Marketing & Strategy Innovation Blog

Continue reading "Importing and Exporting Ideas from Different Marketplaces" »

Posted by Futurelab at 12:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

Continue reading "Total economic impact of Software-as-a-Service: The foundation of a sound technology investment" »

Posted by Futurelab at 10:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: Yann Gourvennec

Yesterday, 12th of December 2007 was a great day in my recent career as a lecturer in marketing and innovation which started last April with the 360° analysis of the marketing of ICT products and services (click here to access the files). Indeed, I was invited by Pr Manuel Sosa to pitch on the subject of joint innovation at Orange business services, in order to present our activities in front of the students of the executive MBA of INSEAD.

Continue reading "joint innovation presentation at INSEAD" »

Posted by Futurelab at 10:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: Alexander Osterwalder

Yesterday I finished a draft for a simple business model innovation manual co-financed by La Trobe University in Melbourne, Australia and DOTARS. In the spirit of open innovation I am sharing this "beta version" online to trigger your feedback.

Draft Business Model Manual (beta version): How to Describe and Improve your Business Model to Compete Better (pdf)

Continue reading "Draft Business Model Innovation Manual (beta version)" »

Posted by Futurelab at 10:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: Dominic Basulto

Earlier in the week, I had the unique opportunity to hear Peter Semmelhack, CEO of New York-based Bug Labs, describe how his start-up company was radically disrupting the traditional consumer electronics industry. Using a modular, open source approach, Bug Labs is focused on bringing the Long Tail of Gadgets to everyday consumers.

Continue reading "Bug Labs and The Long Tail of Gadgets" »

Posted by Futurelab at 7:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

Continue reading "Must see video: "We Think" vs."The Cult of the Amateur"" »

Posted by Futurelab at 4:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: John Caddell

There's a fascinating interview at Harvard Business School Working Knowledge with HBS professor Alan MacCormack, covering innovation and how it's moving away from Corporate R&D and into a collaborative web of partnering & alliances. (You can find a working paper on the subject here.)

Continue reading "Innovative Companies Must Excel at Partnering" »

Posted by Futurelab at 1:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: Dominic Basulto

Companies that innovate at a snail's pace may not be in quite the competitive mess that some experts think they're in. Forget rapid prototyping and rushing beta versions of products to markets.

Continue reading "Slow Innovation" »

Posted by Futurelab at 7:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: Alexander Osterwalder

As I mentioned in a previous post, I had the great pleasure to speak at the same conference as Professor Henry Chesbrough. The event took place in Dublin and was organized by Enterprise Ireland. It was great to follow Henry's talk on Open Innovation and Open Business Models, two terms he coined in two different books.

Continue reading "Professor Henry Chesbrough on Open Innovation and Open Business Models" »

Posted by Futurelab at 10:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: Lynette Webb

I really like this analogy. It touches on an interesting debate too… although I personally agree 100% open always trumps 100% closed in the end, nowadays it’s not always so black and white. Services can be open in some aspects and not others; there are different degrees of open-ness… 

Continue reading "Proprietary Platforms are Like Ice Cubes" »

Posted by Futurelab at 1:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: Karl Long

And myspace might be saying “Thanks for the add” to google as well.

I had initially thought this story from Tech Crunch was like a formation of a “coalition of the willing” with the other social networks, but I’m begining to think it might have much bigger implications.

Continue reading "Open Social - the Social Network For Companies Scared Of Facebook" »

Posted by Futurelab at 10:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: danah boyd

In business, the economic concept of "externalities" has tremendous salience. In short, an externality is a cost that a third party must bear due to the actions of others. For example, air pollution is considered an externality of manufacturing. In theory, as protectors of the public good, reasonable governments should regulate corporate externalities through imposed taxes. (In reality...) More and more, discussion of environment externalities is a core part of business.

Continue reading "Innovation's Social Externalities" »

Posted by Futurelab at 11:08 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: C. Sven Johnson

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: my primary interest in tracking the intellectual property issues currently plaguing the music and movie industries, waiting in the ebook wings for book publishers, and even frustrating hordes of bloggers whose content is appropriated and used to create spamblogs, is that at some point their problems become my problems; becomes the problem of anyone who designs and fabricates real products for a living.

