Archive for publicity
Invisible Innovation: The Blindness of the West to China’s Innovation Story
Posted by: | CommentsMaybe China is just too far from the smug innovation circles of the West. Maybe language and cultural barriers make the events unfolding in China too inaccessible to Western media. Maybe decades of concern about IP theft from Chinese companies has closed the eyes of the West to present realities. Whatever the reason, the West today seems generally blind to the innovation powerhouse that China is becoming. Witness, for example, the highly publicized list from Reuters-Thompson of the top 100 global innovators, based on “patent activity.” With China having become one of the world’s true hotbeds of patent activity, not to mention economic impact with innovation in many fields, one might expect Chinese institutions to be well represented on the list. Incredibly, the list has ZERO Chinese entities on. None from Mainland China, none from Taiwan, and none from anywhere else in Asia except for a heavy dose of Japanese companies (27) and 4 from South Korea. Tiny Switzerland makes the list 3 times, and its minute neighbor, Liechtenstein, makes the list with Hilti Corporation. But zero from China and Taiwan? The list is related to “patent activity,” but its compilers wisely recognize that patent volume alone is a poor metric for innovation. Instead, they have created other metrics based on patent data:
The Thomson Reuters 2011 Top 100 Global Innovators are companies that invent on a significant scale; are working on developments which are acknowledged as innovative by patent offices across the world, and by their peers; and, whose inventions are so important that they seek global protection for them.
Sounds fair. So sure, the manufacturing and supply chain innovation that has been a big part of China’s economic rise are not expected to make a showing on this list. That kind of innovation doesn’t show up in terms of granted US and European patents. And the tendency for many Chinese companies to mostly file patents in China doesn’t help them with the methodology Thompson Reuters has, which looks for measures of international impact and international patents. But did they miss all the international activity of some Chinese companies? For example, a couple of days before this list of innovators came out, I posted this on LinkedIn and Twitter (@jefflindsay):
Two Chinese companies, ZTE and Huawei Tech., are among the top 5 international (PCT) patent applicants. Lots of IP here! http://is.gd/t2tUb4
OK, so Thompson Reuters doesn’t follow me, but these companies should have shown up strongly in their patent searches. These are innovative companies with products marketed internationally, having strong economic impact, and loads of patents. Being in the top 5 for international filings wasn’t good enough to even place in the top 100 for Thompson Reuters. Huh? OK, it turns out the ZTE’s surge in patent filings is recent and their numbers prior to 2010 were probably too low to make the cut for this study–that’s fair. But Huawei had 445 US patents from 2005 to 2010, a number in greater than some other companies on the list. For 2011, by the way, Huawei isn’t just in the top 5 so far–they are Number One, the world’s leader in international patent filings (see the Nov. 2011 article in the Vancouver Sun). Think they’ll be on the next list of leaders in patent activity Thompson Reuters publishes? Perhaps, who knows?
How about the Liechtenstein firm that’s in the Top 100, Hilti AG. Heard of them? They have good products for the construction and building maintenance industries such as hammer drills and other tools. They have 20,000 employees, including 2,500 in the US, and market products and file patents internationally. For the 2005-2010 time frame of the Thompson Reuters study, Hilti had 327 patents. Not bad. Well below Huawei’s score, but still respectable.
Now let’s consider a little company that was not on the list: Foxconn. Heard of them? They have over 1 million employees and are the world’s largest producer of electronic components, including circuit boards. They are the ones who actually make Apple’s products such as the iPhone and iPad. This Taiwanese/Chinese firm (China considers Taiwan to be part of China, and much of Foxconn’s work is in China) is arguably the real powerhouse behind the success of Apple and several other companies on the Thompson Reuters list. Foxconn builds Apple’s products, and not just as a mindless executor, but as an innovative partner.
Ah, but what about real technological innovation expressed in patents? Surely Foxconn is just about cheap labor and low cost manufacturing, right? A quick search of Foxconn patents granted in the US from 2005 to 2010 shows they have over 700 patents. Some are design patents, but the vast majority are technological. Foxconn apparently is conducting serious R&D and spending millions on patents to find new ways to make leading edge high-tech products better, safer, faster, and cooler (both in terms of heat management and the “wow” factor). I have the privilege of interacting with some Foxconn people and from what I’ve seen and heard I can say that they have a world-class IP program to support innovation, and I feel that they are way ahead of many Western companies in these areas. Foxconn innovation and Foxconn IP may be the real key to Apple’s success. Foxconn innovation is abundantly expressed in patents, not just trade secrets and know how, with an estate twice as big as Hilti’s over 2005-2010 and an economic impact on the global market far in excess of Hilti. But Foxconn doesn’t make the list. How do none of these Chinese companies break into Thompson Reuters’ Top 100? Did they miss the 2010 story, “China Poised to Become Global Innovation Leader,” based on patent activity? That must be from another source they don’t follow.
