Existing technologies, such as telecommunications, are often designed for the developed world. But an innovative focus is also urgently needed to address issues in developing countries. This is something that the Royal Institute of Technology, KTH, has acted upon and is sending students to Africa with the purpose to identify needs and develop innovative solutions. Read more in this interview with Professor Margareta Norell Bergendahl.
“There are no quick fixes and no easy answers for succeeding at innovation” says Dr Robert Cooper, senior consultant to Fortune 500 firms and top scholar in the field of innovation management (PDMA) in an interview with InnovationManagement. “It’s back to basics – an aggressive innovation strategy that focuses your businesses’ R&D efforts; effective portfolio manage to pick tomorrow’s growth engines; a climate and culture that fosters innovation in your business; and a robust idea-to-launch system.”
The use of innovation management increases your operational margins. This was one of the key findings of a European study on Innovation Management performance within SMEs. The growth champions were reaching approximately 12% operational margins, an exceptional performance compared to the 5% operational margin of the average SME. In this article Dr. Dirk Balfanz and Dr. Bernhard Kölmel describe a lean and efficient approach to Innovation Management specifically targeted to the needs of SMEs.
The countdown has started; the last bilateral negotiations are becoming frenzied as we approach the opening date for the 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen. A pattern is emerging where countries are embracing this opportunity to show leadership and managing the event as a contingency. The pattern is one of A and B teams of countries, a pattern similar to that in Danish companies investing in innovation.
As Business Development Manager at Philips Research, Gerjan van de Walle was instrumental in opening up the electronics giant’s development facility in The Netherlands to competing companies, and making open innovation the ‘buzzwords of the day’. InnovationManagement.se asked him about the process, the difficulties he had to overcome and the advantages are of cramming thousands of engineers and researchers into one square kilometre.
Innovation management as a topic is wider than any single website can hope to cover completely. Marcus Linder, an innovation researcher at Chalmers, offers a regular column at innovationmanagement.se covering the most inspiring and actionable contents from other online sources, such as blogs and magazines. The first favorite link? Why executives should spend more time and less cash on innovative projects.
Sofia Börjesson is Director of the Center for Business Innovation (CBI) at Chalmers University of Technology in Gothenburg. She is Associate Professor in Technology Management and has extensive experience in leading university-company research projects. Professor Börjesson’s university office is frequently unoccupied – she spends a great deal of time visiting companies and organizations in order to see at first hand and to understand how they are working with innovation. She brings with her the latest academic trends based on the work of her group at CBI and their research in the field, in order to help firms to become more innovative and more efficient. InnovationManagement.se asked her a few questions.
Idea management technology helps organizations to gather ideas from all employees, evaluate them and bring them to market faster than ever before. Learn more about the typical features of these powerful tools, and the benefits they can provide to firms like yours.
