Two recent experiences have left us contemplating the importance of customer service, how this can make or break the quality of the experience a person has with a company, and how service will change in a digital, connected age.
The first was at the timber cutting point in B&Q, the second was in a bike shop.
Add comment | April 15th, 2009
One GM on the left, one on the right
What a difference six months can make. GM is going from Escalade to two-wheeler in no time. Segway and General Motors just announced the self-balancing Personal Urban Mobility and Accessibility Project (P.U.M.A.).
Is this a serious step in the right, austere direction, or just a desperate publicity stunt from a near bankrupt manufacturing dinosaur?
We think there’s serious mileage in these ideas, crazy as they may seem.
Add comment | April 7th, 2009
Natural evolution and the today’s most exciting innovations have a lot in common.
Flickr, Google Maps, Twitter. All of these blockbuster internet services have been subjected to mash-ups, meaning their core functionality was embedded or cross-bred with other internet services. Examples are plenty, such as the Queen’s Corgi Tracker (does what it says on the tin) or the World Volcano Browser. Going into more real world examples, a Google Maps and Twitter mash up is allowing for real time, real world meetings between Tweeters. Twitter feeds are localised on the tmeet.me map, allowing Tweeters to go and continue their tweeting in the real world.
And now an increasing number of Mash-Up businesses are making money too.
Add comment | April 3rd, 2009
The last Innovation Forum organised by Nico Macdonald and hosted by Sense Worldwide gave us the chance to discuss idea driven conferences and, specifically, report back on the fabulous LIFT 09 in Geneva that we enjoyed very much.
Add comment | April 2nd, 2009
This post is a response to Nico Macdonald’s Innovation Forum, and the upcoming theme: Beyond the Crisis: Debating the role of innovation
The roots of the current crunch are crystal clear: Consumers running amok with borrowed money, banks on a risky lending spree and governments all around the world who didnt dare to spoil the party.
Now that fresh debt has finally dried up, and the free markets subsequently going into seizure, Governments are hastily turning to good old Keynesian Stimulation. Many economists believe that this will automatically lead to wasteful support of zombie-industries.
Or will it?
2 comments | February 28th, 2009
Universities all across the world are leading the change to a new culture of work, a culture that aims at more creativity and effectiveness in solving business problems and innovating the future. As nextD in New York states, it is not enough to pick the right disciplines to foster successful innovation. Companies have to carefully tune the interaction between key roles: those of the Implementer, Optimizer, Generator and Conceptualiser in existing teams. IDEO’s John Kelley went into even more detail in his business bible “The Ten Faces of Innovation”. (more…)
Add comment | October 30th, 2008
Our clients come from very diverse backgrounds, but all share a common objective: rapidly turning emerging ideas into enjoyable prototypes, for evaluation, testing and decision making. Our projects are usually driven by people who hold strategic positions.
The end results come in a variety of formats and channels, but all are proposing new and exciting customer facing experiences.
Big Brands
Adidas, GER
Athens Olympic Committee, GR
Barclays Bank, UK
British Telecom, UK
Ittala Homeware, FI
ONE telecom, AU
Swedish Energy Authority, SE
Vodafone, SE [Telenor]
Vodafone, Global
YESlab, DE
Add comment | September 16th, 2008
Enter your password to view comments | September 4th, 2008
In uncertain times, companies focus on cost cutting and Research and Development spending is a usual target. However, the stock market rewards businesses which go against the flow and invest in R&D even in difficult times. This conclusion derives from the study “Do Innovations Really Pay Off? Total Stock Market Returns to Innovation”. The authors are Ashish Sood, assistant professor of marketing at Emory University, and Gerard J. Tellis, professor of marketing at the University of Southern California.
The study suggests that, on average, the shares of a company with R&D investment rise after the announcement of initiation of such projects. The increase materializes even though actual sales are not guaranteed and they just might happen in several years time. Obviously, stock prices drop if an R&D project does not prove fruitful. However, it is crucial to realize that the market prefers to see cost cutting happening elsewhere in a company, rather than R&D spending.
Posted by Solon
Add comment | September 3rd, 2008
This summer Barbican Art Gallery showcases the work of Dutch fashion designers Viktor & Rolf.
This is the first time in the United Kingdom that an exhibition has been devoted to this highly influential duo. Over the past 15 years Viktor & Rolf have taken the fashion world by storm with their particular blend of cool irony and surreal beauty.
The House of Viktor & Rolf presents each of the designer’s signature pieces from 1992 to now, shown in a specially commissioned and characteristically theatrical installation that dominates the entire Gallery. Highlights include pieces fromAtomic Bomb, 1998–99, featuring dramatic mushroom cloud-like cushioned necklines and Russian Doll, 1999–2000, in which a single model was painstakingly dressed by Viktor & Rolf until she was gasping under 70 kilogrammes of exquisite haute couture. For the collection Bells, 2000-2001, models emerged from a smoke-filled space in clothes embroidered with hundreds of brass bells, so they were heard before they could be seen.
Drawing on the Dutch tradition of silver plating a baby’s first shoe as a keepsake, the climax of Viktor & Rolf’s Autumn/Winter collection of 2006–07, was a strapless wedding dress with a wide petticoated knee length skirt, silver plated, including even the bride’s bouquet.
Add comment | August 22nd, 2008
