Travels in Technology and Innovation

Cracking the App Store Ranking Algorithm

2010-07-26T17:13:00.003-05:00

It has been way too long since I posted to the blog. I'll blame that on startup work and twitter. Up next I'm working on a blog post on the awesome wire framing tool Balsamiq. Until then, check out this great presentation from Romain Perrier on marketing your iPhone application.

Cracking the App store ranking algorithm

View more presentations from Romain PERRIER.

Tech Shopping with Mom

2009-06-23T15:40:00.006-05:00

My Mom, like most moms, is not very tech savvy. A few months ago she mentioned to me that she wanted a new laptop. I live hundreds of miles away, so the best I could do was send her a few links based on what features she told me were important to her. A month or so later she mentioned that she bought a new Dell XPS Laptop from QVC. If you're a tech person or a deal hunter you can imagine my surprise when I found out she bought a laptop from a home shopping channel. However, I quickly realized that QVC was the easiest, least threatening purchasing choice for her. Unfortunately, when the laptop showed up she was unhappy with the weight and the glossy screen.

She returned her laptop to QVC and asked me to help her pick a new one out when she came to visit San Francisco. After some obligatory sightseeing we went over to Best Buy to pick out a new laptop. Upon arriving in Best Buy we proceeded to check out the numerous laptop and netbook brands they carry, including Dell, Apple, HP, Acer, and Sony. We quickly discovered that almost all of the laptops today have high gloss screens. These are great for watching movies but not so good for working in bright sunlight. Further, older individuals like my Mom have an especially hard time with the screen glare. We asked the friendly sales associate if they carried anti-glare screen covers that we could sample. He kindly referred us to Office Max.

With our choice severely limited, we decided to evaluate the Macs more closely. Their screens were still glossy but not nearly as pronounced as some of the other brands. She quickly became enamored with the MacBook Air which offered everything she wanted. Notable selling points included the built-in webcam, lack of viruses, light weight, backlit keys, and general ease of use. Although her previous laptop ran XP, she was facing the challenge of learning a new OS on both Mac or PC (Vista).

After settling on a MacBook Air we headed over to the GPS and digital camera sections where our frustrations were repeated. These products, like almost all tech products, are not designed for simplicity or use by older people. For example, the leading digital cameras either have microscopic buttons or touch screens with complex menus. They pack in features while increasing complexity. The cameras with simple menus or large buttons are all low-end models with poor picture quality.

Finally, we went home empty handed to continue our research online and look for the best deals on the models we liked. With my assistance she was able to get some great deals online at Newegg and the Apple store. Her MacBook Air came refurbished from Apple for $999 and her Fuji FinePix came with an accessory bundle from Newegg.com.

Our experience was stressful, typical, and somewhat enlightening. Once again, I realized that there is a vest unaddressed market for user-friendly technology products. The Baby Boomer generation may not have grown up in a high tech world but they have disposable income and a desire to stay connected to their children and grandchildren. Technology companies, software companies and retailers need do a better job of designing and marketing their products to this audience. If you need a tech gift for Mom (or Dad) check out my approved list below.

Tech Products for Older Folks
Digital Camera: FUJIFILM FinePix - large rubbery buttons, a sliding lens cover, and bright colors make this camera a great choice.
Computer: MacBook Air - Light and easy to use with a built in webcam and iChat to remotely trouble shoot for mom.
GPS: TomTom 340 - Simple menus and large icons for easy use.
Computer Service/Training: Apple One to One - Get going on your new Mac for $99.

Best of SF New Tech 6/17

2009-06-19T12:28:00.009-05:00

For the last few months I've been a regular attendee at numerous Bay Area tech events. SF New Tech is hands down one of the best events for the companies featured, the format, and the networking. With so many great companies presenting I've decided to highlight the best companies each month.

The June 17th New Tech, "Widgets up the Wazoo," included Clearspring, Gigya, Sprout, Sellit, Adgregrate Markets, Toobla, & Transpond. All of these companies had interesting technologies but the two that impressed me most were Transpond (B2B) and Toobla (B2C).

Toobla is esentially a rich media version of Delicious. The site lets you bookmark any content from the web and organize it into folders that can be embeded on other sites. The visual nature of the bookmarks makes them perfect for sharing through social media or on your blog. Toobla also makes it much easier to share things like video playlists or sets of documents from sites like Slideshare, VisualCV, and Sribd. The company did a nice demo at New Tech but unfortunately since they are still in private beta I haven't had a chance to really test their site out. They will be slowly opening up the site over the next few weeks so sign up with your email or check back regularly.

The most impressive B2B company of the night was Transpond (formerly iWidget). The company provides a platform that facilitates the easy creation & publication of applications. They integrate with social media sites like Facebook, MySpace, Yahoo Connected TV as well as moible platforms including the Palm Pre. Their new platform update is drop dead simple and their flat rate pricing will keep your budget happy.

For more coverage on the night check out today's WSJ article. SF New Tech broadcasts live on Justin.tv so if you can't make it to the next event you can always tune in online.

An iPhone App for the Unemployed

2009-05-02T12:59:00.007-05:00

We all know that unemployment is at its highest level in decades. For many people this means cutting back on unnecessary expenses like eating out, that deluxe cable package, or new tech toys. But what about that $80+ iPhone bill? There isn't too much you can do about that, right? You've got to take that hour long phone interview, call in to an audio conference, or network with former colleagues. If your cell phone is your only phone, job hunting can quickly drive up your bill. Although you may be stuck with your iPhone (for better or worse), there are a few ways to keep your bill in check.

This week I've been using an iPhone app called talkfree (iTunes), which goes through your phone address book and identifies all your contacts who are also on AT&T. This is great because now you know who you can call without burning through your daytime minutes. The app adds (in) next to the contact name, making it easy to surf your address book and figure out who to call next.

Obviously, talkfree will be useful for many people, and at $0.99 you can't beat the price. However, for people that are currently unemployed talkfree will give you the piece of mind you need to waste the day catching up with friends (or networking with former coleagues).

So Many San Francisco Tech Events

2009-04-23T00:18:00.007-05:00

Things have been busy lately- very busy. Since moving from Boston in August, I've been immersing myself in the SF tech community. Although Boston has some great events (like Mobile Monday), it seems like SF has about 10 times the number of events. Over the last few weeks I've been to SF New Tech, Web 2.0 Expo, and Startup Weekend. In addition, there are are another half dozen events that made it on to my schedule. Whether you're job hunting or just looking to get involved in the tech community, here are my best of San Francisco tech events.

