As an early adopter of consumer electronic gadgets far and wide, I am constantly reading and absorbing everything I can in print and online when it comes to technology.  Recently, I caught the announcement that Microsoft pulled their Kin phones just 45 days after product launch.  This is as fast as the closing of a bad play on Broadway (but way more expensive - one estimate says the failure cost Microsoft at least $240 million after selling possibly only a few thousand devices).

This got me thinking about the challenge in balancing the drive to be "first to market" with the mantra of "fail early and fail often", and how our work with clients fits into this.  A critical element to open innovation is that although these new skills can enable a robust product devleopment funnel (by combining internal activities with enabling external components, subsystems, platform technologies, ideas, products for acquisition, etc.), but it is critical to have metrics in place to evaluate projects at every step of the way (even after product launch).  Many companies have "stage-gate" type processes, but often these processes are not strictly adhered to. 

For example, one thing I've learned in working closely with CPG and Food and Beverage companies, is that product development activities have to be closely aligned not only to the corporate/business strategy, but also to consumer insights.  Consumer insights are not only useful for test marketing products and driving marketing and brand development, but with solid integration of Open Innovation practices, gaps in the product features/performance can be identified and then rapidly filled via external innovation. 

By the way, before you count Microsoft down for the count, the entire Kin team has already been reassigned to enable them to focus exclusively on the Windows Phone 7 mobile platform, so you can bet Microsoft will learn from their mistake and come back stronger.

Let NineSigma help you launch an open innovation program.  Contact us to learn more about open innovation.

Once upon a time, a long, long time ago, before anyone had heard of “crowd sourcing”, (coined in 2006) NineSigma clients were fascinated by the opportunity to reach into every corner of the globe for answers to their biggest challenges.  The focus was on “how” and “where” to get the solution.  NineSigma solved the “how” by providing the answer to “where”.

Fast forward to 2010…companies have more information than they can process.  Chat rooms, company-sponsored websites, OI intermediaries like NineSigma…Open Innovation can feel like the suggestion box on steroids.  The real challenge today is how to manage and optimize Open Innovation.

The companies that will be the Open Innovation leaders tomorrow are those that are successful in creating their Open Innovation Office – the structure that broadcasts the right information outside to the best external resources, and then funnels the value back inside to act on it efficiently.

We believe that three pillars are essential to building a successful, sustainable Open Innovation Office. 

Framework –Vision, Process and Organizational Design, and underlying Software

Support – People and resources to:

• Develop OI best practices and build OI adoption
• Manage the Needs Funnel, relationships with external partners and integration of OI projects into the product development cycle

OI Toolbox –Partners and tools to engage internally and externally

Framed by executive commitment to your OI Strategy and program management and accountability, these three pillars build an integrated, managed and optimized Open Innovation program. Let NineSigma help you launch an open innovation program. Contact us to learn more about open innovation

Over the last ten years, we have either worked for or discussed working for a large number of companies that are implementing open innovation programs. Many times they have referred to NineSigma and others as Open Innovation intermediaries.

I have always pushed back when firms classify NineSigma as an OI intermediary. To me an intermediary is a group that simply connects two groups together and hopes for the best from the connection.

At NineSigma our work is focused across the two dimensions of Engage and Enable. Our Engage business is all about supporting our clients in solving a critical business challenge. This may involve finding and acquiring a platform technology to enable a suite of new products, it may be mapping out a white space and presenting options to our client on how to capitalize on new opportunities, it may be helping indentify new applications for existing technologies or it may be identifying and then contracting with a co-development partner.

The work typically involves broadly Engaging the global innovation community in order to deliver the desired results to our client. We use the term Engage to differentiate NineSigma's level of interaction with the global innovation community. Engage implies searching for and then engaging groups identified to deliver results to our client. Engaging means dialog, analysis, interpretation and synthesis to create a final work product that adds value to our client. This is much more that simply acting as an intermediary and connecting two groups together and hoping for a good result.

Launch your open innovation program with NineSigma today.

I have always liked these funny eye tweaking images in which you can see two different images depending on how you focus on the picture.   

Trying to solve a problem is quite the same; depending on how you look at the problem your outcome may vary. When looking at the image, your brain is doing the trick on its own, but how can you do that with a problem? Most of the time we look at the problem from one single angle: the one we are familiar with. Whether this “way of thinking” comes from our education or is built on our experience doesn’t count, what matters is its uniqueness and the difficulty we have to change our point of view. Corporate thinking in organizations tends to polish peoples’ creativity thereby limiting dissension.

Methods like Lateral thinking and tools like S.C.A.M.P.E.R. or TRIZ are available to help creativity and can be applied to problem solving but they require some training and self- discipline. Very often, getting an “outside view” is simple, fast and efficient to help in finding novel approaches. 

At NineSigma, every day we practice this “outside view” for our clients looking for innovative solutions or business approaches. Even better, we perform a “double outside view” that I have seen at work very efficiently dozens of times since I have joined the team. The first “outside view” pass, occurs with our Program Managers who unscramble, decompose and formulate the problem. They methodically review every possible approach in order to open as many paths as possible for potential solution providers. The second pass is done by the solution providers who offer their own knowledge and approach to the problem. Of course, the first pass drives some expected results in, but almost on every project we do receive unexpected or unobvious solutions. The famous quote from Albert Einstein: “Problems cannot be solved at the same level of awareness that created them” has never been so true. Let NineSigma help you launch an open innovation program. Contact us to learn more about open innovation.

Exactly one month ago I was sworn in as a US Citizen, and this 4^th of July will thus have special meaning to me.  I will now look at what’s happening on this day with a sense of belonging and sharing, and being a part of something bigger. I think in a lot of ways that is what happens when people practice Open Innovation. When collaboration between two companies is done successfully, they will share many very important details around their future growth goals and projects, and create something that is bigger. It is almost like being “sworn in” to be a part of the community of Open Innovation Practitioners.

America became a very successful nation by being a “melting pot” of people from all nations; people that brought their brains, their energy, and their passion here in order to build a future for themselves and this country. Again, there is a striking analogy here since Open Innovation is also about people from all nations bringing solutions to problems that will help companies, and consequently also countries to have a better future. Could America have been as successful if only one set of people were allowed to contribute to this country?

Lastly, when thinking about the birth of this nation, there was a set of progressive thinkers that were passionate about doing the unthinkable:  To create a true democracy, with “The People” contributing to the development of the country and its institutions. Likewise, Open Innovation was started by some progressive thinkers that did the unthinkable: To say that more and more innovation needs to come from the outside!

My hope is that just like this great country that has been around for well over 200 years, Open Innovation is here to stay as well. It has had its revolutionary wars, but it has come a long way from its early days.

A Happy 4^th of July Weekend to all of you!

Sincerely, Andy Zynga