Continue reading "The Looming Dark Horizon: When the IP Mess Hits Industrial Design & Co." »

Posted by Futurelab at 12:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: John Caddell

Hamel talks frequently in the book of enrolling the entire company in innovation. Among all the obstacles to achieving this--the lack of democracy, the weight of inertia--the biggest one in my view is the information gap. Comparing the volume and depth of information I had access to when I was a senior executive to the paucity I had in any other position--the difference was staggering. (Note: you can find excerpts of "The Future of Management" here.)

Continue reading "On Gary Hamel's "The Future of Management" part 5 - Final thoughts " »

Posted by Futurelab at 1:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: John Caddell

When we think of innovation, we think of products. The Segway, the iPod, the Roomba, the hot cellphone of the quarter. It's not surprising: they make good copy, and they can be photographed.

But, according to Gary Hamel, in his new book "The Future of Management," product innovations are a short-lived form of competitive advantage. A highly-successful new product gives you only a few years of excess profits before imitators and, yes, more innovative products commoditize it. (Doesn't it seem that the RAZR's heyday was a thousand years ago?)

Continue reading "On Gary Hamel's "The Future of Management" part 1 - Management Innovation" »

Posted by Futurelab at 7:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: Guy Kawasaki

One of the challenges that geeks, inventors, hobbyists, hackers, burners, and artists who are trying to change the world face is finding a place to do their work. Ideally, it would have lots of equipment, supplies, and other geeks. Until the last year, they would have to set up their own workshop or beg for space at a machine shop. Now they can go and hang out at TechShop in Menlo Park, California.

Continue reading "TechShop: Geek Heaven" »

Posted by Futurelab at 8:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: John Caddell

If you love the messiness that is the sprawl of information on the World Wide Web, then read "Everything Is Miscellaneous," by David Weinberger. If you hate that messiness, you should read the book, too. It'll teach you a few things.

Continue reading "Miscellaneous means more knowledge for those who want to dive in" »

Posted by Futurelab at 9:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: John Caddell

An article in the current Journal of Product Innovation Management starts out with this rather bland statement:

Continue reading "For a Nimbler, More Stable Alliance, Share Less" »

Posted by Futurelab at 12:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: Dominic Basulto

Leave it to the New York Times to stir up the innovation pot with the provocative thesis that innovation is increasingly becoming the exclusive preserve of the techno-elite, notwithstanding the recent trend toward consumer-generated innovation.

Continue reading "True or false? Innovation is elitist" »

Posted by Futurelab at 9:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: Alain Thys

Spoiler alert: This post gives away a key plot point of the final Harry Potter book. So if you've haven't finished the book, do not read on.

Last week Monday (at 1:30 AM) I finished part 7 of the Harry Potter series and after sat through the young man’s wizardry adventures for thousands and thousands of pages, the end of the series felt like losing a friend.

Continue reading "Crowdsourcing Harry Potter?" »

Posted by Futurelab at 3:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

Rejoice New York, one of your sons has joined the Futurelab list of contributors. Not so long ago Dominic Basulto used to curate the Fortune Magazine's Business Innovation Insider and act as Director of Editorial Strategy at Corante.

Continue reading "A Big Welcome to Dominic Basulto" »

Posted by Futurelab at 4:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: C. Sven Johnson

While reading something yesterday concerning marketing in virtual worlds I resisted the urge to comment. Last night and again early this morning, I further resisted the temptation to post something here regarding what I’d read. And I’m now resisting the urge to slip something in. I won’t.

Continue reading "Personal Entry: Pre-Alpha" »

Posted by Futurelab at 8:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: David Armano

I'm a sucker for successful communication whether it be visual, written, or oral. So take a look at this presentation from Scott Gavin titled "What is Enterprise 2.0"?  It uses a persona based approach to tell a story.

Continue reading "What Would Charlie Do?" »

Posted by Futurelab at 5:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: Yann Gourvennec

A brand new version of the Orange innovation whitepaper for business services - which I have co-authored with Jean-François Fava Verde - has just been made available (click here to download). 

Continue reading "Joint innovation: a client perspective in real-time" »

Posted by Futurelab at 5:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: John Caddell

Struggling to grow your revenues through differentiation, competitive strategy and line extensions? You're playing on the wrong field, says Erich Joachimsthaler, author of the new book "Hidden In Plain Sight: How To Find And Execute Your Company's Next Big Growth Strategy."