SF New Tech
This is consistently one of the best tech events in the Bay Area. From the venue, to the format, to the attendees, everything about this event is great. It is usually held once a month at Mighty in Potrero Hill. Presentations are 5 minutes with an additional 5 minutes of questions, and plenty of time for networking before and after. Even if you're not in the area you can watch the live stream through the website. The last SF New Tech featured Twittfilter, AdCause, and Pixelpipe among others.

Startup Weekend
This international event brings together developers, business people, and "cooks" who want to pitch their ideas, build a team, and work on a project over the course of a weekend. At the recent Startup Weekend SF over 150 people show up and worked on 23 different projects (including my own cheap parking mobile app). About 80% of the teams had a product to demo by the end of the weekend and many of them are currently moving forward with their projects. For a great recap of the weekend check out this blog pos t.

Plug and Play Tech Center
PnP is a tech incubator that has three locations around the Bay Area. The events they hold at the Sunnyvale location are a great place to meet people working on early stage startups. The guys who run PnP have their pulse on the VC community and help tech entrepreneurs understand how to found and grow their companies. Check out their monthly event calendar here.

If you're interested in keeping up to date on t the latest events check out this great newsletter. Also, feel free to let me know what interesting events I've left off.

Women Over 55 Discover Facebook

2009-02-15T18:41:00.005-05:00

The other day I came across an interesting article highlighting the explosive growth of Facebook users over 35. This trend is especially interesting in the 55+ demographic and it mirrors my recent experience.

To my surprise, about a month ago my Mother-In-Law began talking about getting on Facebook. Now that all of her children and grandchildren were on Facebook, she felt left out. Why hadn't she hadn't seen that great picture her family was talking about? Why was she the last to know about a fun day of sledding?

The situation got me thinking about how under served this demographic is on the internet and with technology in general. A few companies have tried to cater to them, but nobody seems to have hit the winning formula. Examples that come to mind include Eons, Web TV, and Jitter Bug.

Now that the network effects of Facebook (and other technologies) are so strong, older users are ready to sign up as well. There is an opportunity to modify these existing sites & technologies to better cater to this group. For example, why not a scaled down Facebook with larger text specifically for older people? My Mother-In-Law doesn't care about 95% of the applications and isn't tech savvy enough to sort through them. However, she does want to see family pictures, maybe get status updates, or remember everyone's birthdays. How about streaming Facebook photo albums to her digital picture frame?

One of the more interesting stories I've heard about older Americans on the web was from a digital entertainment conference at the MIT Media Lab. The presenter, who worked at an MMO gaming company, described how older players (55+) were joining the game as priest characters. They weren't really interested in the fighting aspect of the game but they enjoyed interacting in the virtual world. This was especially true for retired people or people with limited mobility.

Many older American's have the money and are more than willing to spend it to stay up to date with their family; However, the technology has not been modified or marketed to them. Why not market the iPhone to grandparents? They would love the ability to see the latest photos, use Loopt to keep track of grandchildren, or utilize the GPS to get directions. With a little help on the setup I'd say the iPhone is easier to use than most cell phones.

No doubt creating technology for older Americans can be a risky proposition. However, over the next few years I hope to see some websites that cater to my aging parents and make it easier for me to share my digital life with them.

iPhone Billing Problems

2009-02-02T14:09:00.003-05:00

You should have seen my face on Christmas day when I unwrapped my new iPhone 3G. I spent the next couple weeks glued to the screen getting it set up just the way I wanted it. One such customization was to change the number that had been assigned to me to a new phone number. I made sure not to activate the default number and went to the At&t store on December 27th to get the new number set up.

After a month of blissful usage my problems began about a week ago. I got a bill from At&t for the number I had never used. When I called customer service the agent gave me a bit of a hard time until I pointed out there was no usage for the number so clearly it wasn't active. Then I got an SMS saying that I had racked up a big text bill. I called to straighten that out and the agent discovered that my request for the 200 text plan had never gone through. Today I logged in to my At&t account to find a bill for $1,269 which had auto charged to my credit card. Apparently, when they changed my number they didn't set it up on the iPhone data plan, which is odd because the agent didn't mention that when she added my text plan.

I think the interesting thing is that my iPhone bill was well over $1,000 for one month of data usage at $.01 per kb. When I was using the MediaNet plan for my old phone I didn't have a sense for how much heavy mobile internet usage would cost me so I just went with the unlimited plan. Of course, it is so much easier to use the iPhone data but I it just goes to show that At&t has decided to set up their pricing so that the unlimited plan (text and data) is really the only practical option.

After over 45 minutes of talking to customer service and a $1,200 credit card charge it would have been nice if they threw me a few extra minutes for free. All the agents were friendly enough but considering I'm accruing interest on my card it would have been nice to get a little compensation. A few years back when I was on T-Mobile they would always give some extra minutes if you had a major customer service issue.

25 Years of Steve Jobs

2009-01-25T18:58:00.004-05:00

Check out this great video from the archives. Classic Steve Jobs from 1984.

Boston Mobile Investment

2009-01-15T16:35:00.005-05:00

Along with the list of Boston area mobile startups, Xconomy (a great site covering Boston and Seattle startups) also posted an analysis of the total mobile investment which has been steadily growing. Interestingly, the 2008 investments were fairly steady despite economic issues.

"MoMoBoston didn’t detect any dropoff in mobile investment as 2008 progressed: the total of $562 million was invested in fairly even chunks across the four quarters, with a slight spike in the second quarter...With over half of a billion dollars invested in 2008 and 180 very diverse companies operating locally, Boston has quietly developed into the worldwide hub of mobile and wireless.”

Boston Mobile Companies

2009-01-15T14:23:00.004-05:00

Xconomy, with the help of Mobile Monday, just posted a list of all the mobile startups in the Boston area. It is pretty cool to see Boston gaining a reputation in the mobile community. Some of the more notable statups include Skyhook, uLocate, and JumpTap. Here is the full list.

Mapping in the Web 2.0 World

2009-01-12T20:06:00.003-05:00

As part of my MBA internship I had the opportunity to research mapping and location based technologies like wifi, GPS, UWB, and cell tower triangulation. Through the combination of these technologies there is an opportunity to guide people from the outdoors through an indoor environment to their destination.

