There are two companies going through something similar right now; Twitter and Google, not necessarily in that order.Both of them are worrying their third-party developers somewhat. Twitter wants to move on with making Twitter a business and so it needs to take some control over a platform that it claims is too fragmented. Ryan Sarver, Twitter's platform product developer says that with more people joining Twitter and accessing the service in multiple ways, "a consistent user experience is more crucial than ever". He's actually asked developers to stop making apps and tools that focus on the basic Twitter functions.Frankly, users don't seem to agree and are happy enough to pick and choose from the innovative apps and tools that third-party developers have been creating away while Twitter sat quiet. But on the plus side, Twitter isn't going to stop the use of hugely popular clients and is going to only insist that the companies that developed them follow a set of stringent rules on privacy and security. Great, but I wish they were handling it differently instead of seeming to forget that it isn't Twitter that thought up compelling ways of making the platform usable - it's the developers. For heaven's sake, you couldn't tell who was saying what to whom until clients like Tweetdeck came along.The other company coming down hard on developers is Google. Now, unlike Twitter, the world of Android really is fragmented. And in so many ways. Not only is Android housed on many devices from many companies but it's in several versions, creating some degree of confusion. Something updates, something doesn't, something works, something doesn't - it's a riot of openness. The fact that Android is an "open" system, allowing third party developers to freely create apps and the user to freely customize an Android device, has been a big anti-Apple strength and has contributed to how Android has surged ahead to grab market share (at 31 per cent) from other smartphone operating systems. But things are getting messy, as was demonstrated nicely with more than one malicious attack on apps in the Android Market. Google is asking for quality. And unsurprisingly, most people support that. It's pulled out many apps it thinks might be troublesome and is also looking at licenses for services and devices that companies are providing.Well, we're all for an ecosystem that can be both free-ish and clean, so good luck, Google.In an interesting coincidence, both companies also have their founders returning to take charge. Co-founder Jack Dorsey tweets that he's back at Twitter and that new things are coming up for Twitter. Meanwhile, at Google, Larry Page is back with a bang, leaving the world wondering what he's going to do next.Mala Bhargava is a personal technology writer and media professional. Contact her at mala@pobox.com and @malabhargava on Twitter
Read More
Are you a big fan of Stephanie Meyer's Twilight series? Are you tickled by the thought that the sexy Lady Gaga could be a man? Do you feel you'd like to help Japan in its time of need as it continues to be bombarded with horrific aftershocks and the frightening prospect of radioactive leakage? Well, there's a scam for that.Not that this should come as a surprise to anyone. I must admit that from day one I've been extremely wary of all those apparently-fun apps on Facebook that tell you whether your friends think you're good looking, match a colour to your personality, tell you what your name really means, and so on. I'm even more suspicious of games, which thankfully I have no time for anyway.But for all those of you who may be "addicted" to Facebook, where you make it a point to take every quiz and play every game that comes your way, here's a home truth: Expert scamsters are leaving no stone unturned to make money by exploiting your habits, from hijacking your whole account and making off with it, to sending you event request, to enticing you into clicking to see an "OMG" video. These exploits are well-crafted and implemented — not like the clumsily-worded Nigerian scams of yesteryear (which nevertheless snare many victims).Facebook users also readily take the bait. After the US, the people who fall for Facebook scams happen to be… you guessed it, Indians. That's according to security firm, BitDefender, who used a free account-protecting tool called Safego to study Facebook scam-scape. In their analysis, they show how the hugest number of users get taken in by the "see who viewed your profile" line. This particular scam gathered 1,411,743 clicks. Offers of free iPads, shocking images, videos apparently featuring you, and even fake versions of popular games have been used as part of scams that spike the click through rate to get the scamsters money. Search for BitDefender infographic to see a visual of the stats.Recently, a friend of mine kept claiming that her Facebook account had been taken over by someone. I was a little reluctant to believe her, until I discovered there were indeed enough instances where accounts were hijacked or recreated. The cyber-criminal sends out messages to the account holder's friends about some kind of emergency and asks for money to be sent immediately.Other scams work by using your interests and behaviour to get you to click on pages set up to use you to spread the scam further and further. The Twilight scam is a recent example. Go ahead and Like the Facebook page for security firm, Sophos. This is a good place to keep track of scams that are doing the rounds. In fact, if you're tempted to click on something suspicious, go check here first. Sophos shows you, in a video, just how you're clickjacked