Why isn’t there a common language of innovation?

For years innovation was considered to be as something that could not be deliberated. Thus no language was developed to understand the complexities of innovation. Recently, stories of innovators have been documented and, on the surface, they seem to be full of idiosyncrasies. However, at a qualitative level, there appears to be a pattern in how a vast number of people identify opportunities and design solutions. With clamor for innovation on the rise, the ability to articulate this phenomena of significant consequences has become a necessity.

Where in the world is talent emerging?

Talent is emerging all across the globe. Helsinki has expertise in mobile handset, Kraskow in FPGA electronic chips, Munich in automotive electronics, Bucharest in anti-virus software, Moscow in pattern recognition software, Beijing in speech recognition, Seoul in liquid crystal display, Tokyo in HD DVD, Singapore in disk drives, Tel Aviv in network security software, Johannesburg in wireless telemetry, Montreal in animations, Minneapolis in implantable medical devices, and Seattle in streaming media. Thus, off-shoring decisions should be made carefully after evaluating talent and not just low cost.

What are the challenges with patent laws?

Patent law provides the incentive to innovate. It grants the innovator a period of monopoly for the invention to be put to use. How long should this period be? What subjects should be issued such right? What should the reviewing process involve? With the growing global influence, how can rights be held across borders? These questions pose challenges for the current patent system. The US patent system was codified in its modern form by 1836. However, constructive changes made in 1982 have created present debates. US patent system was centralized for litigation, and the patent offices were turned into profit centers. As a result, patent examiners are swamped with over 350,000 applications a year. Some patents seem to be unnecessary or counterproductive. Solutions to new issues on patents have been proposed by Josh Lerner, professor at Harvard. He suggests that new patent claims should be posted before issue so that third parties could challenge the novelty and non-obviousness. In the area of patent litigation, he proposes replacing juries with knowledgeable judges.

What are the opportunities in emerging markets?

Recently, there has been significant private equity interest in India and China. Both countries are growing at 8-10% year over year creating a plethora of opportunities. In India, large part of foreign investment is beginning to go into pre-IPO companies. The number of IPO issues are increasing and so are the opportunities to exploit the arbitrage of higher evaluations in the public markets. Warburg-Pincus has been successful with over 200% returns in some cases. Opportunities exist in healthcare infrastructure, auto parts, supplies for building roads, seaports and airports – and much more.

How did Venture Capital develop as a financial vehicle?

Venture Capital started with the likes of wealthy Rockefellers’ who lent money to startups that could not seek capital. Georges Doriot, a professor at Harvard Business School, was the first one to envision venture capital in its modern form. He started American Research and Development as a publicly traded fund to finance war technology in the 1940s. After the war, technology was still viable for other use. With a rocky start, the fund eventually found a successful investment of $70,000 in computer technology DEC that became $34 million. Another investor, Arthur Rock, a then New York based investment banker, found success through investments in Fairchild semiconductors on the east coast. Rock took the venture capital investment concept to California where innovation was happening around the Stanford University. He structured the firm Rock and Davis as a private limited partnership rather than as a public fund. Over the last two decades, regulations changed allowing institutional capital to be invested in early stage funds. University endowments and later pension institutions poured money into many different venture capital funds.

What is the agenda of U.S. National Innovation Initiative?

Quality of manufacturing was systematized in the 1980s. Efficiency efforts were advanced in every aspect of business execution in the 1990s. The National Innovation Initiative (NII), as part of the National Competitive Council in the U.S., has made an unconditional commitment to advance innovation in this decade. The connection between innovation and prosperity is evident. However, we live in challenging times where national security and globalization have come into tension. Global trade makes borders more porous and thus a security threat. After one year of study involving 400 scholars and practitioners, NII recommends that the right solution to enhance prosperity of the U.S. is to promote talent, policy and collaboration towards innovation. This solution is different than other solutions that may suggest protectionism and stricter immigration control of creative people entering the U.S. The initiative is led by Deborah Wince-Smith. Luminaries like the CEO of IBM and President of Georgia-Tech fully support it.