My internship project work focused on thinking about how people navigate large indoor spaces like casinos or malls. It seems like almost everyone who has been to Las Vegas has spent a significant amount of time trying to find their way out of a casino or just trying to find what you're looking for in the casino. Although GPS is continuing to make headway as a location based technology outdoors, an indoor solution is still lacking (despite that fact that the technology exists). Further, most mapping / navigation applications continue to think of search in a 2D world rather than in the full context of the user's space, time, and situation. By combining customer information from a loyalty program (or other data source), time, and location there is an opportunity to drive behavior. I belive that this will be the future of search and location technologies.

I hope to post some of my location based services (LBS) research soon. Until then check out the video archive from the Web 2.0 Mapping and Social Networks meetup group. The group meets regularly in Mountain View, CA. Also, if you want to check out some cool ultra-wideband technology Ubisense has an interesting solution. It is a bit cost prohibitive right now but when used in conjunction with other lower cost technologies it has great potential.

Nike+ Interview

2008-12-11T14:49:00.008-05:00

In addition to being into tech, one of my other passions is running. One of the things that has helped to keep me motivated in is my Nike+ Sport Band. For $60 I can track my routes, pace, and mileage. The thing I love about it is that it is totally easy to use and has a great user interface.

Nike has built in some basic social networking features but has yet to realize the full potential of the platform. With their powerful brand and full line of athletic products they have the ability to be a dominant player in the online fitness space. Currently, the Nike+ site doesn't have many features beyond just tracking runs. I'd love to see them add things like shoe tracking, a gear wishlist, 3rd party race results, etc. These features would let them learn more about me as a customer and drive my purchases through targeted incentives.

Check out this BusinessWeek article and video on Nike+ as well as some commentary from MarketingProfs Daily Fix.

BU Tech Strategy Presentation

2008-12-09T15:36:00.003-05:00

I'm finally getting around to posting some of my work to Slideshare. Below is my team's winning presentation from the 2007 Boston University Tech Strategy Case Competition. Each team had 24 hours to address the subject, “What is the best way for Motorola to win in seamless delivery of media and entertainment?” We recommended that Motorola leverage their position in the set-top box market to enable a P2P media delivery system. Check out the presentation. I'd love to hear your comments.

Motorola's Strategy for Media Distribution

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: box set-top)

Harrah's Innovation

2008-12-09T15:28:00.003-05:00

Last year I had the opportunity to be part of Harrah's newly formed Innovation Team. We were working on some cool projects including the Microsoft Surface, location based services, and mobile applications.

"The best way to fast-track a promising innovation, he says, is to operate it as an independent venture, separate from the tethers of everyday business processes. That often means running an innovation project on separate IT systems to avoid mingling experimental data with business operations." Tim Stanley, CIO & Chief Innovation Officer

Check out this InformationWeek article on the innovation process at Harrah's.

Mobile Start-Up Presentation

2008-12-02T12:52:00.003-05:00

Slideshare is a great site for all kinds of useful information (once you sort through the junk). Check out the mobile presentation I recently found. Also, you can find a number of my presentations there.

The Mobile Start-Up Ecosystem - Rudy De Waele

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: socialmedia startup)

2nd Annual Open Web Awards

2008-11-11T14:49:00.004-05:00

Check out the 2nd Annual Open Web Awards and vote for Rearden Commerce and all your other favorite companies. You can nominate and vote for companies in 26 different categories.

Update: The 2008 winners have been announced and can be found here. Some of my personal favorites from the list include Gyminee, Evernote, and Doodle. Be sure to check out all the rest of the winners and finalists.

Tech and the financial crisis

2008-11-07T11:48:00.003-05:00

Check out this presentation by Mary Meeker from the Web 2.0 Summit. She talks about some of the causes of the financial crisis and the outlook for tech. The video of the presentation is available on TechCrunch.

Mary Meeker Web 2.0 Presentation

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: web 2.0)

Ready For Any Weather

2008-10-03T11:54:00.010-05:00

It seems that this week everyone is talking about how an economic downturn will effect Silicon Valley. Case in point, today's NY Times article titled, "Credit Crisis Spreads a Pall Over Silicon Valley." I'll leave the financial health of Apple or Google up to the experts and say that Rearden Commerce is still growing like crazy. With a $100 million in fundraising this year, Rearden was recently cited by TechCrunch as one of the firms ready to weather a downturn.

Even more important than Rearden's $100 million is a business model with multiple revenue streams and a product that gives companies a platform to capture and reduce their business expenses. In tough economic times the impetus to manage employee spending only gets stronger. The dramatic growth of Rearden's customer and supplier base is a perfect testament to this. Additionally, Rearden's upcoming entry into the consumer market through a partnership with Chase (pdf) will further solidify the company's position as one of the tech companies ready to weather and even thrive in this tough economic climate.

Update 1/30/09: Despite Rearden's war chest and strong customer growth the comapny hasn't been imune to significant layoffs. In November the company had to layoff over 10% of their employees, including the majority of the marketing department, in an effort to reduce costs. Oddly, the compay is now reporting that they are hiring aggressivly including increasing R&D spending by 20%.

An Open Platform for Mobile Application Development

2008-05-19T21:34:00.005-05:00

As my MBA experience comes to an end it seems like a good time to post some of the project work I've done over the last two years. One of my main areas of focus has been mobile technology. This semester I took a class called Winning in Technology Markets which used System Dynamics as a framework for tech strategy. My team project was an evaluation of an open platform strategy for the Japanese cell phone company NTT DoCoMo. Here is our presentation deck. If I get the chance I will also post the full analysis.

View Upload your own

Yahoo's New Fire Eagle

2008-05-11T21:48:00.006-05:00

Tom Coates of Yahoo's Brickhouse announcing Fire Eagle, their new location sharing service. The promise of location based services take one more step forward.

The Future of Mobile

2008-04-08T22:31:00.005-05:00

The BU Tech Strategy Case competition is now a few weeks past but I haven't been able to stop thinking about my team's proposal. We proposed a new platform based business model for Vodafone with Ericsson (competition sponsor) as a strategic partner. Unfortunately, we didn't make it beyond the first round (more details later).

