Point: Test large-scale innovations for 1/20th the cost by using 3D simulations to prove viability and performance.

Story: Forty years ago, Georges Mougin got an idea: solve water shortages in drought-ridden countries by towing an iceberg over the sea to them. Floating icebergs are pure drinking water, but they slowly melt into seawater.  Why not harvest them before all that drinking water is lost?

The idea of towing an iceberg, however, seemed crazy.  When Mougin talked with scientists about the idea, objections abounded.  “Once you get north of the equator, you’ll have nothing but a rope at the end of your tow,” said Wilford Weeks of the U.S. Army Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory at a conference in 1977 when hearing of the idea.  Other questions were: how much power would it take to tow 100-million ton iceberg? What would be the environmental impact of it melting in equatorial waters once it was anchored at a coastal city?

Although Mougin was confident of the idea’s viability, he had no way to prove it. Despite securing the backing of a Saudi prince, Prince Mohammed al Faisal, the projected costs and unanswered questions proved insurmountable.  But Mougin continued working on the idea, doggedly amassing data on issues like ocean currents and learning how technologies from other industries, like those developed for off-shore oil drilling, could be tapped.

Mougin’s lucky break came in 2009, when he heard of Dassault Systemes‘ “Passion for Innovation” program.  Dassault Systemes sponsors the Passion for Innovation program as a philanthropic venture to give individuals or nonprofits free access to Dassault Systemes’ suite of products (CATIA, DELMIA, SIMULIA, ENOVIA, 3DVIA. SoildWorks, Exalead) as well as a team of Dassault Systemes engineers.

“We’ll help you and provide you with the modeling and simulation technologies that should demonstrate that your project is feasible,” said Cedric Simard, IceDream Project Director, Dassault Systemes.

Dassault Systemes worked with Mougin: “We used virtual and digital simulation technology to recreate a virtual world around the iceberg, taking into account real oceanographic and weather data to simulate the sea currents at several depth levels, as well as the wind, waves, and even the impact of the sun’s rays,” Simard said.

After using CATIA software to create an exact model of the iceberg, the team used Dymola for the complex simulation, factoring in issues like ocean temperatures that would affect melting en route as well as meteorological phenomena like wind. The team also used SIMULIA software to consider risks such as fracturing of the iceberg. Running these simulations enabled the team to test the concept for a fraction of the cost of building a prototype: $500,000 instead of $10 million.

The simulations proved that it’d be possible to tow a 7-million-ton berg with one tugboat, primarily relying on ocean currents and consuming only 4000 tons of fuel over the 140-day journey, Simard said. The berg would experience some melting (38%) but still provide enough drinking water for 20,000 people for one year.

“Mougin is a very passionate guy,” Simard said. “He’s 87 years old, and he’s been working on his project for forty years. Now thanks to the power of simulation and the digital world, he can see how his idea would work in reality.”

Action:

• Create mathematical models of large-scale innovations
• Ground the model in real-world conditions and environments with empirical data
• Estimate performance, costs, potential failure modes using advanced software
• Present a compelling graphical story of the innovation with 3D visualization.

Sources and Additional Information:

My video interview with Cedric Simard on CollaborativeInnovation.org

Ice Dream Project

“Dassault Puts Inventor’s ‘Ice Dream’ to 3D Simulation Test” by Beth Stackpole

“Iceberg Transport” by Lauren K. Wolf

Point: Rule-breaking products may require business model innovations.

Story: At BIF7, Alex Osterwalder told his story of breaking the rules when creating his book, Business Model Generation, now an international bestseller. Creating this book meant taking a lot of risks.

The current business model for business books is broken, Osterwalder said. There are too many books and too few readers. Every year, another 11,000 new business books pile on top the 250,000-space of competing titles. The average book sells only 250 copies per year. Worse, book sales are declining: a 12% drop from 2007 to 2009. If Osterwalder wanted to create a book on business models that people would love to buy,  he would need to innovate the business model for business book production and sales.

From the start, Osterwalder asked people what they hated about current business books. People said existing books were too fat with turgid prose but at the same time too light on substance. Second, people found the books impractical because they lacked useful “Monday morning” actions items. Finally, the books were too text-heavy, missing the richer, reinforcing learning experience of a text-and-graphics combination.