to a fake game page. The user is baited into allowing access to the basic Facebook account information and putting up wall posts. There's also a survey which the user takes to add to the scamsters coffers.Scams are being created so cleverly they keep abreast of the news and use what they know to make the content of their bait more realistic. There are many social media companies due for IPOs this year and this fact is being used to come up with scams on sales of unregistered shares. One trader actually tricked investors out of $9.6 million for fake Facebook and Google shares, news reports say.Incredibly, according to Security News, there's even a scam that says Facebook is closing down because it can't handle so many accounts. Users who want to keep their accounts alive are lured to click somewhere or the other. Another crazy scam experimented (and did pretty well) with not using a celebrity or anything very dramatic but apparently linked to a video about how students are going haywire while a teacher is turned to the blackboard. "Teacher from behind" being the operative terms here. For heaven's sake.If only people would stop for a moment and think.Facebook isn't amused by these scams, as you'd well imagine. After all, how would it benefit Facebook if everyone were to get spooked and stop clicking on everything? All that hard work for nothing! Here's what they say: "… (we have) a large team of professional investigators who quickly remove these (groups and pages that violate Facebook policies) when we detect them or they're reported to us by our users. "Facebook says they advise people to be suspicious of anything that looks or feels strange online - whether it's an unfamiliar link in a message from a friend who hasn't contacted you in a while, or a promise of something valuable if you take a certain action or provide personal information. They suggest you keep in touch with the Facebook Security Pages and blog to protect yourself. Meanwhile, they're working on ways of automatically removing scam messages.Can't be soon enough for those 600 million users!Mala Bhargava is a personal technology writer and media professional. Contact her at mala@pobox.com and @malabhargava on Twitter
Read More
This month, Samsung launched enough products to make your head spin. Did someone say sixty three?From its stunning Smart TVs to air conditioners that are said to kill off the H1N1 virus if it's anywhere in the room, to an army of note- and netbooks, one of them as thin as the MacBook Air. You'd have seen blatant electronic-greed in my eyes if you'd been at the Samsung mega-launch.Although I wouldn't say no to most of the products I saw there, what interested me most were the smartphones and tablets - particularly the tablets.So now Samsung is daring its competition to do what it will because it's ready with a tablet in practically every size. There's a "multimedia device" called the Galaxy S 5 which is positioned against the iPod Touch, at 5 inches. It's slim and slick and has what you'd expect from a multimedia player or tablet, except full connectivity and calling. It works on wifi. Then there's the original 7 inch Galaxy Tab. But then, there's also the brand new 8.9 and the 10.1 inch versions. So the 5 inch competes with the Dell Streak, the 7 inch with the Blackberry Playbook and possibly a new one from Motorola, the 10 inch with the iPads and the 8 inch is for good luck. Depending on just which 8 inch steps into the battlefield. In a market still very much in its puppyhood, tablets are fighting it out over bells and whistles. The Playbook, which has been received with thoroughly mixed reviews, is the multi-tasker of the lot. The iPad still has the most finesse. Many of the others have the new Honeycomb operating system for tablets. When the market begins to settle though, I really think size will be an important consideration. A step up from 7 inches to 10 may not sound like much, but this has dramatically different implications for portability and experience. And I think early adopters should keep this in mind.For instance, if you want a tablet because you think you can use it at work to input data while you're on the go throughout your work area - a 7 or 8 inch would probably be more convenient. If you want to bring home a versatile device with something for the whole family, you need the screen real estate for there to be a riveting experience. A very personal e-book reader or something you can play Scrabble on, read the news etc would mean you could drop the size to make the tablet easier to hold.If you're one of those who can't wait for the scene to settle, don't let specs overshadow size when you choose your tablet.Mala Bhargava is a personal technology writer and media professional. Contact her at mala@pobox.com and @malabhargava on Twitter
Read More
