InfoCompanions » Innovation

Kevin Stone: The bio-future of joint replacement

Himanshu Sharma — Sat, 28 Aug 2010 15:41:36 +0000

Arthritis and injury grind down millions of joints, but few get the best remedy — real biological tissue. Kevin Stone shows a treatment that could sidestep the high costs and donor shortfall of human-to-human transplants with a novel use of animal tissue.

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John Delaney: Wiring an interactive ocean

Himanshu Sharma — Sat, 14 Aug 2010 15:36:12 +0000

Oceanographer John Delaney is leading the team that is building an underwater network of high-def cameras and sensors that will turn our ocean into a global interactive lab — sparking an explosion of rich data about the world below.

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Laurie Santos: How monkeys mirror human irrationality

Himanshu Sharma — Sat, 07 Aug 2010 15:34:23 +0000

Why do we make irrational decisions so predictably? Laurie Santos looks for the roots of human irrationality by watching the way our primate relatives make decisions. A clever series of experiments in “monkeynomics” shows that some of the silly choices we make, monkeys make too.

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Legos for grownups

Himanshu Sharma — Sat, 24 Jul 2010 14:51:52 +0000

Lego blocks: playtime mainstay for industrious kids, obsession for many (ahem!) mature adults. Hillel Cooperman takes us on a trip through the beloved bricks’ colorful, sometimes oddball grownup subculture, featuring CAD, open-source robotics and a little adult behavior.

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A headset that reads your brainwaves

Himanshu Sharma — Sat, 03 Jul 2010 14:44:23 +0000

Tan Le’s astonishing new computer interface reads its user’s brainwaves, making it possible to control virtual objects, and even physical electronics, with mere thoughts (and a little concentration). She demos the headset, and talks about its far-reaching applications.

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Sony’s rollable OLED display

Himanshu Sharma — Wed, 26 May 2010 23:54:08 +0000

Check out this awesome 4.1-inch screen with a resolution of 432 by 240 pixels. It’s so flexible that this can literally roll around a pencil! Just imagine the applications – video screen that doubles as a wallpaper, or even the living room window curtain? What about “wearable” video display units!! Check out the video below.

Dennis Hong: My 7 species of robot

Himanshu Sharma — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 21:46:15 +0000

At TEDxNASA, Dennis Hong introduces seven award-winnning, all-terrain robots — like the humanoid, soccer-playing DARwIn and the cliff-gripping CLIMBeR — all built by his team at RoMeLa, Virginia Tech. Watch to the end to hear the five creative secrets to his lab’s incredible technical success.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Jonathan Drori: Every pollen grain has a story

Himanshu Sharma — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 21:43:21 +0000

Pollen goes unnoticed by most of us, except when hay fever strikes. But microscopes reveal it comes in stunning colors and shapes — and travels remarkably well. Jonathan Drori gives an up-close glimpse of these fascinating flecks of plant courtship.

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Dean Kamen: The emotion behind invention

Himanshu Sharma — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 21:39:33 +0000

Soldiers who’ve lost limbs in service face a daily struggle unimaginable to most of us. At TEDMED, Dean Kamen talks about the profound people and stories that motivated his work to give parts of their lives back with his design for a remarkable prosthetic arm.

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Don Tapscott on Gen-Y

Himanshu Sharma — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 15:25:56 +0000

The leading business strategy authority brings fresh focus to Gen-Y through the story of one over-achieving millenial who doesn’t read books (and it’s ok).

Greg Matthews on power of social media as a tool for innovation

Himanshu Sharma — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 15:23:10 +0000

With cool project work to back him up, Humana’s Director of Innovation demonstrates the power of social media as a tool for innovation.

Henry Markram: Supercomputing the brain’s secrets

Himanshu Sharma — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 18:45:07 +0000

Henry Markram says the mysteries of the mind can be solved — soon. Mental illness, memory, perception: they’re made of neurons and electric signals, and he plans to find them with a supercomputer that models all the brain’s 100,000,000,000,000 synapses.

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Deloitte Innovation elevator campaign

Himanshu Sharma — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 18:13:04 +0000

Deloitte Netherlands launched a new business unit – Deloitte Innovation, which focuses on developing new business ideas. As part of the campaign, several Deloitte offices had their elevators transformed into showers. Because after all, the best ideas are born in the shower.

Click here to view the embedded video.

