Innovation Blog
Tuesday, June 23, 2009 | Posted by: Brian Maguire
Categories:
Business,
Technology
| Tags: innovation,
technology,
research,
financial,
government,
energy,
university,
innovators,
science,
car
One per cent of the energy we burn driving a car is used to move the driver. In one hundred years of automotive innovation, mankind has fought financial and military battles over oil reserves; only to announce that 99% of our effort was to shift a hunk of metal. Maybe we should have kept the horses.
Continue Reading
Tuesday, June 02, 2009 | Posted by: Grant Thornton
Categories:
Business
| Tags: innovation,
financial,
international,
emerging markets,
talent
“We need to reinvent ourselves and invest in innovation to compete in the emerging markets”, writes Gerard Lyons in the Sunday Times 31 May 2009
Continue Reading
Friday, May 29, 2009 | Posted by: Brian Maguire
Categories:
Business,
Environment
| Tags: innovation,
entrepreneurs,
government,
renewable energy,
energy,
europe,
science
OPEC has delayed 35 of 150 scheduled oil production projects. Oil prices have swirled between $147 a barrel last July, to $32 per barrel in February. China has announced investment of $400bn in solar energy production.
Continue Reading
Thursday, May 28, 2009 | Posted by: Grant Thornton
Categories:
Business,
Environment
| Tags: innovation,
government,
renewable energy,
national grid,
biogas
National Grid’s Head of Sustainable Gas Group, Janine Freeman, discusses their approach to innovation, including the opportunities and hurdles surrounding their quest to meet sustainable energy targets. In particular, she offers insight into the potential for injecting Biogas – the innovative renewable energy source – into National Grid pipelines. Compiled of the UK’s various waste streams, Biogas has the potential to simultaneously cut methane and carbon emissions, boost renewable energy capacity and provide a domestic replacement to waning North Sea gas reserves.
Continue Reading
Thursday, May 21, 2009 | Posted by: Grant Thornton
Categories:
Business,
Media,
Technology
| Tags: innovation,
media,
technology,
digital
Alex Johns, MD of iblink left his job with Siemens 3 years to start up iblink which filled the niche created by technologists who knew a lot about technology and less about marketing and marketeers who knew a lot about marketing but little about technology. Today iblink is an award winning digital marketing business with a number of blue chips clients such as Titan, Superdrug, Bluewater, P&G and Unilever.
Continue Reading
Thursday, May 21, 2009 | Posted by: Grant Thornton
Categories:
Business,
Technology
| Tags: innovation,
media,
technology,
microtrend,
google,
virul marketing,
twitter
Google admits it has something to learn from Twitter….
Continue Reading
Friday, May 15, 2009 | Posted by: Grant Thornton
Categories:
Business,
Technology
| Tags: innovation,
media,
technology,
science,
amazon
“Jeff Bezos is outpacing our expectations,” wrote an analyst of Amazon’s CEO…
His much-viewed appearance on ‘The Daily Show with John Stewart’ was classic Bezos, nerdy, smiley, hyperactive. Struggling, just a little, to convince Stewart we’ll all read from slim digital screens in the future, he rocked back and forwards with laughter, like Spock on a rollercoaster.
Continue Reading
Tuesday, May 12, 2009 | Posted by: Grant Thornton
Categories:
Business
| Tags: innovation,
jackie hunter,
pharmaceutical
Jackie Hunter is the Senior-Vice President and Head of External Science Development at GlaxoSmithKline. Here she discusses how innovation is encouraged and challenges are overcome at the pharmaceutical, through its continuous evolution on both an internal and external level.
Appointed in 2008, within Dr. Hunter’s remit at GlaxosmithKline is the development of a more open and transparent global R&D architecture, which includes developing new ways of working with academia and publically funded bodies.
Continue Reading
Friday, May 01, 2009 | Posted by: Brian Maguire
Categories:
Business,
Education,
Technology
| Tags: innovation,
technology,
research,
financial,
university,
europe,
intellectual property,
economist,
patent,
entrepreneurial,
capitalism
Seventy years ago, Schumpeter, economist and entrepreneurial cheerleader, declared the pending death of capitalism and the rise of sober socialism – the consequence, he said, of the innovation equivalent of corporate perpetual motion.
Continue Reading
Wednesday, April 29, 2009 | Posted by: Grant Thornton
Categories:
Business,
Education
| Tags: government,
intellectual property,
teri willey,
cambridge enterprise,
ip laws
Turning great science concepts into commercial reality.