Ah, I love a good fight! And here it comes.Apple is suing Samsung. And Samsung has gone off to find something which it can use to hit Apple over the head with, in retaliation.Apple tends to keep its legal department rather busy, actually, and is currently suing Nokia and Motorola as well. With the lawsuit it's hurled at Samsung though, an interesting situation has been triggered off because Apple happens to be Samsung's second biggest client, ironically for parts that go into the disputed products.On the face of it, the reasons Apple is going after Samsung, sound rather silly. Apple says Samsung is "slavishly" copying many aspects of Apple's product design and packaging. A black border around the screen, square-rounded icons, round-rectangular product shapes, a metallic line around the body, icon styling, and so on. But when you take all the points that Apple is complaining about together, detailed in a 373-page lawsuit, you see that the similarities extend to the overall look and feel and packaging, including the silver lettering on the boxes.So, why did Samsung not take the trouble to create its own signature styling rather than get within a whisker of Apple's iPad and iPhone? Perhaps the idea was to get away with as much as it could and leverage on the success of Apple's design. I'm sure Samsung worked out, with its own legal advice, what it could do though they say they developed their own designs and technology independently. The question now is whether the Samsung products are getting so close to Apple's that they could confuse the buyer. Well known tech analyst, Nilay Patel has had a good look at the Apple lawsuit and simplified it, and he explains that trade dress law is violated when people buying the products are actually getting mixed up between them. Of course, I rather doubt that this is the case since no one goes into a shop and asks for a Samsug-iPhone or even otherwise picks up one when they wanted the other. In the present times, buyers are savvy enough to know what they're buying. Incidentally, the Apple lawsuit makes for interesting reading. Apple i-pad (AP) I'm not very business-savvy else a) I'd be very rich and b) I'd understand exactly why Apple is suing Samsung. Where will it get critical parts for its products (including for MacBooks and iPads) if Samsung were to delay or withhold these in a countermove? What would happen to the technologies these competitors were actually working on together? Is this a pure anti-Samsung move or an anti-Android move, or just a temporary spanner in the works to buy time and strengthen its position, taking back share from Android? Of course, it isn't necessary that the whole Apple-Samsung relationship would go to pieces because the business they do together benefits both companies – obviously.If Apple wins this battle, it will put Samsung at a bit of a disadvantage and stem the flow of me-too devices being rushed to market. If it doesn't, such products could flood the place and the edge Apple has could be under threat.All I can say is I hope, while Apple and Samsung are busy with each other, someone will leave the warehouse doors open and let us get at those phones and tablets.Mala Bhargava is a personal technology writer and media professional. Contact her at mala@pobox.com and @malabhargava on Twitter
Read More
It took being smacked squarely on the head with a revolution or two for the world to stop arguing with the huge fact that is social media. Skeptics have figured out that even if the social bubble were to burst, something has changed forever. What they're slower to get however the transformation is happening to content online, even as we speak.If you're in the business of writing, or if you produce other forms of content for your company, consider the implications of these 15 changes shaping digital media.1. DemocratisationIn this age of social networking, everyone has a voice. And everyone uses it. Right from the start of the web, the internet has been a great equaliser - anyone can produce content. And they do. This democratisation has meant content-related industries have seen a disruption inside out. The consumption of content has gone up exponentially - just not in the old predictable ways it used to be consumed. Book publishers, music companies, television, newspapers and writers have all had to reinvent themselves in a world where they're not the only content experts. The implications for anyone producing content are that they no longer have a handful of competitors. It's you against ROW. Facebook 2. Ownership In QuestionCompanies find they no longer own their logos, businesses discover that ideas don't necessarily come from their swanky cerebral-stimulating air-conditioned innovation centres, and writers see their work sprouting up in places they didn't expect it to online. Can a news site link to your blog and make it look like they wrote it? Can you use a photo someone seems to have forgotten online without it being theft? Can you put up a friend's video on YouTube for all to see when he didn't say you could? The social web has challenged and re-challenged content ownership as we once knew it. Most contentious of all is user-generated content. Does an article put up on Facebook belong to the user or to Facebook? Does a comment on a company's page entitle the company to use it as they like?3. CrowdsourcingThey call it "the wisdom of crowds". Starbucks calls for great ideas on a special website - and it gets them. Lego puts design software up for download and asks its customers-to-be to use it to create new products, Harley Davidson makes a bunch of marketing material based on the participation of fans and the ideas they submit. Business publications crowdsource polls and surveys, the Q&A site, Quora, crowdsources answers from subject experts, and journalists crowdsource information for their writing. Never before was there such a wholehearted recognition of the fact that content doesn't just come from institutions and organisations but from extraordinary ordinary people.4. Aggregation And CurationThere was a time, not so long ago, when you had a producer and a reader-visitor-viewer-listener. There was no middleman. Today, many have entered the mix. Stopping just short of violating copyrights, aggregators create collections of content, providing a different search and see experience. As long as they have their search engine optimisation in order, aggregators come up right on top in search