Google has received a bit of press for it's announcement that its product, Glass, will be manufactured in the US (at least early runs). Google held a competition called #IfIHadGlass to identify eager early adopters. Winners will get the "chance" to pay $1,500 to get their hands on the product before the general public does. There are several reasons Google probably wants to … [Read more...]
The Internet Of You
I just read an intriguing article (I used Google Glass: the future, but with monthly updates) that discussed the benefits and drawbacks of the Google Glass project in its current state. I, for one, am ready to be a cyborg. The promise of Google Glass is that it will give us a heads-up display at every moment of our life. While scanning your environment for clues, Glass provides … [Read more...]
Shrodinger’s Cat And Strategy
My wife and I are coming to terms with the fact that we are staring down the barrel of the end of a two year tour of duty for work that has taken us from Chicago to Southern California. We don't have to go back, but there are compelling reasons for us to do so (finances, friends, family, educational system, etc.). We don't have to stay, but there are compelling reasons to do so … [Read more...]
Brilliant Machines: It’s The Little Bits That Matter
A while back, I saw the fantastic GE Brilliant Machines, "Robots On The Move" ad. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7DNYocXvR0&height=315&width=560 After seeing it, I sent a tweet confessing my love of the spot. I was pleased to see that GE responded with a note of thanks. I was surprised that they offered to send a token of their appreciation. I responded … [Read more...]
Breaking Down Barriers: Clearing The Innovation Brush
Recently, I was involved in an innovation initiative which was a crowdsourcing initiative to identify efficiencies within a company. The challenge was open to all employees and voting and commenting were permitted. After the challenge was closed, the most popular (by votes and comment counts) were presented to leadership. Their reaction, to say the least, was less than … [Read more...]
Standing On The Threshold
Some things that are amazing me: We can smash atoms together to unlock a particle that only existed in math equations a month ago. We can store enough data to simulate a living organism. We can slow down time enough to sort through photons and see around corners. We can sort through vast amounts of data and determine that someone is pregnant based on their … [Read more...]
The 5 Vectors Of Business Transformation
I spend my days in the Innovation Office of a large professional services organization. Our team focuses on helping the firm generate and refine new ideas to improve our culture, operations, and the services we provide to clients. All our efforts would be useless unless what we do is strategically aligned. One tool we use to ensure alignement is to map out the business … [Read more...]
Is Brainstorming Broken?
I just got done reading William Duggan's post on strategy+business called "How Aha! Really Happens." It is an interesting read and I'll let you read it for yourself rather than try to recap it here. For brevity's sake an our purposes, let it suffice to say that Mr. Duggan asserts that the process companies use to come up with solutions to problems is flawed in that the focus is … [Read more...]
Cat & Mouse: Innovation In Entertainment
Change is happening. You can’t avoid it. The economy is fluctuating, there is an ongoing battle to reconfigure the regulatory landscape, and the marketplace keeps shifting as new players get into the game and established players enter new markets. However, the most profound changes we are seeing are being driven by technology – the digital platform is opening up new channels, … [Read more...]
Predict This! Kaggle Seeks The Michael Jordan Of Analytics
Last week, my boss and I had the pleasure of speaking with Anthony Goldbloomd and Karthik Sethuraman of Kaggle (http://www.kaggle.com/) and we were both impressed by what this San Francisco startup has cooking. Kaggle is a platform for crowd-sourcing solutions to complex analytics problems. There's a great writeup at Forbes about the company. Here's the gist of it, … [Read more...]