To address these problems, Osterwalder envisioned something more like a coffee-table book akin to architecture books, being simultaneously informative and beautiful.

Osterwalder also faced a business problem: no book publisher wanted to break the rules of traditional business books to publish his book. At the time, Osterwalder was an unknown author from Switzerland wanting to create a book with high production values, expensive color printing, and a very un-business-book approach. The only solution was self-publishing.

But, self-publishing wouldn’t be easy because Osterwalder had neither the cash, book production resources (editors, designers, etc.), marketing department, nor  distribution assets of a publishing house.

To solve the problem, Osterwalder recruited peers to co-create the book. Ultimately, 470 people contributed to the book in a wide variety of ways. People joined Osterwalder for early access to the ideas, to be part of something bigger, and for the stimulating collaborative process of working on the topic. Not only did this community of contributors help make the book, but they were also its best sales force.

To raise money, Osterwalder offered advanced sales under a “pay me now to reserve a copy” philosophy. Demand for the book proved higher than expected, so he raised the price from $24 to $36 to $54 to $81. And, just before publication, he offered a last-minute premium deal: for $250, the buyer would be listed in the book as a contributor who helped make it happen. For distribution, Osterwalder ultimately chose Fulfillment by Amazon.

The book quickly became a bestseller in business and in the top 100 of all books selling on Amazon. Osterwalder’s success in self-publishing attracted the attention of Wiley and other traditional publishers, who would never have taken a risk on Osterwalder’s book. “Once you’re successful, everyone wants in,” Osterwalder said. After tough negotiations, he signed with Wiley. To date, over 200,000 copies have sold and the book has been translated into 22 languages.

Action

• Listen to customers and partners to uncover why competitors fail.
• Look for lateral inspiration; that is, look for out-of-category products that evidence desirable characteristics.
• Pre-build customers through a co-creation community in advance of the product release.
• Play with the pricing and offering to maximize revenues and volume.
• Find service partners and community members to handle or support the critical secondary tasks of the business.

Point:  Use roving cross-functional teams to hunt for promising new product and service ideas.

Story:
In a world of large organizations and diverse global hotspots for R&D, innovation occurs everywhere.  Companies can tap those innovations through search processes, which may be cheaper and more effective than only using traditional “start from square one” R&D efforts.  The rationale: there may be no need to re-invent the wheel if the wheel already exists somewhere inside (or outside) your organization.

Here’s how multinationals General Mills and Whirlpool approached the search for innovations. General Mills formed two “innovation squads” consisting of six-to-eight employees selected from multiple functions. The squads are tasked with hunting for ideas from inside and outside the organization – one squad focuses on finding ideas internally, the other focuses on looking outside the organization.  The squads present the best ideas they’ve found to division heads. Once a quarter, the squads give their top 10 ideas to the company chairman.

For example, one squad found a patent for a new method of encapsulating calcium. The patent had been donated to a university. The squad converted it into a very successful new line of orange juice with added calcium that doesn’t taste chalky.

Similarly, Whirlpool designates some employees as innovation mentors – “i-mentors” – training them in innovation and tasking them with identifying promising new product ideas from across the organization. Whirlpool has 1000 i-mentors globally.  Most of the individuals self-identified and asked for the training, which consists of a formal training program that creates a common language for innovation and embeds innovation into an organizational competency the way Six Sigma training does. Whirlpool developed “how-to” guides for its innovators, including analysis of who has contact with whom [network analysis].

Action:

• Explicitly designate individuals or teams to look for innovations
• Provide innovation training to these cross-functional teams
• Cast a wide net when searching for good ideas
• Filter, refine, and present the best ideas for funding/implementation decisions

Sources:

“Unleashing Innovation,” Research-Technology Management, http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_6714/is_1_52/ai_n31337091/

Mason Carpenter and Sanjyot P. Dunung, “Harnessing the Engine of Global Innovation” in International Business, Flatworld Knowledge, August 2011 http://www.flatworldknowledge.com/pub/international-business/524265#web-524265

Jessie Scanlon, “How Whirlpool Puts New Ideas Through the Wringer,” http://www.businessweek.com/innovate/content/aug2009/id2009083_452757.ht

Peter Erickson, “Innovating on Innovation” Keynote Presentation at the Front End of Innovation Conference, Boston, MA, May 2009