Innovating on multiple fronts

Innovating on multiple fronts

 
Refocusing innovation efforts
Watch CEOs from Wolters Kluwer, Marsh & McLennan Corp., ASTRO Malaysia Holdings and others discuss enhancing products, services and value through cross-functional innovation.

CEOs in communications and media & entertainment, two industries facing swiftly changing dynamics, are the most active on all fronts, whether refocusing innovation efforts for existing products and services, or for entirely new products in new models. CEOs in insurance and asset management are among those more likely to emphasise innovation in new business models – often taking advantage of new technologies.
CEOs changing innovation portfolios

 

More companies are avoiding a simple export model. This is the case in every major geographic market identified by CEOs. Substantial proportions, between 20% and 36%, say they are designing new product innovations specifically for local markets. The balance is surely changing as companies increasingly operate in dissimilar markets and learn to segment better.


Quotes

Baba Kalyani
Chairman and Managing Director, Bharat Forge LTD
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It will take us another five to seven years to become as innovative as companies in the West. But we will get there for sure.
Francisco González
Chairman and CEO, Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria (BBVA) SA
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In BBVA we’re also experimenting with avatars for specific parts of jobs, including servicing customers. Imagine what that will be like.
Marijn Dekkers
Chairman, Bayer AG
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The business case for innovation is increasing, but as I often say, the easy stuff has been done. For innovations to be meaningfully better requires more insight into the fundamentals of science.
Keith McLoughlin
President and CEO, AB Electrolux
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When R&D, marketing and design work independently of one another, we do have some successes. But we don’t get the same sort of amplifying effect like we do when they work together in the innovation triangle.
Roger W. Ferguson, Jr.
President and CEO, TIAA-CREF
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Certainly we’ve seen generational differences, particularly around social networking and the use of technology, so there are many ways in which we are listening to clients and adapting our practices to respond to the unique needs of different groups.
Francesco Starace
CEO, Enel Green Power SpA.
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In terms of technical breakthroughs, the renewable energy industry generates an inordinate amount of innovation. So, we have stopped trying to be the company that generates all the ideas and instead we focus on the best ideas regardless of where they originate. Instead of always trying to be the inventor, Enel now wants to become the company that is best at commercialising innovations and bringing them to scale – whether those innovations are internal or external to our company.
Antonio Rios Amorim
Chairman and CEO, Corticeira Amorim SGPS SA
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If volume growth is not going to be there, you need to have value growth, and in order to have value growth you need to offer the market innovative solutions, products, materials. So, we are focusing a lot more on innovating across the board in our company.
David M. Cote
Chairman and CEO, Honeywell
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We’ve certainly seen much more innovation coming from outside the US. Ten years ago, less than 40 percent of our sales were outside the US. Today it’s approximately 55 percent. We’ve grown from a $22-billion company to a $37-billion company. You don’t do that by simply taking US products and selling them somewhere else. You have to innovate, design, manufacture and source locally to be successful anywhere. For instance, we talk about the need to develop products in India and China, for sales both in those countries and in other markets, including the US.
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