CPH127

I do not want to turn this blog into a promoter for danish design and products thereof. Believe on this, we need to make it to the international scene if we want to have any chance in writing related stuff on design and innovation.

But I just couldn’t help myself from posting this. A danish company, Aresa, is developing a special sort of plant that will be planted in African countries and other countries that is dealing with landmine problems. When the plant grows and then discovers explosives, it turns from green to red. This is a great way of using design to remove the millions of landmines out there.

An idea for Aresa: What about making a special kind of grass that turns red when it discovers oil in the dirt underneath? Would be a great way of discovering polution underneath your lawn!

The possibilities of this is endless.

I had a conversation with a former co-worker today, about the knowledge economy is moving towards being a creative and conceptual economy. He is, just like me, a traditional Silicon Valley Bubble kind-of-guy. No education really, a lot of experience and a whole lot of a good ideas. As I wrote about some time ago, I would although like to study (Is there a bachelors degree in Design and Innovation?) and get away from this, well, personal brand.

I told him this, and we then got onto how product development works in a typical internet firm. It’s the "Ready. Fire! Aim." model. At first you’ve got a great idea, you then work on it a little and do a prototype. You do a little more work on this and call it a beta version. You then upload it and people start using it. You then correct errors and sooner or later you’ve got some venture capital on your hands. He thought that this was what caused "The Bust" in late 2000, but I do not agree with him. People like us are maybe a litte hasty some times, but I think that’s a good thing! If everyone starts aiming before shooting, no good business ideas will make it out there in the conceptual age. We need to let go, forget about the boxes and have some trust in ourselves.

Bottom line is that there’s a lot of things to learn from the bust, but this is not one of them. Keep on shooting pals - we need a lot more good ideas and ventures out there to survive.

TODAY, MARKETING IS MORE THAN CREATING A SHINY CAMPAIGN FOR YOUR COMPANY, OR LABEL YOUR PRODUCTS “NEW AND IMPROVED”. FROM THE CARMAKER VOLKSWAGEN INTERESTING ASPECTS OF THE ART OF MARKETING CAN BE LEARNT.

Yesterday, I visited my local supermarket to buy some toothpaste. While staring at the shelves, it struck me that something so simple can get so complicated: as a modern consumer you’re confronted with multiple choices everyday – toothpaste included: You have toothpaste with a whitening effect, toothpaste for sensitive gums, toothpaste with herbs, toothpaste with two or three colours, toothpaste with enzymes and so on. Luckily, I live in Denmark, with a much more moderate assortment than in for example England or USA.

I see the increased variety of toothpastes as good metaphor for some of the challenges modern corporations faces today. An increased competition, often

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I am happy to announce that Patrik Gustavsson has joined our crew as a regular guest blogger! Patrik has a lot of hands-on experience with innovation and design from both governmental and business related projects.

Very soon you will be able to find a description of Patrik here

I stumbled across a link from a post from Art - He wrote about Ivan Klinec which gave a presentation last september at the Slovak Academy of Sciences.

The presentation mostly covers ground that will be old news to those
familiar with scenarios, mostly taking a traditionalist (2X2, driving
forces, big stories) approach. But it makes a few good points
(summarized below). Its main theory seems to be that scenario thinking
is developing in parallel with the "information age" (broadly defined),
while linear strategic planning methods are becoming less useful as the
"industrial age" winds down. He notes that scenarios are:

Few weeks ago I did another post on the topic.

UPDATE - APRIL 14 2005 - WHAT I FORGOT TO MENTION IN MY ORIGINAL POSTING - ART HUTCHINSON ALSO WROTE ABOUT THE TOPIC - IN FACT THE ABOVE LISTING IS FROm HIS HAND - I APOLOGIES NOT TO MENTION THAT IN THE FIRST PLACE. MY BIG FAULT AND APOLOGIES….

What is the killer argument for spending money on Design? For every board of Directors, for every businessman it comes down to bottom line, doesn’t it?

It’s not all about form and function, its also about market needs.

Frog Design and Business 2.0 has just announced a special – but MOST relevant Design Award – The Bottom Line Design Award.

They created the first industrial design awards to honor products not just for their beauty but also for their commercial success.

Most relevant and a worth read.

Superflex hope to use their art to remake international commerce. They begin with a highly caffeinated drink named "Guaraná Power"

It’s not up to me to judge – but I hope they will succeed in re-designing some of the landscape…….

Did I mention that "Guaraná Power" taste GREAT? Did I mention that Superflex are Danes?

What does a good innovation? How to initiate good innovation and when do you know when seeing one?

I don’t know the answers, but I think I know someone who does.

Almost a year ago I visited the weblog of Joyce for the first time. Now and then I come back for some very insightful perspectives on what innovation really means and how to motivate innovation into business organizations.

3 weeks ago I got an e-mail from a good friend – is was one of those e-mails with a  question on how to do this and that. Joyce and I was two of the recipients and by that time I discovered that Joyce has a lot more to offer. I discovered www.thinksmarter.com
Take a look yourself and you’ll see that she is a valuable “hub” of information on Innovation-matters.

In fact I asked her to join our group of guest blogger and she returned with a YES few days ago.

I’ll introduce here properly in a few days. I promise

First, I’d like to thank the creators of cph127 (although I am still wondering what it stands for…) and for inviting me to be a guest blogger.  With the fury of postings by the founders over the past month, everyone can see they are serious about this.  After trying to digest all the great ideas and links already posted, I realized it’s time to join the game! 

How do you think about innovation?  Is it a once in a lifetime achievement?  Is it anything new that someone thinks is really good?  Does the world not see the value of most innovations?

The rhetoric around innovation is significant.  About two years ago I argued that innovation is incremental.  And recently, I presented that innovation is defined as something "that is new AND is a commercial success."  Innovation requires adoption and without it, you just have another idea…

Everett Rogers wrote the seminal book, Diffusion of Innovation, and it explores how new and valuable things diffuse into society.  The reason I think innovation is incremental is because any significant change in how we do things, even if amazingly useful, takes time for people to understand and adopt.  Consider that we are roughly 30 years into the adoption of the internet.  Truly an innovation, it has taken some time for it to diffuse.  Of course, smaller commercial successes diffuse and wane more quickly than this.  The iPod, iTunes, and iTunes music store are certainly an innovation for the music industry.  When did the iPod debut?  It’s already been 4 years.  But it has reached 10 million units sold and is one of the fastest adoption of an consumer electronic product ever.  Much faster than the Sony Walkman.

Innovation is a new product or service that becomes widely adopted.  But it always takes time.  This is a hard thing for most organizations to accept and build into their definition and development plans.

How do you think about innovation?

Last monday I had the opportunity to get a sneek peak of Hotel Fox - one part of Volkswagens innovative global event marketing inititative related to the release of their new Fox car. The hotel - located at the centre of Copenhagen - is designed by 21 designers/artists from around the world and is very, very impressive!

The peak was made possible by Patrik Gustavsson - who headed up the only danish participant, E-types, in designing some of the 60-something rooms. Hopefully Patrik will tell us all about the project here on cph127.com very soon!