“An innovation interface might be the key to corporate success over the next few decades”, told by Soumitra Bhat to Economic Times, Ascent (New Delhi/Patna, September 22).

Soumitra is a graduate of the prestigious Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Guwahati. He is an innovation specialist, interaction designer, inventor, researcher and an accomplished musician based in Mumbai and the founder of UserINNOV – a specialist product innovation and design consulting company. He is the inventor of ‘TouchTone’ – an electronic musical instrument for children with cerebral palsy. He has been a visiting lecturer in various professional education schools of design and management. He is SLP Mumbai Fellow 2015-16.
 

Soumitra says, “Over the next decade, companies will increasingly find innovation from sources outside their own boundaries. In this scenario, the single most important asset that a company will possess is an ‘innovation interface’.

Amidst accelerated technology advancement, rapidly changing consumer preferences and behaviours, and mounting pressure from new-generation PESTLE forces, every company of every scale is looking to win the innovation game. An executive palette for winning the innovation game typically features the usual suspects: technology upgrades, business transformation, hiring ‘innovation leaders’, and creating a culture of innovation.

However, over the last decade, a different source of innovation has gained prominence – ‘innovation through acquisition’. The M&A behaviour typical of the FMCG and high-tech industries, has been percolating down to the so-called, less volatile sectors. The truth is that volatility is the new normal. Innovation through acquisition allows companies to absorb highly innovative, validated ideas, updated technology solutions, entrepreneurial people, and a culture of innovation from successful start-ups in one neat package.

A company looking at innovation acquisition needs to be sensitive towards the context and mechanisms of how start-ups operate, so that it can align strategy, incentives, and processes to effectively collaborate for success. Instead of waiting for the serendipitous introduction to an attractive early-stage company as a potential acquisition, companies can be strategic about this and build an innovation interface that increases deal-flow along this channel. For companies new to this, these are five basic building blocks of such an interface.” Read about the five basic building blocks here.