I sat in on the presentations of the four finalists. For the most part these presentations were high level type consulting reports that advocated moving to a mobile broadband world. It was disappointing to realize that the competition sponsors just weren't ready for an innovative idea like ours. On the upside I'm starting to realize that I'm not alone in feeling this way. Check out this great blog post and discussion from one of my favorite blogs, Telco 2.o. To quote from that post:

Then you have to ask: “Don’t we need a new business model here, in parallel with the 4G technical developments?” The answer is of course, yes, and we explained why to NGMN.org in detail over a year ago on this blog. But, of course, we’ve had a deafening silence from the tecchies about this (“Not
our problem!”).

Sloan First Round Presentation

2008-03-30T10:32:00.003-05:00

Dehli's Presentation
Originally uploaded by Boston University Tech Strategy Case Competition.

After an hour of sleep we were the first team of the day to present to the judges. We got off to a slow start but warmed up as we went through the presentation.

BU Tech Strategy Case Competition

2008-03-17T15:58:00.003-05:00

It is just about time for Boston University's annual tech strategy case competition. This year 16 teams from around the world will be competing for the top prize of $25,000 sponsored by Ericsson. Last year I participated in the competition and was fortunate enough to be on the winning MIT Sloan team. As the only first-year student on that team I had the opportunity to put this year's team together. We've got a great team and will hopefully come home with enough money to hold me over until I find a job.

The competition goes from March 27 - 29th and you follow the action on the official competition blog. Check back here to see if Sloan was able to pull off a repeat victory.

Pandora at Sloan

2008-03-02T20:20:00.006-05:00

I want to say thanks to Tim Westergren, Co-founder of Pandora for speaking at Sloan this past Wednesday. Tim gave a great talk on the founding of Pandora, the future of the music industry, and the Music Genome project.

One of the most interesting aspects of Tim's talk was his explanation of Pandora as part of the music discovery process. Because Pandora uses over 400 objective criteria to rate each song, the music discovery process is not driven by the latest fad or ratings that trend toward the mean. Pandora spends between 15 - 45 min rating each song. In addition over 70% of their music is not on a major label. For my money Pandora clearly has nailed one piece of music discovery on the internet. Ultimately they still need to dramatically improve the ease of purchase. Tim mentioned that many of their artists are not on iTunes or Amazon.

For the first three weeks of Pandora's life the company attempted a subscription model. When this was a dismal failure they moved to a free service. Currently, Pandora is supported by ads and a revenue sharing agreement with merchants like Amazon.com. Next time you want to buy a CD (or other item), help Pandora out by clicking through their site.

Pandora recently sent me an email with some tips for improving my station:

Want to create a station with a very specific sound? Consider giving a thumbs up to a song only when you like (almost) every aspect of a song, because each thumbs up will add more songs to your station, perhaps in a range that is wider than you had hoped.
Thumbs down has a less dramatic impact than thumbs up – it simply bans that song from that station, so consider using it liberally for any song you don’t like, or for a song that just doesn’t ‘fit’ on that station.

MIT Sloan Books

2008-02-14T22:49:00.006-05:00

During my time I Sloan I have had the opportunity to work with some great professors and researchers. I just wanted to highlight some of the books they have written.

My CISR Research Advisor, George Westerman, recently released a new book called IT Risk. One reviewer put it nicely when he said it is the first IT risk book that didn't put him to sleep. George and his CISR colleagues do great work. Please check out his new book.

I am also working as a teaching assistant for Professor Tom Malone. His book, The Future of Work, has some great insights on the organizational changes that are happening due to the reduction in communication costs.

Outsourcing and Innovation

2008-02-14T21:56:00.004-05:00

The CISR research project I have been working on for the last year, "Building an Environment for Innovation," is in the process of finishing up. My last case study for the project is focused on vendor innovation. Our research has found the vendor innovation and outsourcing should not be lumped together. Managed right vendor driven innovation can be an important piece of an innovation portfolio. This research will be available to CISR sponsors this spring. Until then the quotes from a recent CIO Magazine article do a good job of summing things up:

Indeed, most outsourcing SLAs and pricing models deter innovation. Take data center management. It’s the outsourcer’s responsibility to ensure 99.99 percent uptime or provide backup services. “The value add would be when the service provider looks at the environment and says, Now I understand how you support your business and I see that by leveraging this new technology or different hardware, we can improve the quality of the service or your costs,” says Taylor of Fluor, which is on its fourth major outsourcing contract since the mid-1990s. “But you’re paying the vendor X dollars per server so there’s no motivation for them to reduce that number.”
Fluor signed a new contract with IBM last year. “The lesson we learned was that we needed to put a more generic umbrella agreement in place for future innovation,” says Taylor. “There are specific towers of service in the scope of work that are commoditized. But there is also a separate agreement that will enable IBM to provide innovation in all kinds of areas, like virtualization.” The contract includes prenegotiated terms for future innovation around issues of indemnity, risk and intellectual property protection. “If we want to have IBM explore virtual desktops, there’s already a fabric in place. We don’t have to call the lawyers and go through a full negotiation each time,” explains Taylor. “And it’s separate from the rest of the outsourcing, so IBM doesn’t need to get reimbursed through the fees we pay for the commodity activity.” Now Fluor can increase and decrease services from IBM without penalty. “It’s important not to lock yourself in because you don’t get the benefit of innovations that present themselves every day,” Taylor says.

Grand Central Problems

2008-02-14T17:52:00.005-05:00

I've been using Google's voicemail service Grand Central since September. The service lets you aggregate all your phone numbers (home, work, cell, etc) under one master number. When somebody calls you the service routes the call (or screens it) based on your preferences. It is a great concept that has a few bugs.

First, in an age where everyone has caller ID on their cell phones or at work, people get very confused when you call them back on a different number. Then the next time they call you they call back the other number and not your Grand Central number. For whatever reason, people just can't deal with the concept of a number with no home (i.e. the Grand Central number).

Second, all of the call routing preferences are based on your phonebook. However, Grand Central's importing tool is very clumsy and does not de dupe.

Finally, as of late Grand Central is unreliable. Now I know this is only a beta product but you just can't mess with people's messages. On Feb 4th Grand Central lost stored contacts and voicemails. Today is Feb 14th and the voicemails still haven't been restored. Unfortunately for me, I'm in the middle of search for a job and I can't listen to any of the messages that were left for me in the last 10 days. Needless to say I'm not very happy about this.

