies in innovation written by the innovators themselves.
Complete with a keyword search, and categorized into section like “Stage of Care”, “Setting of Care”, and “Organizational Process”, it’s an easy-to-use site that is filled with real life examples of innovations that have worked.
We’ve always been trained to think that innovation has to be something completely new, but this endeavor is a great reminder that a “fast-follower” strategy can work just as well. So, why reinvent the wheel when you can learn from others? Perhaps this is the beginning of many industry and trade associations to take a leadership role in shaping and mainstreaming how innovation can spread within their sectors. Think about powerful a similar “innovation exchange” can work especially in those industries that are ripe for innovation – airlines, insurance, financial services and more.
Of course, this would mean that contributors have an agenda to push forward a common good, but perhaps associations can play the netural, unbiased role in showcasing innovations that can take an entire industry forward.
Leave a Comment » | Healthcare, New Business Model, New Business Process, Non-Profit | Tagged: best practices, collaboration, Healthcare, open innovation | Permalink
Posted by Chetan Chandavarkar
18 April 08
I have had the privilege of being a judge for several innovation competitions. But the one I attended this week was, well, a little different.
When we think of the people who drive innovation within companies, we usually think of new product development teams, research, marketing; the usual suspects. But what about the legal department?
The folks at GE’s Capital Solutions group are embracing innovation because, well, lawyers can be innovative, too. And why not? Read the rest of this entry »
2 Comments | New Business Process, Services (Other) | Tagged: GE, innovation challenge, legal innovation | Permalink
Posted by Lisa Bodell
21 March 08
The United States Postal Service (USPS) and Clover Technologies Group announced a new “Mail Back” program. Through the program, customers use free envelopes found in 1,500 Post Offices to mail back inkjet cartridges, PDAs, Blackberries, digital cameras, iPods, and MP3 players – without having to pay for postage.
Clover Technologies pays the postage fees, and receives all the items sent through the program. The company then recycles, remanufactures and remarkets inkjet cartridges, laser cartridges and small electronics. If the electronic item or cartridges cannot be refurbished and resold, its component parts are reused to refurbish other items, or the parts are broken down further and the materials are recycled. Clover has a “zero waste to landfill” policy, meaning it takes everything possible to avoid sending things to landfills.
The program is a brilliant example of how public agencies can, in fact, partner with private companies for a mutual benefit. This is also a huge boon for consumers who have abandoned, old electronics lying around the house. Read the press release for more information.
1 Comment | Government, New Business Model, New Business Process, New Strategic Partnership, Technology | Tagged: clover technologies, electronics, postage, recycling, USPS | Permalink
Posted by Joshua Kutticherry