Nov. 24, 2011 Update: My search on Foxconn patents needs to be updated. Yes, Foxconn has an impressive 700+ US patents for the 2005-2010 period, more than some companies in the TR list. But my search was deficient, failing to consider that many Foxconn patents might have been filed under the real name of the company that owns Foxconn, Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Ltd. So I expanded my search term to be “Hon Hai Precision” or Foxconn. Now, instead of 700 patents, we’re looking at a massive estate of 5,872 US patents (perhaps a couple dozen more when typographical errors are considered). This estate now dwarfs MOST of the companies on the list such as Brother Industries (2873, searching for Brother Ind* or Brother Kogyo), BASF (2771, searching for BASF or Bayerische Akt*) Goodyear (1152), ABB (948), Airbus (926), Avaya (<600), Arkema (205), Cheil (116), etc. Oh, and what about innovation giant Apple Compute? A search for simply "Apple" (which might include some smaller companies unrelated to Apple Computer) returns 1809 issued US patents from 2005 to 2010, less than 1/3 of the US patent activity of the invisible innovator that makes Apple what it is.
Let’s return to Huawei for a moment. There should be little doubt about the innovation prowess of Huawei, even though they tend to be far more secretive and do much less P.R. than Apple. But this telecom company is big (with over 100,000 employees, they connect 1/3 of the world’s cell phones) and highly innovative. Read, for example, BBC’s story, “Innovation in China: Huawei – the secretive tech giant.” Maybe the Thompson Reuters methodology docks them for being on the young side. Over half of their 445 US patents from 2005 to 2010 came in 2010–but they still clearly outpace Hilti and others over the 5-year span of the study. So what gives? I suspect that the youthfulness of the estate means there has been less time for others to cite Huawei patents, and that may be part of the problem since patent citations are part of the methodology. But to miss Huawei completely?
Thompson Reuters will surely argue that their methodology was developed and implemented fairly, even blindly (a fair term), but someone should have immediately seen that something was wrong if top international filers and innovators like Huawei, and Foxconn didn’t make the list. But when it comes to innovation, innovation in China tends to be largely invisible to Americans, who are stuck in the old paradigm of US being the innovation leader and China just being a copier. That kind of blindness will catch the West by surprise in the very near future when US companies find themselves facing numerous patent barriers from the Chinese companies that will own much of the most valuable IP. China is creating and will create much of the most important global innovation for the future. Innovation needs to ramp up in the West in order to not be left completely behind.
Dec. 8 Update: Chinese computer giant Lenovo, the world’s 2nd largest producers of personal computers, may also deserve to be on the list.
Related stories:
- IAM Blog: “The US, Japan and France dominate new listing of the world’s most innovative companies“
- Nielsen.com: “Nielsen China Forum: Dispelling the Myths of Innovation in China“
- China Law Blog: “Innovation In China. It’s Happening, But Not How You Think“
- Tech Crunch: “Thomson Reuters Names ‘Top 100 Global Innovators’“
Industrial Research Institute Provides New Review of Conquering Innovation Fatigue
Posted by: | CommentsA new review of Conquering Innovation Fatigue was just published on the website of the Industrial Research Institute (IRIweb.org). The review is written by Robert J. Kumpf, the Chairman of IRI’s Board of Directors and the Chief Administrative Officer of Bayer Material Science, LLC. Here is an excerpt–see the IRI website for the full review.
The authors of Conquering Innovation Fatigue immediately captured my sympathy with the observation that “Few things make creative people wearier than empty talk about innovation.” Although it is encouraging that the topic of “innovation” is increasingly seen as important, the downside is that many “experts” are simply recycling well-known concepts. Jeffrey Lindsay, Cheryl Perkins and Mukund Karanjikar are experienced practitioners who offer useful insights into the personal, organizational, and societal challenges an innovator must overcome.
The authors structure their discussion around nine different “fatigue factors” that they group broadly into three classes: people fatigue, organization-level fatigue, and external fatigue. People fatigue factors describe elements that lead to fatigue in individual innovators, including:
- Theft of the invention and exploitation of inventors
- Innovator deficiencies (e.g., unreasonable expectations, impatience, unhealthy pride).