Grand Central has had a few other high profile problems. Check out this post from Tech Crunch.

Innovation and Productivity

2007-10-14T10:29:00.000-05:00

In my work on innovation one topic that frequently arises is the definition of innovation. Innovation is not the same as invention. In contrast, innovation includes both value creation and value capture. This means that innovation is just as likely to be a service as a product or technology. In addition, innovation has a direct link on the economy in a way that invention does not necessarily have. The Economist's recent article & interview with Vijay Vaitheeswaran does a good job of covering these concepts.

John Patrick at MIT

2007-09-27T09:49:00.000-05:00

Last week internet pioneer John Patrick came to speak to my Technology Driven Business Change class. John worked at IBM for over 30 years and helped guide IBM through the internet revolution. In addition, the class is taught by Irving Wladawsky-Berger who headed IBM's internet division. Together John & Irving have some great experiences and stories about the challenges IBM faced. Rather than relay them all I'll just say that you should check out Lou Gerstner's book "Who Says Elephants Can't Dance?" Also, John's slides are posted on his blog.

Check out John's blog and post about his experience at MIT and Irving's technology leadership blog.

Grand Central

2007-09-24T22:21:00.000-05:00

I just got my invite to beta test Grand Central. I stumbled upon this company when I was doing research this summer and about a week later they were purchased by Google. The technology aggregates up to six phone numbers. When a contact calls, Grand Central can be set to ring to specific numbers. Additionally, each contact can receive a custom greeting, voicemail can be checked online, and calls can be blocked. This service is great for people who are constantly checking multiple voicemail boxes. If you have a desk phone, mobile phone, home phone, etc this is worth checking out. Now that they are owned by Google I'm sure we can expect some exciting new features. Also, check out the recent Wall Street Journal article for another review.

Back to School - Week 4

2007-09-24T22:08:00.000-05:00

This semester has been unbelievably busy. I thought second year would be fairly relaxing but as it turns out I'm working just as hard as my first semester of business school. Although, this year most of my workload is self-induced.

One of my classes this semester is through the MediaLab at MIT. The class is called Digital Innovations and we are researching how cell phones can be used to spark economic development in Costa Rica. In the coming weeks you'll probably see lots of mobile tech postings from me. My group is especially interested in how cell phones can be used to enable carpooling. We believe that a good, cell phone enabled system could significantly increase productivity and quality of life by reducing daily travel times. The BTIS system in India has a great start on solving this problem as well as the related traffic issues. In addition, today's Wall Street Journal had an interesting article on phones in India.

Back to School

2007-08-30T21:39:00.000-05:00

It is hard to believe that the summer is over and school is starting back up again. For my summer internship I was back at Harrah's Entertainment working on their IT Innovation team. Before I cronicle my summer or launch into new topics I want to cover a few things from the end of the school year.

I want to thank Michael (MJ) Sikorsky, CEO of Cambrian House for coming to speak to Tom Malone's class. MJ is one of the most well read people I met and he is full of passion for what he does. Cambrian House is working hard to build an engaged community. MJ and I had an interesting discussion on perdictive markets versus a head to head competion format.

I also want to congradulate Harpreet Marwaha, MIT Sloan class of 2007, on his new startup AudioDizer.

There are about a million other things I need to highlight but given my recent track record of posts I think I'll start with this.

PBwiki

2007-04-25T10:54:00.000-05:00

As you probably know business school is all about group projects. Given that I've done a fair amount of research on Web 2.0 topics I figured I should put my money where my mouth is. I've been using PBwiki for many of my class projects. I haven't tried many of the competing products but PBwiki was easier to uses the the other ones I checked out. One of the features that I like is that you can set it up to email you when there are changes to the page. This means that you don't have to constantly check to see if your group members have made changes. In addition, they are offering ad-free wikis for educational purposes.

The company has been adding features since their recent round of fundraising.

I'd love to hear what other collaboration tools you have been using. The field of solutions seems to be growing more crowded everyday.

YouTube for PowerPoint

2007-04-18T19:31:00.000-05:00

Last fall when I was doing some research on Web 2.0 trends I found a site called SlideShare. The site lets people upload their PowerPoint presentations and share them in much the same way as YouTube. For hot topics like Web 2.0 it was another great place to look for information but I became a bit frustrated when I realized that you could not download the presentations. Since then I've gone back one or two times but found that the site had become cluttered with less factual and more entertaining presentations. Now it looks like they are trying to drum up some new traffic and have added the ability to download the presentations (given the owner's consent). They are currently running a contest for the best slide show. Check out their site and feel free to vote for my entry.

MIT Sloan Places 3rd in Red Hat Challenge

2007-04-13T13:25:00.000-05:00

I have to give a plug to my fellow Sloanies who recently placed 3rd in the first Red Hat Challenge. Teams had the opportunity to compete for $20,000 by tacking a real-world business challenge for Red Hat. There was a great turnout for the competition with over 343 teams from 143 schools. Congrats to the Sloan team, Jon Krafcik, Glenn Wilson, Donna Pitteri, and Eric Cheung. The four of them are also competing in the McKinsey Business Technology Challenge which kicks off tonight.

Banking's Most Innovative CIO

2007-04-10T16:09:00.000-05:00

As you may know I used to work for a research and consulting firm focusing on financial services technology. Most of my clients were banks and vendors to banks. I get many of the trade emails and I thought this one might be of interest:

Bank Systems & Technology is accepting nominations for September 2007 "Innovative CIOs" issue. The person must be a senior technology executive at a bank (CIO, CTO, EVP or VP in charge of a line of business technology, such as e-business strategy, customer solutions, etc.). Keep in mind that bankers can be from non-U.S.-based institutions as well.

Your role in nominating potential candidates will be completely confidential. This year's nominees will be honored at the Bank Systems & Technology Executive Summit, to be held Sept. 23-26 at the Royal Palms Resort and Spa in Phoenix. Please provide the following information on your nominee (as much data as you can provide will be helpful):
Nominee's name, Title, Bank name, Contact information (if possible)

Tell us in just a few sentences why you think this person should be included in BS&T's 2007 Innovative CIOs feature. Deadline for nominations is Friday, June 1, 2007. E-mail all submissions to mbritz@cmp.com with "CIO 2007" in the subject line.

