Innovation in Practice

Wikinnovation!

Visit the Applied Marketing Innovation Wiki to see a collection of inventions across a wide array of product categories as well as information about innovation consultants.  The information is from students at The University of Cincinnati taking the graduate course, Applied Marketing Innovation.  Here is what you will find:

Patent's (Value) Pending

The Front End of Innovation blog reports 70% of respondents to their recent survey believe eliminating business method patents will hurt innovation and its practices.  The premise is that innovators and entrepreneurs are less likely to innovate if they know they cannot get patent protection.  The result surprises me, and it makes me wonder what the other 30% were thinking.

The issue stems from whether an inventor can patent an abstract process, something that involves nothing more than thoughts.  The courts are saying no.  A recent ruling on a business method patent by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit said that it was not tied to a machine or apparatus, nor did it transform a particular article into a different state or thing.  It did meet the standards set by the U.S. Supreme Court for patentability.  Many industries that are not "machine-based" like software makers, Internet companies, and investment houses, are concerned.

For me, the more appropriate question is:  WHO will cut back on innovation because of a loss of patent protection?  My observation is that it depends which side of the patent "fence" you currently sitting on:  1. you have patent protection now; 2. you are about to lose patent protection;  or 3. you are blocked by someone else's patent.  The lure of getting a patent can spur companies on to innovate.  However, once earned, patents seem to dull the senses. Companies rest on their laurels, satisfied with the revenues earned on current, patent-protected products.  It is the threat of LOSING the protection that motivates people to innovate.  Finally, if you are being blocked by someone else's patent, my sense is that companies are especially motivated to innovate.  They have no choice.

Keith Sawyer blogged about this over at Creativity and Innovation.  He reports on a recent paper by James Bessen and Michael J. Meurer who conclude, “in most industries today, patents may actually discourage investment in innovation.”    

Most patents are granted in industries that demonstrate little innovation.  Through the 19th century, most inventions were not even patented (only 11% of British inventions displayed at the 1851 World’s Fair, for example).  A study of important innovations at the 1851 and 1876 world’s fairs found that countries with patent systems weren’t any more innovative than countries without.  Following changes in IP law, what happens historically?  Japan increased patent scope in 1988, and this has not resulted in greater innovation nor in increased R&D spending (beyond what would have been expected without that change).  The U.S. changed its treatment of software inventions in the 1990s, but this did not result in an increase in patents by software firms.  (Instead, patents went up in companies known for “stockpiling large arsenals of patents to use as bargaining chips”.)  Surveys of companies find that most inventions are not patented; instead, companies rely on trade secrets and on their first-to-market advantage, or on complementary products and services.

Bronwyn Hall surveyed the issue in a paper titled, "Business Method Patents, Innovation, and Policy" (May 4, 2003).  She concludes: 

"Broad evidence that the patent system encourages innovation always and everywhere is hard to come by. The patent system does encourage publication rather than secrecy; it is probably good at providing incentives for innovations with high development cost that are fairly easily imitated and for which a patent can be clearly defined (e.g., pharmaceuticals). When innovations are incremental and when many different innovations must be combined to make a useful product, it is less obvious that benefits of the patent system outweigh the costs. Business methods are more likely to fall into the second class than the first."

For me, patents do not affect one's ability to innovate given the success of innovation methods.  Rather, patents affect one's motivation to innovate...both positively and negatively.  For long term success, companies should place more emphasis on innovating than protecting.

The LAB: Multiplication (August 2008)

The Multiplication tool is one of the five powerful thinking tools taught to me by the folks at Systematic Inventive Thinking. I like this tool because it is simple and yields great results.  Even children can learn it. 

Multiplication works by taking a component of the product, service, strategy, etc, and then making one or several copies of it.  But the copy must be changed in some way from the original component.  The original component is still intact, unchanged.  Now using Function Follows Form, we work backwards to take this hypothetical solution and find a problem that it solves.

One of our blog readers, Jim Doherty of the Grabbit Tool Company, agreed to let me use their main product, the EZ Grabbit Tarp Holder, for this month's LAB.  I bought a set at Ace Hardware last night, and used the Multiplication tool just now to create some new product ideas.  Here is a demonstration of the EZ Grabbit:

We start Multiplication by making a list of the components:

1. Sleeve
2. Dogbone
3. Chord
4. Grip
5. Lock

Make a copy or several copies of each component, one at a time, and change something about it.  What would be the benefit or potential use of the product with this new, changed component?  Here are some ideas:

1. Two sleeves, but the second sleeve is attached, back-to-back, to the original sleeve.  This would allow a second tarp to be attached to another one (with its own dogbone).  There could be three or perhaps even four sleeves, arranged in quadrant style (with the openings facing out), so multiple tarps could be attached.  The copied sleeve could be longer than the original, allowing different tarp configurations.
2. Multiple dogbones, but each is optimized for different types of material (tarp, plastic, terry cloth, cotton, denim, etc) to prevent damage, improve grip, etc.
3. Multiple chords, each coming out of the same dogbone with its own hole, to allow different attachment points.
4. Two grips, the second one attaches to the first one to allow it to be hung from a hook.
5. Two locking mechanisms, the second one used to attach to the fabric temporarily so it does not get lost or slide around during placement.

Once we have raw ideas like these, it's a good idea to get early customer feedback and perhaps build some working prototypes to let customers envision using the new product.  The ideas above are incremental innovations to the product's original category, so it can be valuable to get customer feedback about potential uses of the new embodiments outside the category to find breakthrough ideas as well.

Innovation for the Ages

I taught innovation to a group of 6th, 7th, and 8th graders as part of my son's middle school enrichment program several years ago.  I had never taught children in a formal setting, and it was terrifying at first.  The course was called, "How to Be an Inventor," and we met one hour a week for five weeks.

I had my doubts about this...whether someone could actually learn a systematic approach to innovation.  I had recently experienced the S.I.T. method as part of my company's efforts to create new medical products.  I wanted to experiment to see if a templated approach to innovation could be taught...and applied...in a setting outside of my company.  So I taught these children the five templates: subtraction, task unification, multiplication, division, and attribute dependency.  On the final day, each student had to take a product that I would give to them randomly, apply one of the five tools, and create a new-to-the-world product - all in thirty minutes. They had to draw the invention on the blackboard and explain why it was useful.

The first student was given a ordinary wire coat hanger.  Using the Attribute Dependency tool, she invented a coat hanger that would adjust to the size, weight, and shape of the garment.  Sixth grade!  I had never seen such a product before.  Truth is it had already been invented by Henry Needles in 1953 (United States Patent US2716512), so technically, she failed the exam.  But she created something new to HER world, for sure.  Each student similarly created amazing new products, some incremental, and some far out (moon beam flashlight).

If 6th graders can learn to innovate in real time, so can the business world.  That is why companies are embracing more productive, systematic methods of innovating and shunning traditional methods.

Teaching children to innovate was an epiphany for me.  My next innovation experiment...senior citizens.  I believe a group of senior citizens could be an ideal scenario for innovating in real time.  They have time on their hands, they want to be productive, they have lots of world knowledge and experience, and they think about ways to improve their situation. 

Innovation for the ages...stay tuned.