Download "Leveraging innovation"

Innovation, like business overall, is rapidly globalizing, with foreign-owned companies and foreign-born inventors accounting for nearly half of all US patents. "Innovation Trends" explores how companies are "Systemizing Serendipity," by creating the right organizational culture and discipline and getting the right people collaborating together with the best equipment.

From research incubators, to science fairs, to social networking sites modeled on Facebook, the spirit of innovation is moving toward the new phenomenon of "crowd sourcing." In the essay "Getting Social to Innovate Networks," we explore how leading corporations are establishing open communication systems to exploit the wide range of divergent employee backgrounds and discover unexpected business opportunities. Indeed, crowd sourcing has become a way to get consumers, suppliers and even competitors talking-and innovating-with one another. Hey, if the toy manufacturer LEGO can do it (with its "Mindstorms" opens systems platform), why not your company?

Nowhere does the need for innovation call out for attention more than in the realm of energy. Indeed, the quest for sustainable, clean energy sources is arguably the next global economic frontier. In "The Crude Reality on the Cost of Innovation," we explore how the dynamics of business-government partnerships must be recalibrated-effectively and quickly-in order to address global energy demands. We examine what can be done for each emerging renewable energy pathway, including solar, wind, and biofuels. While corporate investment in these areas has skyrocketed along with critical venture capital, federal R&D has actually shrunk-even as other nations have radically shifted their public policy to aggressively pursue new energy sources. If the US doesn't follow suit, we could soon be left behind.