What Can A Wiki Do?

2007-04-10T11:38:00.000-05:00

As I've mentioned before I am currently taking a class taught by Tom Malone focusing on how organizations will be designed in the future. Professor Malone is the head of the MIT Center for Collective Intelligence and one of the leaders of the We Are Smarter project. As one of our class assignments we were required to contribute to the book (check out my contribution in chapter II under innovation and invention). To be frank I am not sold on the idea of collective writing. Wikis are an excellent tool for short factual information such as Wikipedia or potentially things like employee handbooks. However, they are currently not well suited to writing that requires a narrative (for another example check out the wiki project at Penguin Publishing). For other types of writing the Helium model seems much more promising. Helium pays authors for submissions that the community finds valuable. They claim to have over 600,000 articles and 5,000 authors. I haven't spent much time on their site yet but it looks pretty interesting.

Clayton Christensen and Chet Huber at Sloan

2007-04-04T15:09:00.000-05:00

Clay Christensen and Chet Huber co-presented today on the topic of disruptive innovation and GM's OnStar. With Sloan's strong connection to the automotive industry, many students were there to hear from Chet while others were just interested in seeing Clay. Professor Christensen, who is well known for his books on innovation, is practically a celebrity around Cambridge. As it turns out both men were classmates at HBS.

I found the presentation to be interesting although much of Professor Christensen's talk was on material from his first book, Innovator's Dilemma. I was unfamiliar with the OnStar business which turned out to be fascinating. Chet recalled how the set up the OnStar business within GM while maintaining its independence. Little did they know that many of their strategies would align with Professor Christensen's future bestseller.

Later in the day I had the opportunity to join a small group of students for a Q&A with Professor Christensen. Here are a few thoughts from that discussion:
Think about the job the product is being hired for not the market segment/demographic it is being marketed to. Too many companies are missing the reasons people use specific products.
Financial analysis is ill suited to foster innovation. DCF, NPV, and shareholder maximization frequently lead to companies sticking with the status quo. The costs of setting up a new business will always look unattractive in comparison to the marginal costs associated with an existing business.
Competing down market requires speed to market and customization. These customers do not need more features they need a lower cost product that better serves their needs.
Christensen has a rapidly growing consulting practice to help other companies improve innovation. Check out there website for some good reading: http://www.innosight.com/

There is also a new article in the Sloan Management Review called "Finding the Right Job for Your Product."

Costa Rica to Boston

2007-04-01T20:06:00.000-05:00

Pardon my recent lack of posts. The last two weeks were Sloan SIP/spring break. I went down to Costa Rica with a group of students and had a great time. I highly recommend visiting. The Arenal region was especially beautiful.

The day after retuning I started the Boston University Tech Strategy Case Competition sponsored by Motorola. This is the second year of the competition. 11 teams of MBA students from around the world took part. They included IIM, Kellogg, Stanford, LBS, Seoul, and others. We were given 24 hours to put together a strategy for Motorola's entry into the digital contnet space. Our proposal focused on using internet enabled set-top boxes as a P2P network. With a bit of luck and a lot of hard work we came in first place earning the $25K prize. Check out the contest blog to learn all the gory details.

http://smgcasecomp.blogspot.com/

Business Innovation on CNBC

2007-03-17T11:18:00.000-05:00

CNBC has a new show called The Business of Innovation airing on Sundays at 9 PM PST/12 EST. I haven't seen the show yet but it looks like they have a good lineup of guests including the CEO of the NASDAQ, founder of Staples, CEO of eBay, and many others. The first two episodes are available for download as a podcast. Episode 2, Evolution to Revolution, featured Larry Huston, former VP of Innovation at P&G, discussing how companies need to realize that great ideas exist outside the walls of the firm.

Even the Economist wants to innovate

2007-03-17T11:03:00.000-05:00

It seems that The Economist magazine is on the hunt for innovative ideas. They have set up a website called Project Red Stripe. I'm not quite sure what to make of the site yet. At the very least it seems fairly like a fairly interesting read. A few people have made some sarcastic submissions and there may even have been some good ones. So far they have received at least 140 submissions. I'm not so sure that I'll be sending them my valuable ideas (assuming I had any) but then again they are offering a six month subscription to the magazine as compensation.

The Future of Work

2007-03-12T21:40:00.000-05:00

I'm currently taking an organizational design class with Professor Tom Malone. The class focuses on what future organizations will look like. His book, "The Future of Work," makes the assertation that the reduction of communication costs has been the driving factor in the development of new organizations such as Wikipedia and InnoCentive. This is a speech he gave in 2005.

http://www.itconversations.com/shows/detail731.html

Clayton Christensen Speech

2007-03-12T21:29:00.000-05:00

Take a listen to Clayton Christensen's keynote speech at the at the 2004 Open Business Conference. It runs 1:48:43 but you can download the file and listen to it on your iPod later.

http://www.itconversations.com/shows/detail135.html

Customer Driven Innovation at Intuit

2007-03-11T21:50:00.000-05:00

When I think of innovation Intuit always comes to mind. Visiting the company headquarters this past January only reinforced things as I got to see some of their customer interview rooms and also hear from their Chairman and former CEO Bill Campbell. Their innovation is primarily focused on solving customer pain points. To do this they obsessively listen to customers and watch them use the product. If you are interested in trying out some of their new products and features check out their innovation website.

http://innovation.intuit.com/

Harrah's Entertainment & Innovation

2007-03-10T16:37:00.000-05:00

ZDNet has a great series of CIO videos. Recently they interviewd Tim Stanley, CIO of Harrah's Entertainment, on his new role as Chief Innovation Officer. As I've mentioned before, Harrah's is on the cutting edge of innovation in the gaming industry. They view innovation as a requirement for improving customer service. They are constantly looking to other industries to find new ideas and technology to improve the experience of the customers. Listen to the interview with Tim to hear more about the technologies they are looking at including mobile, RFID, etc.

http://video.zdnet.com/CIOSessions/?p=113

Building an Environment for Innovation

2007-03-06T19:35:00.000-05:00

This semester I am working as a research assistant on a project with the Center for Information Systems at MIT. The project is headed by CISR research scientist George Westerman. We will be writing a series of short vignettes on innovation as well as some full length case studies. Check out the CISR website for more information.

http://mitsloan.mit.edu/cisr/r-main.php#innovation

In this project we will explore how IT leaders exert the necessary pressure to develop an organizational capability to innovate. Specifically, we will study how leaders in innovative firms reshape IT management processes and organizational culture to enable innovation. We will address the following questions:

How can IT leaders successfully suggest and implement innovative uses of IT?

