Intelligent Innovation

When looking for a new way to innovate and create a "market disrupter" it is easy to surf the wave of another's creation. What I mean by this is that we often see popular products that are things built off of someone else's ideas or creations. The iPhone case to the iPhone, if you will. I believe that though this can be profitable, it isn't always great to start with a product someone has created and build upon it- most times its best to start with the original idea someone had to create that product in the first place and to build from there.

A great example of this is television. First there was black and white- someone thought ' hey this isn't good enough', so then came color TV. After this came another idea, high definition. Then digital, 3d and 4k etc. I use this example because it is a simple way to look at a complex concept. It also reminds me of a conversation I had with my brother when I was little. I once told Brian (brother)- and this was well before before 4k 3d TV's came out that he and I should try and create a version of television that was so clear people felt like they were there and something so unique that people could somehow interact with the television set.

Essentially, he laughed at me and told me something I think about everyday to this day. He said "You are looking at business all wrong- especially Television- if you truly want to do something, say it be for this case with TV, you need to think differently. Hundreds of people will be trying to build a 'clearer' TV. It will be on a screen, viewed on a box shape machine, you would be behind before you started. What you need to do is look at the idea of TV when it was first created. What was the goal? Someone wanted to take a recorded or live event taking place in a different world/ atmosphere and bring it to your living room. So think bigger. How about holograms? How about a truly interactive virtual reality. To think big you need to think outside of the box, in this case the 'literal box'.

Genius. This was likely 12-15 years ago. Today we are in the midst of seeing this with virtual reality head sets and hologram light shows- interactive experiences with Television in general. His view of "not taking a product to improve upon, but instead taking an idea looking at it differently" is the most logical and intelligent market innovation problem solving I have heard to date.

"the lightbulb wasn't created trying to improve upon the candle"