3 Questions to Open Innovation Future Salon Speaker Cesar Castro

As a little teaser we asked Open Innovation Future Salon speaker Cesar Castro 3 questions. Further down his answers. 

Please RSVP for the event. Space is limited to 75 participants. Please RSVP: http://bit.ly/aqSWVi as we are close to capacity.

Remember his talk is only half of the Future Salon on Wednesday. In the second half we will split into small groups to work on the Ideation Challenge described in the previous post. The ideas will be posted on SAP's Idea Place. 2 ideas have already been posted in the section: Open Innovation Future Salon: PCAST General. Check them out and add yours.

Here are the 3 questions and Cesar Castro's answers:

1) When should companies go down the collaborative innovation path?

I think that companies should go down the collaborative innovation path only when they understand the nature of effective problem-framing and effective techniques to extract maximum value from any collaboration. I prefer to look at it from this perspective rather than from the perspective of which type of challenge (or opportunity) is suitable for collaborative innovation. Because many types of challenges can go down the collaborative innovation path.

2) Is there an easy way to avoid intellectual property rights problems when doing Open Innovation?

Absolutely. You can start by just sharing non-confidential information with any external network (and asking for non-confidential information in return). Once you see the quality of potential solutions (or partners) you can then move forward individually with any solution provider (and then sign the appropriate confidentiality agreements). And let’s not overlook the fact that what many companies consider confidential information may in fact be a false assumption. Sometimes companies mistakenly over-value (or over-protect) their confidential  information. Therefore IP may not be as sensitive an issue as most companies think it is.

3) Besides Open Source software, any other industries, that are ahead in Open Innovations?

Certainly the consumer packaged goods (CPG) industry is one of the leaders. Through a variety of approaches, they are actively engaging problem solvers, consumers, competitors, other industries for innovation. Consumer electronics (Philips, LG) and diversified manufacturing companies like GE and Siemens are also doing a lot of work in open innovation.

If you can't be there in person, we will webcast the event and have at least one team collaborating around ideas online. It is going to be really interesting. New webcast URL: https://sap.na.pgiconnect.com/fs/