vidi e-novation

Innovative contest of croatian ICT magazine VIDI is the best thing that happened in last years in Croatia, in the field of innovations.
Brochure is available on croatian&english under:link

3 categories of companies

According to annual study from Booz Allen Hamilton, Global Innovation 1000 (link) in which are included the data from 1000 companies all around the world, which are leaders in R&D funding. Companies can be sorted to 3 categories according to corporate strategy and customer undestanding:

1. Need Seekers - invent new-to-market product with breakthrough innovation. Gathering information about customers and analysing they wishes in shaping new products. Already know technology is used in new ways and their are no new inventions.
2. Market Readers - react to what customers buy by carefully watching market - cautiosly entering with incremential changes
3. Technology Drivers - moving to internal research with technological capacities with help of breakthrough innovations and incremential changes. Spotting and analiysing of future technology trends is essential.

Each of these 3 categories can be successful on market, but there are no ovareall innovation strategy. If we are focused only on one company, then it could be said that there is the best inno-strategy for one company - the one which has as most important part syncronisation with corporate strategy and surroundings. It should be conected with company strategy and customers. Research and development must be connected with informations about customer wishes, and all phases of innovation process - from generation of ideas to realisation and marketing, must give attention to customer wishes.

event went fine

I held an inno-event two days ago. It went just fine, I think that participants were satisfied, because the final event of innovation award program, should be as it was - not long, informative and dinamic. Best 4 participants presented thier ideas and I had a presentation about the inno-statistics this year.
The greatest success is to have new ideas coming in after event, and I heard about some new ideas, really :)
The brochure which I made, was read through event as I saw, and it seems like it was good idea to make it(I haven't waste time to make it). It contains all ideas which was succesful in last year as a stimulant for genereating new ideas.

tower energy - utopia or the 'big' solution

This invention is really big! If this proves to be truth, this could be the solution to world energy demand, and then many 'big' things will be solved - one of them is 'global warming', second is oil demand.
I hope that this is it! We need this!
Link

innovation in horror?

Where is the connection between innovation and horrors?
I watched today new horror movie "30 days of night", and scenario is really innovative :) What can be better for a band of vampires, then to have no sun-light for 30 days. That's the story behind this movie. Small Alaskan town is 30 days every year without sunlight, and at the first day there came the vampires!
It's realy not easy to find something new in this genre, so this deserves good note (currently 7.0 on imdb.com)

how to organize an innovation event?

First of all, I got great receipt from managers, almost all of them will come, but not so good from employees, because they are at business trips or they have private reasons. But I expect that 50% will come surely, so the event will survive...

What's the main reason fo this event?
First, I want to reward best innovators in last year, and to 'make them important'. Second, to present the best ideas for all colleagues, but also for the managers on event, but also through the special brochure and intranet site to everybody in the company. This ideas should inspire future innovators, to see that the guy who sits in next room had a great idea, so why can't he have one too?
It took a lot of time for preparation, specially to make 35-page brochure with all participants and their ideas, but I think it's worth, because each year, more and more ideas are submitted.
Also, everyone is aking me about the event, and when will be this year's. It's also a good oportunity to introduce the new posters and awards for new season of innovation program.

nils bohlin

Nils Bohlin - the inventor of three-point-seatbelt - standard in every car today, has invented it in late 50's of last. it was patented in 1958. and by 1963. every new Volvo (Bohlin's company) has seatbelts. This breakthrough saved lots of lives, specially thanks to Bohlin and Volvo, who gave their invention for free to every car manufacturer. Now, to give them a thank, we can at leat say that we all have something from 'Volvo' in our vehicles.

MyCuppaTea/Cofee

If you can better visualise your taste for coffee, then this is the product you've waited. This mugs will help you to make your coffee or tea by matching the colour guide inside. I would love to have it!
Link to MyCuppa website

inno-campaign

Today I faced a dilemma concerning innovation campaigns posters. For a third year in a row, we run an inno-campaign in our firm. First year we had an image of parachuter on poster. Last year we had a picture of american football pitch with two amateur teams preparing for the game.
This year we have to choose from three 'finalist' which was filtered from 6-10 pictures which was looking 'innovative'. We choose the one that looks most connected with our company and which also was the prettiest. It's the picture of offshore windmills and beneath them a little boat. The poster has a message: "Let's sail away in the sea of ideas. Be creative!" (I hope for a good campaign this year)

cat poo cleaner

There are so much of useless inventions, and this seems like a favourite for top positions. But, as there are many cat-lovers on the planet, this may seem as a great idea to get rid of the cat poo :)
So, get your cats into robot (what if robot goes crazy and start to roll the cat! ;)
On this web-site there is the demonstration of this litter-robot:
Litter robot web site

hoverboard scooter

This is what I thought about in last post, when I was talking about future. I would like to drive this vehicle!

top-down vs. bottom-up innovations

Top-down innovations, from one side - innovations promoted by senior managers and bottom-up innovations - ideas given from employees through the organization is two processes, which may sound opposite, but both must be enabled. Why? For good (or great!) innovation process it's essential to have high-level commitment, but also to be oriented to each employee. Only Top-down innovation principle will close the door to every improvement idea which could come from employees including process improvement or for example, introduction of new toll.