From PDMA Visions

Portfolio Pain Points

This study, once again points out how poorly we manage our NPD Projects.  We do not seem to think of the collection of projects as a portfolio and do not manage them as such.  If we are to achieve our strategic goals for NPD as well as our objectives for each of the projects we have in process, we need to manage them as a portfolio.

Too many projects and poor decision making is at the root cause of poor success rates for both strategic and tactics objectives.

This research connects to a previous post regarding an article by Robert Cooper   Cooper Article

What do you think?  Am I overly concerned?

Thanks Frank.

Check out this video of a Roll Top PC

Rolltop PC

Thanks Shawn

From Wired

Bionic Finger Article and Video

This is an amazing technology.

From the article ” ProDigits, as the device is called, can help its users bend, touch, pick up and point — reflecting almost all the key functions of a natural hand. The prosthetic fingers are for those who have a partial hand, where the absence of fingers is due either to congenital anomalies or to amputation, says Touch Bionics.”

What do you think?  What is next?

Thank you Sanghomitra

From YouTube

Check out this video of a Portable Ultrasound

What do you think of that?  Cool, eh?

From the Harvard Business School Blog…..

How will Augmented Reality affect Your Business

Check out the five “things”.  Personally, of these, the “nature of location” will have the most profound impact.

What do you think?

Thanks for the link Hugh.

How Jobs Transformed APPLE

The Decade of Steve

And, my favorite link   Jobs’ Greatest Hits — A Timeline

So, is he the CEO of the decade?  Is he one of the most innovative manager/leaders ever?

What do you think?

Thanks Hugh

GOOGLE Maps Navigation (Beta) Video

Scroll Down for Video

Awesome!  Perhaps we know why some are predicting  iPhone  domination by the Droid!    Can I build this into my car?  Are you listening Toyota?

Check out the slide shows too!

Voice command.  FREE no ads (for now)

What do you think?

An article on “strategy+ business” entitled “Profits Down, Spending Steady: The Global Innovation 1000″

” Booz & Company’s annual study of the world’s biggest corporate R&D spenders finds that most companies have stuck with their innovation programs despite the recession — and many are boosting spending to compete more effectively in the upturn.”

Within the article we read quotations from business leaders  “Innovation is what drives our competitive position in all three of our markets — automotive, professional, and consumer — and therefore we can’t back off,” says Robert Lardon, corporate vice president for strategy and investor relations at Harman International Indus­tries Inc. Adalio Sanchez, general manager of IBM’s System X server business, echoes that point of view: “I would argue that the recession is a catalyst for in­creased innovation.”

This is encouraging for new product developers and a welcome sign that innovation is live and well, and in fact, an imperative for survival — long term.

What do you think?

Here we go, the rumors are starting?  The New Your Times’ Bill Keller ranting about the end of newspaper publishing (the coming of Googlezon?) and the potential of an iTablet?  Is this good marketing — pre-announcement?  Market Research?  Apple iTablet

What do you think?  Marketing?  Rumors?  Advance, off the record, notice?

A recent HBSP blog post “What Baseball Can Teach Us about Innovation” teaches us that statistics, and the use of widespread use and availability of statistics help baseball improve.  The posting suggests that statistics can help innovation efforts.   From the blog “Companies should create an internal encyclopedia in which they highlight the year they started work on each innovation, what type it was, how projections about its market potential changed through time, its key characteristics, and its ultimate performance. The encyclopedia would facilitate statistical analysis to help the company increase its success rate.”

What do you think, can better categorization and measurements of innovation efforts help us be more innovative?

Thanks to Hugh for these links.

We discussed briefly Next Generation 911 in class.

An article discusses what the problem is and what it is going to cost to fix it.

Next Generation 911

Wikipedia Explanation of NG911 From the article: “In addition to calling 9-1-1 from a phone, the public will be able to transmit text, images, video and data to the 9-1-1 center (referred to as a Public Safety Answering Point, or PSAP)”

Did you know about this?  (I did not know about PSAP)  What do you think?

