Becoming more choiceful: Lessons from Mark Brodeur of Nestle’s Silicon Valley Innovation Outpost

How Nestlé’s Silicon Valley Outpost has learned from its early mistakes and the lessons gained from developing 80 different services, propositions, and business models

Covid-19 has rewritten the rules of daily life. It’s not just that consumer priorities have shifted — a huge swath of people have quickly become comfortable using technologies like video conferencing, telemedicine, and online tutoring that would have otherwise taken years to embrace.

In our new webinar series Build, Buy or Partner we’re talking to leaders at some of the biggest companies in the world about what they see coming next after a year of incredibly rapid transformation. We want to know how they’re working with innovators and start-ups, where they see opportunity, and what kind of relationships they are hoping to build for the future.

In the first Build, Buy or Partner we hosted a conversation (video recording) between Mark Brodeur, Vice President of Digital Innovation for Nestlé and Dave Knox, Author of Predicting the Turn. As the leader of Nestlé’s Silicon Valley Innovation Outpost (SVIO), Brodeur’s job is to see around corners and spot what’s coming next. His team is tasked with identifying and prototyping new digital services and business models to expand the reach and impact of existing products in Nestlé’s vast portfolio.

He told Knox that when his team first formed about seven years ago they made the mistake of setting too short a timeline — they were usually working on problems that needed to be solved within a six to 12-month window. They were crucial challenges to meet, but addressing them wasn’t leading to big breakthroughs or innovations.

The SVIO is now “more choiceful,” Brodeur says. They work on a three to five year time horizon, identifying challenges and opportunities, and what that means for Nestlé. They also connect innovators and start-ups to different teams within Nestlé, to match problems and solutions.

Brodeur and Knox talked about the huge opportunities that exist in health and wellness, how to connect ideas to the right leaders in a large organization, and how the SVIO fits into the larger Silicon Valley ecosystem. Here are five key takeaways.

Finding the sweet spot

SVIO is focused on new ways for consumers to interact with Nestlé products — they’ve gotten very good at seeing opportunities coming, Brodeur says.

Brodeur: When I think about what we do well, one thing is to really look out three to five years, to look for those signals, to understand how consumer behavior is changing, and how technology is driving or enabling some of that change. It’s really important for us to be able to bring that back to what the potential implications, both good or bad, are for Nestlé? And then how do we take that next step in terms of designing these new propositions, these new services, these new solutions?

So what IS coming next?

The pandemic has pushed consumers to be more proactive about their health, whether by seeking out nutrition advice, using technology to help manage chronic illnesses like diabetes, or as well to remotely access health care. Brodeur says that he sees a great deal of potential in adding wraparound services to existing Nestlé products in the health and wellness space.

Brodeur: The push toward self care is one of those big themes. So is proactive wellness.

Consumers are leveraging hardware — their Apple watch, their phone — and software, they’re

leveraging many of the solutions that companies in Silicon Valley and beyond are building that provide insight information in real time to help people make better decisions on how to improve their physical and emotional well being.

Using partnerships to become a nimble giant

Nestlé is the largest food and beverage company in the world, with 270,000 employees around the globe and revenue of about $90 billion a year. Moving quickly and nimbly is a major challenge, and Brodeur says that his team is especially aware of this when they are working in partnership with start-ups, and the difference in size and resources is so pronounced.

Brodeur: We’re not a technology company. We’re a big, big multinational company. We’re not nearly as agile as we need to be. And that’s why when working with companies who are technology companies, agile startups who are very innovative, we try to find that marriage. It’s not easy, but it’s really important.

Thinking beyond the launch

Over the past seven years, the SVIO has developed close to 80 different services, propositions and business models, Brodeur says. One lesson they’ve learned along the way is that some projects need sustained attention, after they’ve been launched to thrive, and to get the full value out of them.

Brodeur: Oftentimes there’s new capabilities, there’s new technologies, it’s not just about launching it, but it’s sustaining it. So I would say the incubation piece was one of the big ahas that we probably didn’t focus in on early enough.

Cultivate excitement for change

Envisioning the future is challenging. Convincing other teams in a large company that you see what’s coming, and getting buy-in, can be even harder.

Brodeur: It’s super important, and now more than ever, to really be in a position to see what’s around the corner, but you have to try to make some sense of it, and to try to get your organization to really get excited about what some of the possibilities are. So my advice would be persistent, be pragmatic, be positive and really push.