results, sometimes far more than the sites that contain the original material. Now, curators who filter and select content are taking up where aggregators have left off. Take a look at the special way in which LinkedIn is aggregating-curating content on its LinkedIn Today. You Tube 5. Trending TopicsOnce it was publishers who controlled what ended up as news or was widely consumed. Today it's the crowd that decides what is trending and what isn't. And it isn't what you'd logically think should trend either. Recently, Rebecca Black, an American pop singer, put up a song called Friday on YouTube.Getting 2.7 million dislikes, the song nevertheless has 137 million views as it went wildly viral, gaining Black global much notoriety - or fame, whichever way you look at it. Content producers can no longer take distribution online for granted but have to figure out the science of how to make something trend. If the content doesn't "fly" on its own, they will need to push it forcefully into the social media flow.6. Content Meets AppsIn the past two years or so, apps have created magic with content. Quite apart from apps made and branded by content producers (most major newspapers and magazines have them) there are others like Flipboard, Feedly, Zite, and others that serve up content from multiple sources all dressed up in beautifully designed pages on tablets like the iPad. On smartphones too, there are apps for all sorts of content, from videos and podcasts to games and newspapers. Even apps for movies are beginning to be available. Content makers can't afford to ignore the reality of apps and will need to make sure they're right out there where more content than they realize will be consumed. In India, where smartphones are internet access for the first time for so many, it's all the more important to be part of the app world.7. Nothing Without InteractivityIn the early days of the web, interactivity was limited to a being able to click around and maybe get a pop up or picture for your troubles. Games and Flash and subsequent technologies took interactivity to another level. Today, with tablets, interactivity enters another phase of creativity. At a TED talk, Mike Mattas demonstrated the first full-length book for the iPad and iPhone, Al Gore's Our Choice. In this book, you can only pinch and zoom into pictures, you can pinch to fold and unfold sections, blow on the pressure-sensitive screen to make a windmill turn, see live infographics and get deeper and deeper into the content by touching elements. The software that makes this happen is up for use by anyone else who wants to. It's interactivity like this that is making users expect an experience, not just a visit to a static website.8. SharingHow to make content share-worthy and get it to go viral has become part of the necessary strategizing of distributing content online. Plopping it online and leaving it to fend for itself isn't going to cut it anymore. People spend time and effort thinking of what their communities will want to share (as opposed to read or view without necessarily sharing) and they package content to maximize the chances of sharing, whether that's through Retweets on Twitter or posts on |Facebook, updates on LinkedIn, or anywhere else including plain old email. Much effort also goes into apps to make it easy, if not outright pleasurable, to share content with others.break-page-break9. Social ObjectsAs if it weren't enough, content producers also have to create social objects of or around their content. Anything put out there must generate engagement and interaction. This is quite apart from pressing the Like button or even sharing the content. Meaningful discussion must combine with that to bring it up a notch. This isn't easy to do and writers, film-makers and others are constantly seeking new ways of sparking off conversations around their content. The content has to become the reason people are coming together at that moment. In effect, content can't be thought of without community engagement opportunities today. Linked in 10. Recommendations MatterThe frantic race to get people to Like content has kept many social media marketing teams busy. The point of it all may not always be clear or fruitful, but the number of Likes and Recommendations has become a yardstick for content quality. Not to be left out in the cold, Google recently began rolling out their equivalent of the Like button, called Plus 1. On the professional front, LinkedIn upped its use of recommendations to move beyond personal testimonials for individuals to endorsements for companies and products. The whole business of liking and recommending has spread through the internet to become a part of the basic fabric of everything you do.11. Instantly MeasurableTimes were when you could remain blissfully unaware of what people really think of your writing, videos, photos or songs. And then maybe a couple of people would tell you and you'd hear what you want to hear. If you went about it more scientifically, you would have to wait for audience surveys, focus groups and ratings to yield their results. Today everything is instantly measurable. At least, if it's linked in some way to social networking and not sealed off in a time-warped silo somewhere online. There are numerous tools to measure how content is faring online and these are not in the hands of experts. A URL shortener like Bit.ly will give you enough statistics - in real time. This means it's tough to get away with putting out content that interests no one.12. AccountabilityIt's no longer enough to claim expertise and years of experience. The landscape online is a