posts tagged ‘intellectual property’

From creation myth to the reality of innovation today

13 May 2011 | Editor

On the surface, Malcolm Gladwell’s latest article for The New Yorker, "Creation Myth: Xerox PARC, Apple, and the truth about innovation", is a story about the mouse and how inventions travel – and evolve – across time and place. But examined more deeply, the article is really about the factors that determine whether you end up with an invention or an innovation. The story of PARC – and for that matter, any other innovative company – is indeed a mix of hopeful inventions, world-changing innovations, and missed opportunities, as Gladwell observes. But there's more – in contrast to his thesis that there’s a clean split between invention and innovation, and that companies are structurally limited in their innovation opportunities – we believe that there is now a framework that allows companies to innovate beyond their comfort zones and existing infrastructures. It's called open innovation.

Shift Happens (at PARC)

3 March 2010 | Mark Bernstein

PARC hosted a fieldtrip for TTI/Vanguard attendees following their recent "Shifts Happen" conference in San Francisco. [Through private conferences that they describe as "part classroom, part think-tank, and part laboratory", TTI/Vanguard is a forum for senior-level executives that links strategic technology planning to business success.] Surprisingly, the questions I was asked before and after the demo-presentation tour weren’t that different. Basically, folks were looking for simple answers or replicable formulas to some pretty fundamental challenges: How do we do what we do? How do we do it differently than before? How do we make the right choices? There's no single formula, but...

Technology scouting and acquisition: what do YOU want to know?

9 September 2009 | Jennifer Ernst

Next week, I'll be moderating a panel on "Creating Value with a Smart Technology Scouting, Acquisition, and Licensing Strategy" at Growth, Innovation, and Leadership (a Frost & Sullivan global congress on corporate growth). Since I'll write up the discussion after the event (and, of course, post here what I can), let me know what questions you want answered -- what would like to hear more about? What questions about acquiring technology from external sources are top of mind for you?