Teri Willey, Chief Executive, Cambridge Enterprise spoke with a Grant Thornton representative at the Economist ‘Innovation Island’ conference. Tasked with leading innovative research oriented companies to commercial success, Willey said it is important to shield innovators from excessive managerial constraints, to let them ‘do the science’ then lead them through financial and governance processes. She bolsters Britain’s claim to be a leading centre of innovation, saying our overall approach provides an opportunity to leap ahead of the United States, her home nation.
Continue Reading
Friday, April 24, 2009 | Posted by: Grant Thornton
Categories:
Business,
Technology
| Tags: innovation
Marie Wold discusses the drivers of innovation at OnRelay, including the role of stakeholders, the financial gains, and ultimately the thrill of developing new technologies. Marie founded OnRelay, a software company specialising in fixed mobile convergence – an innovative technology integrating mobile phones into fixed telephony networks, 9 years ago.
Continue Reading
Friday, April 24, 2009 | Posted by: Brian Maguire
Categories:
Business,
Technology
| Tags: technology,
innovators,
broadband,
financial innovation,
starbucks,
telecoms,
voip,
mobile financial services,
3-d imaging,
global banking
Data is about to drive some of the biggest mergers and acquisitions the global markets have ever seen. Some banks are preparing for a breathtaking integration of telecom delivery channels which will leave their competitors gasping for growth.
Continue Reading
Tuesday, April 21, 2009 | Posted by: Brian Maguire
Categories:
Business,
Technology
| Tags: government,
nuclear,
economist intelligence unit,
geneva motor show,
electric cars
Some years from now, there will be less talk of economic gambling and more on how we played a steady hand in heavy seas. We will talk of how innovation, and investment in electric cars, changed the way we live our lives, how green cars became the catalyst for economic recovery and a beacon of British science and ambition.
Continue Reading
Wednesday, April 15, 2009 | Posted by: Brian Maguire
Categories:
Business,
Education,
Technology
Descartes’ ‘I think; therefore I am,’ will be surpassed by ‘We have; therefore we will’ – our capacity for assessing reality is heading for a quantum leap.
Continue Reading
Wednesday, April 15, 2009 | Posted by: Grant Thornton
Categories:
Business,
Education,
Technology
David Gann, Head of Innovation and Entrepreneurship at Imperial College Business School, and joint Chair in Technology and Innovation at Imperial College, discusses the pioneering concept of 5D Innovation modelling, anticipated to impact decision making on a global level.
Continue Reading
Wednesday, April 15, 2009 | Posted by: Grant Thornton
Categories:
Business
| Tags: innovation,
economic recovery
BBC Radio 4’s Peter Day hears from those who are pinning their hopes for economic recovery on innovation.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00jjls6/In_Business_All_New
Continue Reading
Thursday, April 02, 2009 | Posted by: Brian Maguire
Categories:
Business
| Tags: innovation,
regulation,
financial innovation,
the ascent of money,
niall ferguson,
turner review,
derivatives,
alastair darling,
louisiana purchase
Niall Ferguson, Scotland’s finest export since steel, recently wrote that the development of credit and debt is: “as important as any technological innovation in the rise of civilization, from ancient Babylon to present-day Hong Kong.” Glasgow born Ferguson, a financial historian and Harvard professor, has delighted television audiences with his pithy presentation of The Ascent of Money. Despite all the monumental fiscal calamities he details, a recurring message is “We never really learn”.
Continue Reading
Wednesday, April 01, 2009 | Posted by: Grant Thornton
Categories:
Business
| Tags: innovation
“Are we really hiring the irritants? Because it’s the irritants that are the risk takers, and it’s the risk takers that contribute to the culture of innovation.” Jonathan Kestenbaum, CEO, NESTA
Continue Reading
Friday, March 13, 2009 | Posted by: Brian Maguire
Categories:
Business
| Tags: innovation,
great depression,
economic downturn
Apple. Those crazy guys. They’re about to launch an up-scaled IPod Shuffle, and rumours grow of a new touchscreen device. Recently, they previewed a refreshed desktop range. What’s with all the innovation Steve, there’s a recession on? Maybe a depression. Even with cool little headphones jammed in your ears you can hear the world collapsing, or maybe Apple is too in tune with a different beat.
Continue Reading
Tuesday, March 10, 2009 | Posted by: Grant Thornton
Categories:
Business
| Tags: innovation
Will King, CEO of KMI (King of Shaves) talks about the role innovation has played in his career, from studying Mechanical Engineering which gave him a grounding in design and manufacturing, to his views on innovation in the UK.
“What happens in a recession is that creativity and common sense comes to out-weigh cash. People can’t simply rely on getting the cash in to do the job, they’ve got to use their brain and be creative and challenge things…...the currency of common sense is coming to the fore rather than the currency of cash.”
What do you think?
Continue Reading