transparent one and it makes it essential to prove your expertise in your chosen field. For those producing content it means not assuming no one else can do it; not being complacent with mere presence or giving away too little. If you have ideas, concepts to convey, you need to back them up with specifics and with background content. Twitter 13. InfluenceIt's an age of influence online. That much we're sure of. Ever since Twitter began growing into an "information network" where writers and others point to their work, one could see that some develop huge communities who follow, interact and spread the message - while others remain low key. Analytical tools give you influence scores, and some companies are even beginning to reward people with high social influence. See Klout as an example. For those pushing their content online, the moral of the story is that you need to be an influence in your field and you need to know how to develop and tap into other influencers. In India, as we know, politicians have recognized the importance of online influence and you'll find the most unlikely individuals have jumped into social networking, gathering themselves quite a sizeable following.14. No PrivacyOne of the fallouts of consuming and sharing content online is that the entire privacy landscape has changed. Very soon, our definition of a concept that was once fairly straightforward, too will adjust to the changes. Suffice is to say that whatever content you consume is increasingly visible to your network of friends and contacts and this is a fact that has to be managed carefully. For content producers, the onus is to create content with which people want to be associated. Another challenge that touches on privacy is the fluid boundaries online between the personal and professional. Developing and maintaining a persona or brand calls for being several steps ahead of changes you have to stay alert to predict.15. Four Screens, No WaitingSmartphones and tablets add to computers and televisions to demand new, varied formats that go beyond optimisation and must provide a worthwhile experience. If an app just gets you to click to go to a website, users will soon move on from it. If an internet-enabled television makes it difficult for you to get to content easily, viewers will lose patience with it. The long and short of it is that users want their favourite content everywhere, on all their devices, in real time. On these four devices - smartphones, computers, tablets and television - consumption patterns have also changed in that users may want to either use a device in a focused way or multitask and consume on several devices at the same time.Social media may have brought about sweeping changes to content and communication but it is still very much in flux. Changes are fast and furious as new technologies and devices come up. Already though, publishers' digital audiences are beginning to match their print and broadcast audiences and just recently, at Amazon, e-books outpaced paperback sales. According to Neilson, television-watching just went down 2 per cent because of the shift to digital media. Anyone in any content industry must not only be thinking digital but must get ahead of the curve in all of the aspects of the changing face of content.Mala Bhargava is a personal technology writer and media professional. Contact her at mala@pobox.com and @malabhargava on Twitter
Read More
Soumitra Dutta, a researcher of Global Innovation Index report, a Roland Berger Chaired Professor of Business and Technology, Dean of External Relations, and faculty director of e-lab at INSEAD, has done his PhD in computer science and MSC in business administration. He was in India recently to release the CII-INSEAD Global Innovation Index (GII) Report. Dutta spoke to BW Online's Poonam Kumar on the reason behind India's poor performance in the GII report and what makes INSEAD a preferred destination for management students. Excerpts. India has slipped 11 places down from its previous rank in the GII? What is the reason, according to you? And what can we do to improve our ranking?It is important to keep in mind that these rankings are relative rankings. Thus while India has improved in absolute terms as compared to last year, it has slipped in relative ranks. This is an indication that India needs to accelerate the pace of change in some key areas such as infrastructure, education, administrative burden of regulation etc. Due to a variety of political issues, I think that the pace of change has been slower in the past few years than what was desired. Now that India has weathered the crisis better than many other economies, it is time for India to move forward with speed and confidence. The small countries topped the GII this year, whereas, biggies such as the US, the UK and Germany slipped from their previous ranks (ranked among top 10 last year). Your comments.Small countries such as Scandinavian nations and Singapore typically do tend to do well in many international rankings. This is not just because they are small – note that there are many other smaller nations which do not make the top 10 list. However, the smaller countries which do come in the top do share some common strengths such as good leadership, a clean and efficient environment, a culture of investment in people and good infrastructure. It could be argued that they often find it easier to make changes and implement new policies given the small sizes of their countries and/or populations. Larger nations often have a harder time to implement changes and one possible reason for the drop of some of the larger countries could be the