Innovation Roundtable - discovering the 'adjacent possible' with emerging technologies

Earlier today I attended one of Axel Rosenø's Innovation Roundtable workshops, this one being on the topic of Technology Enabled Business Model Innovation. Others will do a much better job of summarising the wide range of themes presented and discussed during this event, but here are some brief personal selected highlights:

• Shell:  We heard interesting examples of how start-ups are implementing business models in the world of transport, including Filld (fuel delivery service) and MetroMile (pay-per-mile insurance). During one of the many fruitful informal discussions, examples of interesting 'non-traditional' innovations from Shell emerged:  these included 'Fill Up and Go' and the trial of an app that used the sensors in drivers' smartphones to sense how they were driving, and reward economical behaviour with reward points.
• Bosch: For IoT innovations in a firm such as Bosch, one challenge is bringing together and aligning the different worlds of what were described as the 'Machine guys' with the 'Internet guys'.  Bosch use a very structured process to explore IoT opportunities (solution sketches, mapping value drivers >value proposition >value delivery, stakeholder network diagrams etc.)
• JLR:  Innovation in automotive has been largely incremental for many years. Disruption requires a catalyst, and one example of that is the explosion of mobile communication technologies, and the way in which these are now so deeply integrated into cars. Vehicles now contain a huge range of sophisticated ICT systems that are an innovation 'gift' for car makers to exploit. For example, JLR can now offer a range of features that are enabled by the connection between the car and the driver's smartphone.  
• 3D printing: the discussions that followed the presentation of trends in 3D printing raised many common themes with those revealed during evidence gathering to support the development of UK national strategy for 3D printing. Key among these were concerns about the availability of data on the performance of different material / machine / process combinations. The discussions also highlighted the need for firms to be able to experiment with 3D printing technologies to help discover the 'adjacent possible' that could be the real opportunities for value capture from these technologies.

And on the actual logistics of the event, I like the use of Catchbox for Q&A from the floor and the IRMeet app for the use of in-presentation polls, stimulating discussions, and capturing feedback.