- The NIH syndrome (“Not Invented Here”)
Organization-level fatigue arises from the company’s strategy, culture, and actions, and includes:
- Breaking the will to share (loss of cooperation from the innovation community)
- Fundamental flaws in decision making and vision
- Open innovation fatigue (corporate barriers to external innovation and collaboration)
External fatigue originates with factors external to the individual innovator and to the organization, including:
- Patent pain: barriers to intellectual property protection.
- Regulatory pain: challenges in policy, regulation, and law.
- University-industry barriers.
The book offers some compelling examples of innovation from the prolific inventor with an unforgettable name—Philo T. Farnsworth. Although the story of Farnsworth and RCA is generally well known, the details are worth recalling. The authors build on the Farnsworth story to examine the issues around innovation fatigue in individuals.
The strongest parts of the book, however, are those chapters that examine innovation fatigue factors that are tied to organizations. These chapters—which also include examples from the touring company of The Lion King—offer the most important lesson in the book: “Employees can be paid to offer their time and energy to the corporation but in spite of what might be on a contract, they will only share their best ideas when they feel personally motivated to do so.” This fact is at the core of the challenge that many organizations face. It is expressed in phrases like “if only ____ knew what ____ knew” (fill in the blanks with your company or organization). These chapters are well worth reading and rereading….
Full review: go to the bottom of the page at http://www.iriweb.org/Public_Site/RTM/Volume_54_Year_2011/September-October2011/Information_Resources.aspx”
The BP Oil Disaster in the Gulf: Innovation Fatigue in Full Force
Posted by: | Comments
Spill Cam View
The problem in large organizations, and the US federal government is pretty much the world’s largest, is that numerous entities have their own turf and their own advancement in mind, and without special efforts being taken will naturally work in ways that cause conflict and delay. Leaders must carefully work to align these interests and incentives toward organizational objectives, but this can be almost impossible when an organization gets out of control. Adding a new committee or bureaucracy in addition to everything else will rarely be the most effective path forward. Meanwhile, those who may have the answer and want to bring their expertise to the table find themselves discouraged, worn down, ignored, and ultimately punished for their passion to innovate and help. Welcome to organizational innovation fatigue, and welcome to the Gulf Coast disaster.
Several voices have discussed the need for innovation in dealing with the disastrous oil leak in the Gulf Coast. There are so many intriguing opportunities for technology–oil absorbent materials, new chemistries for dispersing or attacking the oil, controlled burnoffs, skimming and oil collection systems, barrier technologies to keep the oil away, materials that coagulate oil, and a host of proposed technical solutions for addressing the root cause and stopping the leak. Many of the proposals should be considered and tried. This is not the time for bureaucracy. This is not the time for the government to be shutting down efforts with its bureaucracy. If the Coast Guard is worried about inadequate fire extinguishers, round up a batch and take them over to the relief effort to help, not hinder the State of Louisiana as it tries to protect itself. But what the Coast Guard did in this case is akin to what happens thousands of times each day in companies and government around the world, contributing to the innovation fatigue that stymies much needed efforts at innovation and progress.
The V16 Separator of Ocean Therapy Solutions
Kudos to Kevin and his team! He certainly has an advantage with his name recognition and extensive networks–without that, he may have been viewed as just another voice in the wind claiming to have something. There are others with technologies and potential solutions. May they also find their way to make a difference. May all the innovation fatigue factors remain far from Kevin Costner and all others seeking to bring something new to help us fix the Gulf Coast disaster.
BusinessWeek’s Summer Picks Include Conquering Innovation Fatigue (#10 of 20)
Posted by: | Comments
One of BusinessWeek's top picks for summer reading.
BusinessWeek has just come out with a list of their top twenty recommended reads among innovation and design books for the summer. We’re excited to report that Conquering Innovation Fatigue made the list and sits in the #10 slot. Thank you, BusinessWeek!
The Featured Book at InnovationCoach.com!
Posted by: | CommentsI’m happy to announce that Conquering Innovation Fatigue has been honored by being selected as the “Featured Book” at InnovationCoach.com. Thank you! Innovation Coach is the brain child of Robert Brands, former CEO of AirSpray (a company with cool dispensing systems such as their famous innovation of soap pumps that dispense foam) until they were acquired by Rexam. Robert is a terrific innovator who has held high positions in other companies such as Kohler and Rexam. Robert is working on a book on innovation called Robert’s Rules of Innovation which I hope to see in print by the end of this year.