BMW GINA Light Visionary Model

Himanshu Sharma — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 14:36:05 +0000

Am not a great fan of “concept cars”, but BMW Gina deserves special attention for completely rethinking out of the box. Check out the cool premiere video below, where Chris Bangle, Director of Design, BMW Group, describes the thought process that went behind this cool pair of wheels. No wonder GM and Ford are struggling just to survive.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Simon Whatley has some interesting pics. Also check out TechFresh.net for related pics.

Google Wave – another masterpiece from Google

Himanshu Sharma — Sun, 31 May 2009 02:03:34 +0000

Which one of the following communication mediums do you use the most? Email? Video Conference? Instant Messaging? Blogging? Bulletin Boards? Social Network? And if you said yes to at least 2 of the mediums above, am sure you have wished for a product that helps blur the boundaries between these products.

Wait no more, Google unveils Google Wave, an open source, personal communication and collaboration tool – all within a browser, using HTML 5 (dubbed as the Microsoft killer). Simply defined, Google Wave combines the best of worlds from plain vanilla email, hosted conversations, bulletin boards, combined with the power of instant messaging and social network applications like Orkut. Connect the concept with the possibilities at workplace – shared meeting minutes, with REAL TIME view as content is created (yup, real time – meaning text shows up in your browser as your colleague types), real time deliverables and content creation etc.

Lisa Hoover from “Computer World” defines Google Wave as:

“Wave is an elaborate mashup of collaboration, documentation, and real-time messaging that Google hopes will make people finally sever ties with AOL, Microsoft, and other online services. Its function is similar to what would happen if you linked your team’s computer desktops together, then put a giant virtual whiteboard in front of everyone.
…
I think it’s a safe bet Wave will fly in enterprise. If nothing else, the magic words “improved workflow” will entice companies to at least try it. There’s no question that freelancers, telecommuters, and anyone who relies on remote collaboration will jump on Wave the day it’s available, and stick with it if it helps save time and money.”

What’s more – Google Wave comes with a cool set of APIs, opening up a world of possibilities and opportunities to develop extensions. Drooling.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Check out Ben’s latest blog post on Mashable.com for a deep dive

RepRap – the self replicating machine

Himanshu Sharma — Sun, 25 Jan 2009 15:26:18 +0000

Ever wished that your new iPod could somehow self-replicate into two iPods every night? Or maybe every other hour? Christmas would be so much more fun… and less expensive Adrian Bowyer is thinking on somewhat similar lines. A senior lecturer in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Bath, Adrian is credited with the invention of the revolutionary RepRap Project – an open-source self-replicating 3D printer. As per The Guardian, “[RepRap] has been called the invention that will bring down global capitalism, start a second industrial revolution and save the environment…”.

RepRap is short for Replicating Rapid-prototyper. Adrian defines it as a practical self-copying 3D printer that builds the parts up in layers of plastics – in essence, a self-replicating machine. Not counting nuts and bolts RepRap can make 60% of its parts; the other parts are designed to be cheaply available everywhere.

This is an interesting coincidence: we can make 60% of our proteins; the other parts are evolved to be cheaply available everywhere. In this respect, RepRap machines could/would follow Darwin’s theory of evolution. And with the project now available in Open Source domain, natural selection seems all the more logical growth route.

Imagine the potential impact of this “magical wand”! Will this “demonetize money”? Check out the video below.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Vision of One Laptop Per Child

Himanshu Sharma — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 17:00:51 +0000

Check out this cool animation highlighting the “Vision” of One Laptop per Child (OLPC) program. I love the simplicity in the messaging and design of this video. All major projects and initiatives SHOULD start with a clear statement and “visualization” of the vision, such as this… and can help engage your stakeholders, users and other community members alike.

Also check out the other blog post pointing to some potentially troublesome future for the OLPC program.

Click here to view the embedded video.

One Laptop Per Child – On Life Support?

Himanshu Sharma — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 17:00:29 +0000

Am sure you are already aware about Nicholas Negroponte’s “One Laptop Per Child” program, (also check out the cool “vision” video here)which over the last few years has gained considerable momentum and accolades… in addition to a healthy amount of criticism. Back in business school, many times I have scratched my head to the financial viability of a program like this… in addition to the long term sustainability. Sure there are some generous souls out there and would love to spend/donate/give-away… but even the noblest of all ideas need a “realistic” financial plan. Four decades of global charitable contributions have poured trillions/pentillions of dollars into Africa… and failed to produce any comparable returns – forget about long lasting effects. The continent if at all, is in even more dire need of resources and funds. How many case studies do we need before we learn our lesson?