recession which has hit them harder than many of the smaller nations now at the top of the ranking. Now that the economy is picking up, what kind of impact do you see on admission for the executive programme of INSEAD.B-schools have two markets: one is the MBA market and the other is the executive education market. The MBA market is usually counter-sector market. What we expect is when the economy picks up MBA applications will decrease slightly because last two years it increased dramatically – 25 per cent per year or more. And the executive education market is more cyclical and that market has decreased with the economic slowdown. But now we expect that market would pick-up. What is the USP of executive programme? And what are the criteria to join the E-MBA programme at INSEAD?The USP of the executive programme is that you have to keep on learning. The lifecycle of knowledge is about two years, so every two years, half your knowledge gets outdated. So, if you look at any executive today in an organisation they have to keep on learning. Let us take an example of web 2.0. For most of the executives, it's a very new thing. The only way they can learn about how the companies can use web 2.0 is by enrolling into executive programmes and learning from professors and other people in the classroom. In turn, the students could even learn about what works in other countries or in some other company. For executive MBA, we typically take people who have been very successful and did not have the time to do an MBA earlier. These are people who are in their late 30s and want to do an MBA to develop their skills but didn't have the chance or ability to do it earlier. What is the percentage of Indian students' and other countries at INSEAD?The highest proportion of applications comes from Indian students. We have a policy in which we limit the number of student for any one country, does not matter which country, to 10 per cent. The three biggest nationality groups on campus are Indian, American and French. We have a policy of increasing diversity in the classroom. Tell us about INSEAD's future plans?We are a global school. We have the campus in Singapore and we are expanding in Asia to Singapore. We will be doing more in India with Indian companies. We are setting up our new campus in Abu-Dhabi. For companies and individuals, how important is innovation in the current scenario?Innovation can be defined as the leverage of new ideas to create value in economic or social terms. The world has become more flat and competition is global. Innovation is the only option for countries that wish to continuously improve their competitiveness and develop their societies. Societies around the world also face common problems such as energy, climate and the environment. Again, innovation is the only way forward to find solutions to these common problems. Your book Throwing Sheep In The Boardroom: How Online Social Networking Will Transform Your Life, Work and World (2008) focuses on Web 2.0. With tools such as advanced social networking functions and smarter, personalised web services we are going beyond Web 2.0. Are the ideas mentioned in the book relevant in the present context as well?Well, the web 2.0 world is not yet well understood and I would hesitate to say that we are stepping into a web 3.0 world. It is not very useful in my view to make sharp distinctions between specific phases such as 2.0 and 3.0 as I believe that this is all one continuous process. In many ways, the seeds of what we today see as the web 2.0 world were sown 40 years ago at the inception of the Internet. When the internet was designed, it was designed as a real time shared system with open standards and with intelligence distributed to the edges. These design choices have today become a reality for many individuals and businesses around the world with the maturation of key underlying enabling technologies (such as broadband to the home or office) and have created the world we call today as web 2.0. The changes are as much or more in changing habits and behaviors as in technology progress. These changes continue and our actions today (such as attempts to provide universal broadband access) will influence and shape our world tomorrow. Whether we call it web 3.0 or something else really does not matter, in my view. What are the new teaching methods used at INSEAD?All processes in INSEAD are tightly integrated – we do not manage our Europe, Asia and Middle East campuses as three separate independent entities. Students join INSEAD as an institution, begin their studies on any campus they like and migrate at their own will to another campus. Faculty members choose to live and work on any campus and the management structure is uniform across the three campuses – such as one Dean, one department chairman, one MBA admissions office, etc. INSEAD also uses video conferencing extensively to integrate the campuses – it is interestingly the single biggest (one location) user of video conferencing in both France and Singapore. Technology supports our strategy at INSEAD and keeps us at the forefront of innovation. poonam(dot)kumar(at)abp(dot)in
Read More
