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PLATFORM-DESIGN

SuperLab’s tools constitute a platform because they enable almost every other element of the product development and go-to-market processes to realize their full utility and functionality.  Our platform is an easy plug-in for our consulting and investment firm clients’ own processes and tools.

Our platform was developed to address new venture/new product innovation in the context of an “entrant” succeeding against “incumbents”- in other words the toughest competitive environment.

The following collaborative design process highlights SuperLab’s six step methodology.  The devil as always is in the detail and our clients’ end user’s culture. A company can complete their design process in 2-3 weeks.

                                                                                                                     
New Venture/New Product Business Model Concept Design Steps Explained
Sharing the Fire and Setting the Frame

A company arrives at SuperLab’s creative design environment.  A company immediately feels the process, models, tools and their efforts are not going to be the same as “back-at-the-office.”  Why is the company designing?  What is the fire burning within? Is it reactive or proactive?  SuperLab performs an audit to frame the context.  This framing helps avoid solving the wrong problems and often guides the company to immediate breakthrough thinking: Does the company have control over its existing resources? What is the growth gap the company faces over next 5years?   What does management consider a balanced portfolio of innovations among 1) expanding the core business, 2) moving into adjacent segments or 3)entirely new businesses.  Will organic or acquisition tactics be used?   Will management allocate resources so capital is invested (not NOI).  Will 100% of a few executives’ time be committed?  What are the company’s goals and boundaries?

 



 




Integrating Our Models

The company’s or divisions’ top executives learn our models.  These models are now codified in Mark Long’s new book-core Strategy. Our body of knowledge and models build off the premier and widely accepted best practice standards.  However, a particular debt is owed Dr. Clayton Christensen of Harvard for his standard setting analysis regarding innovation theories.    The company first learns foundational models.  Then the company learns the new venture models/theories of:

  • Sustaining Innovation
  • Substitute Innovation
  • Disruptive Innovation
  • Complementary Assets For Sale Innovation
  • Complementary Assets To Flip Innovation

This session ends with several Category Mapping exercises to identify the real marketplace with a “Situation Needing a Job Done” approach.  In most cases senior management experiences major breakthroughs in the way they perceive their competitors, customers, complementors and the innovation theory the company should rely on for success.

 

 









Selecting Options

Executive team alignment and commitment starts shaping up.  What foundational models and new venture theories represent the options the executives want to explore now come into view?  These options are tested against the information secured during the framing audit at Step 1.

 



 





 Mapping the Market

With models, theories and the framing audit in alignment, the challenge of mapping the category and competitors becomes more meaningful.  Marketplace intelligence hinges on the quality of the starting models and theories, the questions and tools.  The outcome of this step provides the company with a rich pattern-based analysis as input for the next step-DesignLab.





 



Creating the Concepts

A design team is selected for a two or three day DesignLab experience.  For breakthrough insights the collaborative way, a minimum number of 10 participants is necessary.  This number guarantees that there will be 90 one-to-one connections n(n-1)=90 which our process demands for maximum results. Some teams have their experience and resources so steeped in incremental/sustaining innovation processes that most of a company’s core team, resources, processes and values are unsuited for breakaway designs. Consequently on many designs we select outside domain experts to supplement a company’s core team.  Lead end user innovators are also selected.  The balanced team will be decision makers and innovators from business, technology, marketing, product design and lead end user innovators. 

The design team is now ready for DesignLab.  A portfolio of business model concepts is designed by the most powerful and proven creativity and design process in the world-Group Genius™.  Group Genius™ is a license held by SuperLab.  Cap Gemini, another Group Genius™ licensee has conducted Group Genius™ work with 56 of the Fortune 100 in 18 of their Accelerated Solutions Environments Worldwide.  What differentiates SuperLab is how we integrate our new venture models and new venture assessment system with the Group Genius™ creative/design process.

 





 

 



Assessing the Concepts

SuperLab’s proprietary assessment system rates the portfolio of business model concepts.  This provides necessary prioritizations and S.W.O.T. analysis and accelerates “go” or “no-go” decisions about moving the designs into the development stage.  Equally important, our assessment system’s framework naturally captures, categorizes and assigns a future “to-do” agenda for every idea generated during Step 5’s DesignLab work.  In short a knowledge/creation portfolio management system becomes possible with some follow-on commitment.  Now potential ideas are not lost but saved for future commercialization.

 

 








Reliable Business Models

Each business model concept includes category identification, meta-business model selection, production model choice and competitor identification within a motivation/means assessment.  The product’s scope and scale requirements are called out with any possible increasing return strategies defined.  The S.W.O.T. analysis from step 5 is now completed with critical team member buy–in for the next 90 day action plan.


Business Model Concept (Innotype) or Portfolio of Business Model Concepts
   

A happy team ready to rely on their business model for the product development and go-to-market steps for their successful new venture.