Reinventing the wheel

What is innovation and how do you innovate? How do you create something new from something that already exists? To find out, we joined forces with Hyper Island and organized our first studio session at the SapientNitro London offices — a collaborative workshop in which like-minded people had a chance to have fun debating and creating.

Erik Rodin kicked off the session by introducing the concept of technology brokering, an exploration of how existing technologies could be combined to create breakthrough innovation which allows companies to move into new spaces.

He shared the example of the first suitcase with multi-angle wheels, which was created as late as 2004. The inventor came up with the idea by literally seeing a suitcase on a trolley.

Then, I referred to Gartner’s Hype Cycle for Emerging Technologies, highlighted some of them and shared examples of how companies are using the concept of technology brokering nowadays. The Good Night Lamp, which combines the technology of night lamps and the internet of things, was one of the examples to inspire the participants.

The final part of the session was facilitated by Daniel Gonzalez, who talked about some creative principles such as “quantity over quality”, “approve or improve”, “kill your darlings” and “yes AND”.

He introduced the Mash-Up exercise and asked participants to divide in groups and brainstorm emerging technologies, human needs and existing services.

Then, each group had only ten minutes to come up with as many mash-up concepts as possible, which are creative outcomes of lateral thinking.

A valid mash-up had to be a combination of at least two elements of an emerging technology, a human need and an existing service.

We also asked the participants to come up with names before presenting their ideas back to the wider group.

The ideas were great.

Mindful London: an app which uses strategically placed RFID tags to shut down your phone while moving through the most beautiful parts of London to have a moment of mindfulness.

Smart wave: a microwave which connects to Spotify. Spotify plays songs that match the cooking time, which makes the waiting time no longer boring.

And especially:

Pixxxa: a drone-delivered post-coital Domino’s service, derived from the insight that cuddlers are hungry but don’t necessarily want to get out of bed.

My thanks to all those who came and to those who put a lot of effort into this. Our next event will happen soon.

Thomas