How do innovation processes differ across firms with different strategies and/or structures?

How do IT management processes need to change to improve IT innovation?

What are the elements of an innovative organizational culture?

Cool Mobile Apps

2007-02-27T14:58:00.000-05:00

Nokia is working on some new applications for mobile phones. Check out their site, http://www.widsets.com/. The application lets you add mobile widgets to your phone to track blogs, news feeds, online communities, etc. Currently it works with Flickr, Digg, Engadget, Meetup, Simply Hired, and many others.

While I was out in Vegas in January for CES I got to meet the co-founder of Soonr. The application lets you access any files and programs on your home computer through your phone. It also lets you designate shared files that others can access. The power of the application is that it can easily access programs like Skype or your Outlook over almost any phone. It could also be a great tool for sales people who need access to materials or want to share designated files with prospects. The company is backed by Intel Capital and the application is currently free. http://www.soonr.com/

Nokia at Sloan

2007-02-27T14:42:00.001-05:00

Today Taneli Ruda a Director of Strategic Projects for Nokia spoke at Sloan. Taneli focused on Nokia's view of internet enabled phones. He brought with him the N95, N800, N76, and N8801. Nokia believes that an increasing value of the cell phone will come from social networking applications, location based services, and mp3 functionality. As consumers get increased value from their cell phones Nokia hopes to see a higher average selling price. They believe that the iPhone will be good for their business as it will increase user adoption of higher priced mobile devices. Although I agree with this I wonder if Apple's good customer service and innovative designs will give them a big advantage over Nokia. If I'm going to buy a $500 - $800 phone you better believe that I want to know that I can get good support and repair. Check out some pics of the N95 (retail price $800) on Engadget:
http://www.engadget.com/2006/09/26/nokias-n95-smartphone-goes-legit/

Steve Wozniak at MIT

2007-02-26T00:10:00.000-05:00

Check out a great video of Steve Wozinak's visit to MIT last fall as part of his book tour for iWoz.

http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/400/

Meebo CEO at Sloan Today

2007-02-23T12:53:00.000-05:00

The MIT Innovation Club hosted Meebo CEO, Seth Sternberg, today. Meebo lets AOL IM, Yahoo, Google Talk, and MSN users chat directly through their browser without downloading any software. Corporate users who cannot download software will find this especially useful (at least until the page is blocked). Currently the site is getting about 80 million instant messages daily. They also just received $9 million in funding from Sequoia and Draper Fisher Jurvetson.

http://wwwl.meebo.com

MIT Deshpande Center IdeaStream

2007-02-21T23:00:00.000-05:00

The MIT Deshpande Ceneter will be holding their annual IdeaStream Symposium on April 12th 2007. This is an invite-only event that brings together venture capitalists, MIT researchers, and successful entrepreneurs. Focus areas include energy, health care, transportation, and communications. To get an invite you must submit your idea by March 1st, 2007.

http://web.mit.edu/deshpandecenter/ideastream2007/showcase.html

McKinsey Business Technology Case Competition

2007-02-21T21:41:00.000-05:00

Today McKinsey announced their first business technology case competition. For a chance at $10K you can bet I'll be signing up. This past fall I competed in the Darden Innovation Challenge which was a great chance to evaluate Web 2.0 trends for financial services. My team didn't end up in the top 3 but two other Sloan teams competed in the finals. Hopefully, this will be another good learning experience.

The McKinsey Business Technology Challenge invites teams of 3-5 MBAs from Berkeley Haas, Kellogg, MIT Sloan, University of Chicago GSB, and Wharton to show how a breakthrough technology could transform one of the world's leading
companies. On Friday, April 13th, we'll reveal the technologies and companies.
Your team will then have 48 hours to develop a plan for how one or more of the technologies can create extraordinary value. The incentive? $10,000 for the Campus Winners and an additional $20,000 for the team that wins the National Competition, to be judged in New York on April 20. Plus, the winning team will receive the first-ever McKinsey Business Technology Prize. Interested? Save the date: April 13. We'll be sending you further competition details, including registration information, on March 1.

InnoCentive Co-Founder at Sloan

2007-02-21T12:32:00.000-05:00

Yesterday the Co-Founder of InnoCentive, Alpheus Bingham, spoke to students in Tom Malone's Organizational Design class. The class focuses on innovative organizational designs and the future of work. InnoCentive is one of the companies demonstrating innovative organizational structures. The company was founded as a subsidiary of Eli Lilly and later spun off. They post scientific challenges in the areas of biology and chemistry and reward solvers with compensation between $10,000 and $100,000. They have posted roughly 400 - 500 challenges and over 25% have been solved.

InnoCentive is particularly interesting because it demonstrates a potential structure for the future of the knowledge economy. By outsourcing these problems companies have the ability to reduce the risk/expense associated with R&D. In addition, the InnoCentive network harnesses the power of the masses to tackle problems that have been unsolvable. InnoCentive will not replace R&D in organizations; however, it can reduce the expenditure on in house knowledge workers. As companies become more comfortable using this type of service we will hopefully see an increased rate of scientific breakthroughs at a reduced cost. Given their current success, the company is planning on expanding into other technical areas.

www.innocentive.com

Wharton Technology Conference

2007-02-20T23:30:00.000-05:00

Wharton is hosting a technology conference this Friday, February 23rd, focusing on monetizing innovation. Topics include clean technology, digital content, globalization in venture capital, e-fraud, and more. It looks like they have a good list of speakers including the CIO of FedEx Robert Carter, Keith Rabois VP of Business Development at LinkedIn, Marc Pecen VP of Advanced Technology at RIM, and Anil Vijendran Director of Mobile User Experience at Motorola.
http://www.whartontechconference.com/

MIT Sloan Tech Trek in Forbes.com

2007-02-19T23:22:00.000-05:00

While I was out in San Francisco I spoke with a reporter from Forbes Magazine about the types of jobs MBA's are looking for this year. Check out the full article in "Follow the Talent" by Elizabeth Corcoran:

In three days, the visitors from Boston enjoyed a whirlwind of introductions and sneak peeks. They talked with executives of fledgling start-ups and toured companies with market caps in the billions. They chatted with venture capitalists. And of course, they lunched at Google.
http://www.forbes.com/home/technology/2007/01/12/valley-mba-google-tech-cz_ec_0115valleyletter.html

Sony Customer Service

2007-02-19T17:59:00.000-05:00

I just have to take a second to rant on Sony customer service. Over the summer I purchased the Sony Light Blue Earphones, model number MDREX51LP. This is the second pair of these that I have purchased. For $40 they have decent sound and are comfortable for extended listening. However, they only last about six months before they stop working. This being the second time buying the earphones I decided to purchase the optional $10.99 two year replacement warranty.