Anyways, back to the OLPC topic – The original goal of the project was to reduce the cost to market to about $100 per unit. However, insufficient volume and configuration changes have ensured that dream remains elusive, and cost to market to about $188 per unit. What’s worse – a series of reorganizations in the recent few years have alienated several key contributors. OLPC Director of Security, Ivan Krstic, left the program earlier this year, complaining that, “the internal restructuring reflected a fundamental change of vision that he couldn’t accept”. Ivan continues to blast the program on his personal blog. Ranting of a not-so-happy-ex-employee? Not so fast. Ivan points to several key issues, including infrastructure. He wrote:

“We have no real support infrastructure for these rollouts, our development process is not allocating any time for dealing with critical deployment issues that (will inevitably) come up, and we have no process for managing the crises that will ensue”.

Another key excerpt from his personal blog:

“Put differently, OLPC can’t claim to be preoccupied with learning and not with training children to be office computer drones, while at the same time being coerced by hollow office drone rhetoric to deploy the computers with office drone software. Nicholas used to say the thought of the XOs being used to teach 6-year olds Word and Excel made him cringe. Apparently, no longer so. Which is it? The vacillation needs to stop. As they say in the motherland: shit or get off the pot.”

A “big enough” population out there thinks that Nicholas is insane, even adding that he is a “terrible manager and leader”. A case in point – on May 20, 2008, at the recent OLPC Country Workshop, Nicholas said that the OLPC mission statement “has not changed one ounce”. And the very next minute, he introduced a fourth version of the mission statement, entirely different from the previous three reported on OLPC News not long ago. Hmmm… The original Five Core Principles were:
1. Child Ownership
2. Low Ages
3. Saturation
4. Connection
5. Free and Open Source
Then how does XO (the Microsoft Windows version) fit in this vision?

Bottom line – The OLPC project is now struggling to sustain momentum, and might end up on life support if its leadership can’t turn things around.

But hold on… this blog post isn’t all about bashing the OLPC program… it’s to celebrate the success, even if limited, of the program, including 600,000 units sold in the first six months, for more than $200 million. And how can you forget that this program helped create a new market segment, ultra-low-cost laptops, where there is more Linux than Windows on offer. So check out the video below – OLPC program distributes 650 laptops in a remote school on Cambodia… and the reaction from a grateful community. Do you find it interesting that in Cambodia, the Defense Minister if the “official cheerleader” for the program? Hmmm… wonder what happened to the Ministry of Education.

Also check out my previous post about Nicholas reporting on the OLPC program.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Toys that blend Beauty and Magic

Himanshu Sharma — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 14:00:40 +0000

Remember Pleo, the animatronic dinosaur toy designed to emulate the appearance and behavior of a week-old baby Camarasaurus. The creator, Caleb Chung is a very funny man, who interestingly is also the co-creator of the Furby. In this video, Caleb walks us through the intimate design routine and countless hours that went into conceptualizing, building and perfecting both Furby and Pleo. He tells us the philosophy is to blend art and science, “beauty and magic”… and wrap the whole package in a thick layer of business logic. We see his philosophy in all his “life-like creations” from Furby, which sold over 50 million units worldwide, generating over $1.2 billion in sales, to Pleo.

Look out for instances in this video where Chung quickly walks through toy successes and failures in the past. I think it requires a great sense of humor and self confidence to be able to discuss your past failures. On a related note, check out this cool blog post- “You Must Fail – Six lessons from Michael Jordon”

Click here to view the embedded video.

Innovation at Procter & Gamble

Himanshu Sharma — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 06:00:00 +0000

Over the past seven years, Procter & Gamble has tripled profits; significantly improved organic revenue growth, cash flow, and operating margins; and averaged earnings per share growth of 12 percent. How? A. G. Lafley, Chairman and CEO, Procter & Gamble, and his leadership team have integrated innovation into everything P&G does and created new customers and new markets. In this interview, A.G. Lafley talks about how innovation is at the core of P&G’s business strategy, and how P&G makes innovation an everyday practice in their organization.

Click here to view the embedded video.

About A.G. Lafley:
As the CEO of Proctor and Gamble, A.G. Lafley is a world renowned leader in innovation. He began at Proctor and Gamble in 1977, and was chosen as CEO in 2000. He inherited a struggling company that was then and still is adapting to a new global business unit. He saw one of the only ways to get out of trouble was to focus on innovation in his company. A.G. Lafley and Ram Charan have co-written “The Game-Changer: How You Can Drive Revenue and Profit Growth with Innovation”.

InfoCompanions » Innovation

Kevin Stone: The bio-future of joint replacement

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Vision of One Laptop Per Child

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One Laptop Per Child – On Life Support?

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