Continue reading "To innovate, you have to go beyond" »

Posted by Futurelab at 8:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: Alexander Osterwalder

I just finished a draft presentation for a workshop on the topic "Competitive Advantage through Business Model Design and Innovation". I'm facilitating the workshop next June with about 100 executives in Guadalajara, Mexico. The workshop is hosted by the Tecnologico de Monterrey (ITESM). Your input regarding the slides is most welcome:

Continue reading "Draft Presentation: Competitive Advantage through Business Model Design and Innovation" »

Posted by Futurelab at 10:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: Yann Gourvennec

On April 23rd, I was giving a lecture on the marketing of technological innovations to our Paris University MIB-MBA students. This mba is done in conjunction with San Francisco State University. I am now making my training material available to all online at visionarymarketing.com. It comes with slides, bibliography, videos and business cases. Enjoy!

Continue reading "MBA training material on innovation available" »

Posted by Futurelab at 7:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

By: Chris Lawer

Everyday, marketers, product developers, managers, all business-people in fact talk about “value”. In fact, I reckon it is probably the most popular – yet at the same time, most misunderstood - word used in everyday business conversation.

(Quick “non-empirical test” using Google: Value – 776 million hits, Customer – 583 million hits, “A Definition of Value” – 606 hits!)

Continue reading "“Value”, “Value”, “Value”– the Most Vague and Over-Used Word in Marketing" »

Posted by Futurelab at 3:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: C. Sven Johnson

I recently used the scientific term “free radical” to describe a blogger whose writing I enjoy. I used that descriptor to mean someone who doesn’t think about issues and problems the way others studying them might. It is, in my opinion, a very designer thing; and I don’t mean that in the applied arts context.

Continue reading "Free Radical Tregs and Staples" »

Posted by Futurelab at 2:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: Dominic Basulto

In order to breathe more life into its stable of consumer brands, General Mills is embracing a new strategy of open innovation. The company hopes to follow in the footsteps of companies such as Kraft and P&G, who are at the forefront of the open innovation movement.

Continue reading "General Mills embraces open innovation" »

Posted by Futurelab at 11:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: Dominic Basulto

The Economist has caught the innovation bug -- as part of Project Red Stripe, a team of Economist staff members are assembling some of the best ideas from around the Web in order to generate innovative new ideas for the magazine:

Continue reading "The Economist and Project Red Stripe" »

Posted by Futurelab at 10:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: Alain Thys

Exactly a year ago this blog went "live" and we just wanted to thank everyone who's been part of making it something much more successful than we ever thought it would be.  Today, we've got about 25,000 regular readers, over 1,400 posts, and more importantly, our base of daily feedburner subscribers keeps growing by the week (currently at 2,500).

Continue reading "Happy Birthday Futurelab Blog" »

Posted by Futurelab at 10:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: Alain Thys

As I compiled the most read posts on this blog, I couldn't shake the feeling that "there was a lot of great stuff missing". That's why I decided to do the "old media" thing and make a selfish editorial selection of what I thought were the twenty strongest thoughts expressed on this blog since its inception (one per contributor). 

Continue reading "The 21 Strongest Thoughts for 2006" »

Posted by Futurelab at 12:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: Alain Thys

It's the season to make lists and hitparades, so to end the year we'll do our bit as well.  According to Google Analytics, here's a list of the ten most read articles since the launch of this blog on March 5th, 2006.  It's an interesting mix, which for me, is also a testimony to the way the Long Tail seems to be working.

Continue reading "The Ten Most Read Futurelab Articles in 2006" »

Posted by Futurelab at 10:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: Guy Kawasaki

Marti Nyman is “director of global innovation networks” for Best Buy. This means that his job is to find leading-edge, cool stuff for Best Buy—and yes, he gets paid to do this.

Continue reading "Ten Questions with Marti Nyman" »

Posted by Futurelab at 11:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: John Caddell

It goes without saying that alliances are crucial to an open innovation strategy. By tapping into other organizations for some part of your product, you require structures, agreements and management of those other organizations.

Continue reading "Open Innovation and Alliances" »

Posted by Futurelab at 1:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  • Email this article to a friend

by: John Caddell

There's an increasing interest in user-driven innovation, and how this phenomenon can be leveraged in other industries.

Continue reading "Awaiting User Innovation in Business Software Markets" »

Posted by Futurelab at 1:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)  •&nbs