Look inwards to go further down the innovation lane

Having fed the markets with increasingly efficient solutions than a generation would ever need, nations today are looking at triggering off innovation to support their future markets. Companies today need internal innovation for many reasons including exclusivity and indigenousness of end products. Business and markets have turned into highly volatile spaces where without exclusivity and focus in innovation, there is hardly any space left to set the foot in.

Figure this. When average lifespan of even most coveted Fortune 500 companies falls from 75 years to a mere two decades (well, just 18 years) it is time to sit up and take note of where the companies are headed and who would they be serving in the next so many years of their existence. How different the solutions would be, as against the ones they have rolled out so far?

Innovation in tech sector in the early years must have been the most exciting and most challenging as well. That was around the time when computers were still somewhat nothing more than an indulgent child’s rubick’s cube and the world didn’t even obsess over the efficiency of people. But, in the recent times, millions of people across the continents, have been constantly working on making the experience of using technology better and even better than the last best one.

And the consumer who happens to use the end product of an innovative thought, a child spoilt to the core with so many options, is enjoying the fruits of really difficult labour. He/she is all about choices and what can impart the best experience of some abstractness to them.

Whether it is technology or consumer products, companies today do not develop them the way they want to. Though that was the case earlier, close competition and exclusivity of a product do affect the chances of something sustaining the competition in the market or be a goner forever.

Today, after having released way too many products in a hurry at the beginning of new millennium, companies have been revisiting their attics to ensure they pick up even the last bit of spark let on the floor of the basement, in order to create something new and something earth shattering, or something better than the competitors. That is where the benchmark lies. We have to be better than our pals and peers, and consumer has to reserve his loyalty for us.

Independent entrepreneurs and corporate houses rely heavily on internal innovation today for reasons of exclusivity alone. Countries have been investing in Research and Development (R&D) as more focused ways of deciphering a problem, finding ways of solving it, iteratively matching a possible solution to that problem and arriving at a business model that supports their innovation.

Out-of-the-box problem solving method, in this manner has become inside-the-box problem solving approach in the recent times. Because, when companies propose problem solving solution to the customer or client without having to upset his economical situation, it is bound to invite favourable responses as against the old beaten methods, even if they are cost efficient.

With the advent of new technologies and new ways of doing business with the customers in varied markets, internal innovation gets the key position.

For eg: While the world was busy making mobile phones, Steve Jobs of Apple company was busy innovating to beat his own thinking process that yielded products that were priced at a premium, yes; but were indigenous to the core. The consumers loved this niche product, and how!
Some of the best innovations aren’t a problem from the outer space. They only proposed very efficient solutions to customers’ chronic problems that they faced on a regular basis.

In Indian context, the solution to the challenge of internal innovation has been astonishingly fresh and has changed the course of the manner in which problems were addressed so far.

Experts opine open innovation suits Indian economy in the best possible manner. Because the country that’s surging ahead on innovation is slowly but surely becoming aware of the capabilities, potential and uniqueness of the market the country holds. Intellectuals with high innovative power, have ushered in the open innovation concept in India.

Core strength of open innovation is the pattern of uniformly distributed market, which is catering to the needs of diverse communities. For companies to rely entirely on their own research can get a little difficult since the market experience can vary from one problem to another; and one region to another.

Government and corporate India needs to understand the talent pool this country holds and work on creating a framework where this can be distributed and used to push in new trends into economy. In terms of policies and education, India needs to look at bringing in drastic changes in order to open the markets within its own premises.

Image Credit: Indiatimes.com