Weekly Updates (8-12-2015)
- joshnosal
- Aug 12, 2015
- 3 min read
————— Summary —————
The Need For Continuous Innovation
Bigger Isn't Always Better In The Tech World
Defining a Tech Company
More Backing For Asian Tech Start-Ups
————— News —————
“Continuous innovation is really the only sustainable competitive advantage.” Because most individuals think linearly and are inherently resistant to change, incorporating innovation into your business culture is an ongoing process. Many new startups avoid the innovative edge as they introduce yet another social networking site or dating app. In this article, Martin Zwilling addresses 10 steps that contribute to the innovative corporate culture and can be applied to startups as well. They include:
Inspire – innovation requires a leader who can inspire others to step into the unknown, outside of ordinary linear thinking.
Risk – innovation never results in a sure thing, but failure can be the best teacher.
New Product Process – innovation is not random, it must follow a structured process of idea generation, evaluation, prototyping, customer feedback, and success metrics.
Ownership – a business leader must own the results of innovation without passing off the development risk to a technical champion.
Value Creation – innovation must be a solution to real customer problems, and intellectual property can ensure a long-term sustainable competitive advantage.
Accountability – lack of accountability can jeopardize successful innovation if the new product process is not followed.
Training and Coaching – innovation requires a can-do attitude but also needs continuous coaching on the unknowns and ongoing education to stay at the forefront of the industry.
Idea Management – continue to develop and collect new ideas from both customers and internal team members responsible for the solution.
Observe and Measure – the best entrepreneurs stay close to the innovation process and benchmark their ideas against the competition.
Net Result and Reward – give rewards for milestone achievements, return on investments, and results in the market place rather than efforts expended.
There has been a historic practice in the tech industry of buying selling and merging tech conglomerates to develop the largest and broadest base in the industry possible. However, unlimited growth through acquisition has not always proven to be the best solution. Symantec has demonstrated this as it sells its storage and recovery business Veritas for $8 billion after its original $13.5 billion Veritas acquisition in 2004. Although splits, sales and spinoffs often help restore some of the lost value, they often leave fresh cash in the corporation’s hands that spurs ideas for the next hot new deal. Even Symantec has indicated that it is on the hunt for new inorganic investments, indicating that this habbit is extremely difficult to break before going back to internal growth.
Defining what a tech company is has become more and more difficult in the age of mobile apps and internet start-ups. Labeling yourself as a tech company now has less to do with producing hardware or software and more to do with the purpose and goals of the business. According to Moody’s Analytics chief economist, the term tech company is synonymous with innovation, research and development, and long-term thinking. However, this gray area has allowed new start-ups to attach themselves to the technology wave that has attracted so many large investors. Similar to the dot com bubble, investors show favoritism toward the tech scene that has adopted the innovative mindset even if the companies do not necessarily focus their business on technology development or production. As a result, it will be important to keep an eye on the current hot trend and be sure what type of branding will attract the largest investments.
Tech start-ups in Asia have grown at the same fast pace as in the US. 46 Asian start-ups, compared to 48 in North America, had fund-raising rounds of $100 million or more in the first half of this year. This is an indication of the increasing decentralization of global technology investments. International corporations are growing more willing to invest in domestic start-ups with advantages in their respective home markets. This shift in investment has focused primarily on the Asia and India markets. But, the recent turmoil in China’s stock market has raised some questions about the long-term availability of funds as larger investors have less cash to throw around. According to a former vice president at Google, the slight economic downturn in China may create some hiccups but will not halt big investments. On the other hand, India is one of the youngest countries with very minimal mobile penetration. As a result, many investors feel that it will be one of the next major tech hubs.
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