Collaborative innovation will be key for success in the future. Corporate leaders realise that they need to work collaboratively with their business partners, customers and governments to innovate successfully for the future. Innovation ecosystems that span across public and private sectors and extend to include citizens and societies have to be formed. Collaborative innovation is the name of the game for future success.In one of the most comprehensive studies ever conducted on collaborative innovation, eLab@INSEAD, in collaboration with Logica, surveyed two hundred CxO level business leaders from blue-chip organisations from both the public and private sectors across the world, about their views on collaborative innovation. The research (available on http://elab.insead.edu) shows that, although they claim to grant high priority to collaborative innovation, most companies are handicapped by low levels of innovation readiness.The research reveals that while collaborating with external partners is an important enabler of innovation, executing such partnerships is difficult. This is akin to winning three-legged races. It is a game of balancing cooperation and competition while focusing on winning. Around the world, organisations are struggling to identify the best strategies and approaches to 'win together'.The culture of sharing, of risk taking and of working with diverse partners, employees and goals are all aspects that touch on successful innovation, and in particular, collaborative innovation. Complementing cultures can be a strength, however, cultural mismatches are frequently the stumbling block in designing effective collaborative innovation.This research shows that organisations need an effective innovation 'multi-culture' where different aspects of an organisation's behaviour are combined in varying proportions, depending on the stage of the innovation process. For example, diversity of experience and background is more valuable in the idea generation phase, whereas common goals and working styles may be more important in the execution phase.Effective implementation involves directing resources appropriately to ensure that competing priorities are resolved effectively. Getting the balance between innovation and managing the day-to-day demands of the business is one of the greatest challenges respondents experienced.Collaborative innovation does not succeed in a vacuum. Leadership has to create a fertile foundation for collaboration and innovation to thrive. Just saying 'innovation is important' does not make it so. Simply setting up an innovation function, and allocating money to it, does not create innovation. Innovation has to move beyond the hype and be grounded in the reality of the organisation. It is time for leaders to step up and meet the innovation challenge head-on.The author is the Roland Berger Chaired Professor of Business and Technology at INSEAD, France. He has authored several books on technology, policy and innovation. He can be reached at: soumitra dot dutta at insead dot edu
Read More
We are living in special times. After a long wait the world is getting truly connected. Globally, nearly 5 billion people are connected via mobile phones. China's mobile penetration is expected to reach 100 per cent within the next five years. India is not far behind with already more than a third of its population connected through the mobile network. Large parts of Africa are also moving up the mobile adoption curve rapidly. Indeed the world has suddenly become closer.The near ubiquitous presence of mobile technology is having a powerful impact on the lives of people in emerging markets. It has enabled new connections to be formed and old links to be renewed. For example, mobile calls are often made by the poor in rural villages to their richer relatives in cities for the transfer of funds. Mobile telephony has enabled new forms of entrepreneurship amongst the rural populace. Witness the success of Grameen Phone in Bangladesh in which women are creating businesses to sell communication services through a mobile phone stand. It has also stimulated the creation of innovative applications to improve the quality of life for farmers. For example, Nano Ganesh (the emerging markets innovation award winner from Nokia in 2009) is a simple mobile-based application in India used by farmers to switch on remote irrigation equipment for their fields.A similar phenomenon is also taking place in developed countries. The increased availability of 3G has improved the richness of communications and data access possible through mobile telephones. Witness the range of applications available on the Apple iPhone platform. In about a year's time, more than 150,000 iPhone applications are now available for a variety of personal and business needs. These innovations are not being designed by large software houses, but are rather being driven by individuals. A similar phenomenon is taking place in other social computing platforms. More than a million developers and entrepreneurs from 180 countries have created over 400,000 active applications on Facebook within a year's time.While these innovations improve the quality of life for many, it is interesting to note that they are not generally driven by high technology research. Most are driven by a deep understanding of local customer and contextual needs and the liberation of the creativity of the individual.It is not just technology that is becoming ubiquitous in society. A new force of innovation is becoming pervasive in society. A social culture of innovation is emerging and ubiquitous technology is driving this.The author is the Roland Berger Chaired Professor of Business and Technology at INSEAD, France. He has authored several books on technology, policy and innovation. He can be reached at: soumitra dot dutta at insead dot edu
Read More