When I called up the number listed on the warranty I was told that they don’t cover the product for the first year and so they would transfer me to Sony technical support. Sony technical support told me that they only cover the earphones for 90 days and I should call a different extended warranty number which just happened to be disconnected. Now I’ve called the original support number and the Sony number twice and spent 30 minutes on hold each time I’ve called. At this point I’d rather just go buy a new pair of earphones but I’m too stubborn to let them keep my $10.99. Thanks for nothing Sony. Can I have two hours of my life back?

New BlackBerry 8800 Announced

2007-02-18T23:49:00.000-05:00

MIT Sloan Innovation Club partner Research In Motion is set to launch their new BlackBerry 8800 on February 21st. The device will be available through the new AT&T and will be the first BlackBerry to have built-in GPS. In addition, the 8800 incorporates trackball navigation, a multimedia player, and Push To Talk. Members of the Innovation Club have been testing two different BlackBerry models for the past year. Unfortunately, I was not one of the chosen few but hopefully it was worth the wait and I will get my hands on one of the 8800s. Check out the RIM website for all the specs.

RIM Co-CEO and Founder, Mike Lazaridis spoke at Sloan last week as part of the Dean’s Innovative Leader Series. Members of the Innovation Club had the opportunity to have lunch with Mr. Lazaridis and hear more about the company’s current strategy. Check back soon for video of the speech.

Sloanies Trek to Silicon Valley, Seattle to Experience the Best of Tech, Networking - MITSloan News

2007-02-18T20:30:00.000-05:00

A great article by Jen Laio in the latest edition of Fifteen:

Sloanies Trek to Silicon Valley, Seattle to Experience the Best of Tech, Networking - MITSloan News

To kick-off 2007, Sloanies descended upon Silicon Valley and the Emerald City to get a taste of technology companies, start-ups, and the city's nightlife. The treks were hosted by the MIT Sloan MediaTech club, drawing almost 40 students to the Bay Area and over 20 to Seattle. Silicon Valley The Silicon Valley Tech Trek (SVTT) spanned 4 days and involved 25 companies; students visited on average three companies per day. In the evenings, they networked with alumni at the Menlo Circus Club and attended an Open House at the Plug & Play Center...

A watch fit for James Bond - Student Life

2007-02-18T19:51:00.000-05:00

Check out my article on the Suunto n3i SPOT watch that I have been testing out courtesy of Microsoft:
A watch fit for James Bond - Student Life

SPOT, or Smart Personal Objects Technology, watches were first released in early 2003. These watches offer automatic time adjustment, customizable faces, news, weather, traffic, stock quotes, sports scores, instant messaging, Outlook synchronization, and other advanced features. The information is continually updated through low-power FM frequencies and requires a subscription to MSN Direct services.

Externship Report: My Month with Harrah's - MITSloan News

2007-02-18T19:42:00.000-05:00

Externship Report: My Month with Harrah's - MITSloan News

Harrah's Corporate

2007-02-18T19:39:00.001-05:00

100_0244
Originally uploaded by dodge2315.

I spent the month of January working for Harrah’s Entertainment corporate IT group. Harrah’s is well known for being the first casino company to implement a nationwide rewards program. They are widely recognized as the industry leader in the use of technology and have been the recipient of many IT awards. For my month long project I had the opportunity to do some research for one of their strategic initiatives and present my findings to Harrah’s CIO, Tim Stanley.

Check on my article in the MIT Sloan newspaper, Fifteen, to hear more about my Vegas experience.

Travels in Technology and Innovation

Cracking the App Store Ranking Algorithm

Tech Shopping with Mom

Best of SF New Tech 6/17

An iPhone App for the Unemployed

So Many San Francisco Tech Events

Women Over 55 Discover Facebook

iPhone Billing Problems

25 Years of Steve Jobs

Boston Mobile Investment

Boston Mobile Companies

Mapping in the Web 2.0 World

Nike+ Interview

BU Tech Strategy Presentation

Harrah's Innovation

Mobile Start-Up Presentation

2nd Annual Open Web Awards

Tech and the financial crisis

Ready For Any Weather

An Open Platform for Mobile Application Development

Yahoo's New Fire Eagle

The Future of Mobile

Sloan First Round Presentation

BU Tech Strategy Case Competition

Pandora at Sloan

MIT Sloan Books

Outsourcing and Innovation

Grand Central Problems

Innovation and Productivity

John Patrick at MIT

Grand Central

Back to School - Week 4

Back to School

PBwiki

More Great Video Content

YouTube for PowerPoint

MIT Sloan Places 3rd in Red Hat Challenge

Banking's Most Innovative CIO

What Can A Wiki Do?

Clayton Christensen and Chet Huber at Sloan

Costa Rica to Boston

Business Innovation on CNBC

Even the Economist wants to innovate

The Future of Work

Clayton Christensen Speech

Customer Driven Innovation at Intuit

Harrah's Entertainment & Innovation

Building an Environment for Innovation

Cool Mobile Apps

Nokia at Sloan

Steve Wozniak at MIT

Meebo CEO at Sloan Today

MIT Deshpande Center IdeaStream

McKinsey Business Technology Case Competition

InnoCentive Co-Founder at Sloan

Wharton Technology Conference

MIT Sloan Tech Trek in Forbes.com

Sony Customer Service

New BlackBerry 8800 Announced

Sloanies Trek to Silicon Valley, Seattle to Experience the Best of Tech, Networking - MITSloan News

A watch fit for James Bond - Student Life

Externship Report: My Month with Harrah's - MITSloan News

Harrah's Corporate