What have been the major technology revolutions in history?

Once the practical aspects of a technology are identified, they bring about sweeping changes within society. Richard Arkwright’s mechanized cotton spinning process brought about the first factory system in the 1700s. James Watt’s steam engine led to the Manchester Railway system, changing the nature of transportation. Andrew Carnegie’s Bessemer converter in the steel plant provided steel, the backbone of construction. Ford’s idea of democratizing cars by making them cheaper using an assembly line brought about the age of dependence on oil. And then in 1971, Intel’s first microprocessor triggered a revolution in information. Now we are entering an age of precise information about everything essential being at one’s fingertips. Telemedicine, tele-presence (virtual presence), nano-technology (tiny, fast, organic), e-books, e-paper, grid computing – all will shape our future in every field.

What technologies will shape the future?

Laser, radio, IC engines, refrigeration, and integrated circuits have changed the way we live. Life is unimaginable without these technologies that at one time were groundbreaking. What is coming down the pike that will completely transform our lives? Computing in a way that free computer capacity all over the globe could be exploited, completely automated flight controls at airports, precise mining of information in databases across the globe, using light nano-tubes to replace heavy electricity wires, identifying some diseases merely through analysis of molecules like sugar rather than gene or protein, manufacturing drugs for disease like malaria by engineering bacteria with multiple genes from different organisms, seamlessly combining electronics and mechanical parts with neural pathways, increasing computer memory without tradeoffs of excessive power usage or space, making computers work with ‘light’ based circuitry rather than inefficient electrical circuitry, and protecting cell phone from devastating computer type viruses – such technologies would find foothold with time and create yet another unimaginable transformation.

What is at the scientific frontier?

Our scientists continue their detective work as they have for centuries. Newton opened our eyes to gravity, a force that pulls the apple to earth and keeps the moon in orbit. This opened up opportunities for space travel. Maxwell connected the dots between electricity and magnetism leading to design of many products that improve our quality of life today. Einstein resolved the challenges with Newton’s laws of gravity. He established that gravity was not instantaneous but traveled only as fast as light. In contrast to such observations of large masses, Neil Bohr opened up a new world to us at the microscopic level. Scientists that followed showed us that minute particles at this quantum level operate by a whole set of different laws of physics. Their position and velocity cannot be ascertained accurately unlike large celestial bodies that Newton and Einstein observed. The new question for scientific inquiry has been – are all things in the universe interconnected and is there a common law that can explain the apparent differences at quantum level? For the past twenty years, scientist have arrived at a set of mathematical equations that unify all laws of universe and begin to identify the building blocks of the universe. In accordance with this perspective, all forces and matter are made of vibrating strings at the minutest level and not point particles. So, the atom has a nucleus, the nucleus is divisible into protons and neutrons that are further made of quarks. Quarks are made of vibrating strings. If this were true, then there is a possibility that there are 11 dimensions and multiple universes that are stacked right next to each other. Strings manifest differently to produce a plethora of particles like electron (creates electricity), protons (create light) and gravitons (create gravity). Several millions of dollars are being spent at Fermilab in the US and CERN in Europe to somehow prove or disprove that the ultimate indivisibility beyond quarks is a string, not a point particle. Since we are pragmatic, the key question is how could it impact society? Well, if there are parallel universes, we may not have to travel far off in our own but punch through on the other side to discover new useful possibilities, even life in a parallel universe! What was fiction and what reality could be are beginning to sound the same!

Customer may not know – Doug Hall, CEO Eureka Ranch

There has been a lot of discussion lately on how the consumer is driving innovation. Many have suggested that a strategy for incremental innovation is constant attention to one’s consumers. Others maintain that studying consumer behavior closely could yield trailblazing ideas as well. Doug Hall suggests that radical ideas often come from anticipating future needs of the customer. In some instances customers may not even be aware of them. Doug may be right, BMW continues to be ahead in innovation and popularity, offering features in cars that the customer may not have yet conceived as a need.