"Never before in history has innovation offered promise of so much to so many in so short a time.” - Bill Gates

Open Innovation on the cheap, Joel West
Joel discusses some reactions to Kellogg's site: Kellogg's Great Ideas - Submit Your Idea or Innovation.  Interesting idea and I agree with most of what Joel mentions.  I think the idea would be great (or should I say gr-r-reat)  on an intranet or inter company basis ... might even bring in some of the partners in your distribution chain to submit the ideas...

Does DARPA Still Spur U.S. Innovation?, Congress Daily
This is a short entry on a briefing with Dr. Erica Fuchs: ITIF Breakfast Forum: Does DARPA Still Effectively Spur U.S. Technologicl Innovation? in Washington DC earlier today.  You can download the slides.  A great quote from the  short entry:

"We never state it publicly, but ...I want to fund the those companies that will put Intel out of business.  I'm not interested in driving Moore's Law."

ReSource Pro Launches Insurance Industry Innovation Effort October Innovation Summit will create a vision of the Best Insurance Agency 2015, 1888PressRelease
The title is what got me interested in this press release (though I didn't know who ReSource Pro was).  Turns out ReSource Pro is working with futurethink (an innovation consulting firm) to drive some incremental innovation.  There are many quotes that ring true to me, such as:

Too often, insurance industry executives feel they can’t innovate because they are handcuffed by industry regulations,...

An interesting quote that describes what they are thinking about:

In order to envision the insurance industry in 2015, participants will be divided into teams to explore a number of questions, including:
· What skills will employees need to have?
· What will the key competitive differentiator be in 2015?
· What will drive value?
· What will continue to require a human touch (and can’t be automated)?
· What would have to change to achieve a 50% increase in operating margins?

I wonder why they picked 2015 and not something closer?... Related link: futurethink's site, futurethink's blog: futurethinktank

The innovation paradox, Jeffrey Phillips
This is an interesting entry.  It discusses how innovation needs creativity and freedom to exist but also needs organizational structure (resources and budget) to continue existing ... though the organizational structure (and processes) don't help foster an innovative environment - I think talented and respected leadership can make up (and shield) a lot of the negatives while selling the bureaucracy on innovation's positive points.  An interesting quote from the entry:

To innovate, you've got to do things differently. This includes how you generate ideas and how you manage the ideas, as well as the way your innovation team works within the existing corporate framework. If your innovation team is forced to work within a culture and process that is not innovative, then your innovation team will not be innovative either.

The Option Portfolio for Innovation Projects, Graham
This entry discusses a way to visualize innovation (or R&D) projects by their degree of Market Uncertainty and Technical Uncertainty.  The differing levels are captured in the following groupings:

• Incremental Improvement
• New Platform
• Positioning Option
• Stepping-Stone Option
• Scouting Option

The entry then detail what each of these grouping mean and how they can relate to a company's innovation strategy.

Other Notes

For those in the northwest US, I found this today on Oregon State's site: Undergraduate Research, Innovation, Scholarship and Creativity (URISC) Winter/Spring 2008-09.  Proposals deadline is November 3, 2008.