Thanks to Hugh for the link.

Well, here it is the Barnes and Nobel Nook using the Android System, ATT partnership, wirelesss connection,  and some cool electronics, we have a challenger to the Kindle.

What do you think?

A blog post at Harvard Business School states that the USA cannot make the Kindle.  The article gives lots of insight into the design and manufacturing of the Kindle.  More importantly, it raises the questions associated with the importance of our (USA) ability to manufacture a product such as the Kindle.

The US Can’t Manufacture the Kindle and that’s a Problem

What do you think?  Does the USA NEED to be a manufacturer?  Why?   Is this “killing innovation”?

Fast Company published a posting with a video circa 1987 called “Screw Microsoft’s Courier: Apple Had a Better Idea 22 Years Ago” The posting has another video you might enjoy as well.

What do you think about this posting?  Do you like the original or the “latest version”?

A FAST COMPANY article talks about Hybrid Thinking at P&G.   From the article “Hybrid thinking is much more than gathering together a multidisciplinary team. Hybrid thinking is about multidisciplinary people. ”

Forget Design Thinking Try Hybrid Thinking

Hybridity???  From the article,  ”Hybridity matters now because the problems companies need to solve are simply too complex for any one skillset to tackle. We’re in an era when car companies are trying to grapple with massive changes in technological capability and market need, when cell phone companies are trying to own global entertainment, and when snack food companies face extinction unless they figure out how to promote health and wellness. As Lou Lenzi, a design executive at Audiovox, once told me, if you want to innovate, “You need to be one part humanist, one part technologist, and one part capitalist.”

Willing to Try?  How will you do it?  Can you do it?

Another article today on FAST COMPANY  — Kindle Killer  reports a partnership with AT&T and its 3G network.  Do you recall how we spoke about how these kind of “technology partnerships” are the current wave and the way of the future?  No new product is just a product, it is always a service, and coupling/connecting it with strong partners that lead to make it a service offering — with ease of use and ubiquitous availability makes this a formidable competitor to the apparent leader.   Sometimes “first” or even fast follower is not the best position. 

What do you think?

In the innovation game, competition can be brutal or wonderful depending on what side you are on.  We have commented in class and within this blog a bit about the Kindle, we have also looked at the Plastic Logic E-Reader in 2008 within this blog.   

Now we have aFast Company blog article that describes the Plastic Logic E-Reader as a Barnes and Noble product which directly challenges both Sony and Kindle.  The 3 minute video describes and shows some of the cool features.

What do you think?  Do you think the market benefits?  How, why?  or why not?

Thanks Dave (MG-745) for the suggestion.

Digital Grandma

So, how important is education and training to technology diffusion?

A FAST COMPANY blog posting talks about a recent patent by APPLE that could undermine their sustainability movement positioning, however, there is another interesting concept and this is “active packaging”. 

ACTIVE PACKAGING

From the post ” According to Apple’s patent, such packaging could receive power “provided by a direct power connection to an external power supply or by one or more wireless power techniques. A data signal may be provided by one or more direct data lines to the electronic media device within the packaging, or the electronic media device may enable an integrated wireless network interface to receive a data stream while housed in the packaging.” Traditional plastic polymer backings present in Apple packaging could be printed with wire traces to supply power, ground, and data to the enclosed device.”

While this does add more packaing, especially electronics and other items most people are reducing due to their sustainability efforts, this technology may provide a competitive advantage through better promotion.

What do you think?  Competitive advantage or are they damaging their own “green” positioning?

Continuing with a bit of a theme around “design”, we have an article that suggests five ways to use “design” in this economic time of recovery.  I like the idea of recovery versus crisis, don’t you?

“Roadmap for Recovery: Five Ways to Come Out on Top”

Do you think “design” can play the role the author suggests?  Why or why not?  Should design be articulated in new product or innovation strategy? How?