I was recently invited as a speaker in the Google customer event in Paris. The discussion was all about cloud computing.Speaker after speaker, both from Google and other enterprises, extolled the virtues of cloud computing. It was argued that the time for cloud computing has come. The Internet has matured to a point that connectivity in technology and business processes has become natural and easy to do. The digital generation has arrived in the workplace and are demanding the same friendly communication and coordination tools at work as what they have got used to in their private life. Small businesses in particular do not have the capabilities to nurture in-house IT departments - for them cloud computing represents the best hope of leveraging technology for efficiency and business innovation.To make things more challenging, we are in the midst of a data explosion that shows no signs of slowing. Google's experts estimate that every two days we are generating as much data as what created in the world till 2003 since the start of recorded history. How else can companies continue their investments in the hardware and computing power to store and process all this data, without resorting to cloud computing for help?Then there was a show of hands. Less than a third of the assembled group of more than 300 CIOs and technology leaders from across the world gave a positive answer. Why is this the case?For one, there are serious concerns about security. Most firms are still very cautious about the security of their data and applications when they are moved on the cloud. Legal issues, especially in Europe and Asia complicate the storage and transfer of many data types across national boundaries. The response? Google and other cloud experts acknowledged this concern but highlighted the tremendous investments they are making into building sophisticated security processes into their cloud solutions. The point was argued that being open in the cloud architecture may actually lead to a more secure computing environment for firms.Also, most firms are reluctant to move their core business applications onto the cloud. In many cases, such as for ERP systems, they are tied to the cloud transition plans of the software vendors. Google and other experts acknowledged that firms need not move their core applications onto the cloud now. This could progress in phases over the years as the software packages themselves became cloud friendly. However, the major source of productivity improvements in firms today comes from improving the way people communicate and collaborate. Cloud computing is difficult to beat on these dimensions and should not be ignored.After a day of debates and discussions, I came away convinced that cloud computing is here to stay. However, I could also see that many CIOs are not yet convinced. It is time to change. It is time to start living in the cloud!The author is the Roland Berger Chaired Professor of Business and Technology at INSEAD, France. He has authored several books on technology, policy and innovation. He can be reached at: soumitra dot dutta at insead dot eduComments on this note can be sent to: mail at soumitradutta dot com
Read More
Two important questions were posed to me the other day, "Are you born innovative? Or do you learn to be innovative"?Stop for a minute and reflect on how you would answer the above. On which side would you lean? And don't answer with "it depends" - that is not an option here!Actually, the question is not that difficult to answer. Just look at a typical four year old around you. What kind of behaviour does a four-year- old typically exhibit? She constantly observes the environment. She never gets tired of asking questions. She is not fearful of making mistakes. She never hesitates to try out different experiments and is comfortable making mistakes, learning and trying once again. Remember how she learned to walk? By constantly trying and never giving up!If you reflect on the above behaviors of a four-year-old child these are very much the behavioural traits that we associate with innovative people. So the first part of the question is quite easy to answer: people are indeed born innovative!This is good news because it shows that we all have a lot of potential to innovate. However, frequently we deplore the fact that people in our organizations are not innovative enough. Why does this happen?There are two major reasons in my view. One, our schools and universities do a poor job in stimulating innovative thinking. Most schools and universities around the world are still geared towards rote learning and memorisation in a model which assumes that "teacher knows best and role of student is to replicate what the teacher writes on the board". Few schools encourage out of the box thinking amongst students.Two, organisations are designed for efficiency of execution and not for learning via bold experimentation. Firms are focused to get groups of people to execute on processes efficiently and reliably. Incremental innovations are fine but there is little room for radical ideas that may throw the whole organisational design into question! How else can you explain why an outsider - Apple - has completely transformed the music industry?So to answer to the second question, it is not about learning innovative habits. Rather it is a question of unlearning bad habits that block innovation! We all have the DNA for innovation within us. We just need the courage and a supportive organisational environment to go back to our childhood behaviour! Well, at least for some part of the day, every day!The author is the Roland Berger Chaired Professor of Business and Technology at INSEAD, France. He has authored several books on technology, policy and innovation. He can be reached at: soumitra dot dutta at insead dot eduComments on this note can be sent to: mail at soumitradutta dot com
Read More
