global
July 2020 | Volume 2.1
i n n o vat i o n magazine CUP CLUB CUPS AS A SERVICE
specialized bikes on the right track
learn impliment innovate
5 Essential bits of hiking gear
greenhouse living bring the outside in
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CONTENTS
10 CUPCLUB Reusing, recycling and making the most of what we have created, is not always convenient and easy to achieve.
04 GREENHOUSE LIVING Project Sustainability
12
15
A NEW WAY FOR NEWS
INNOVATNG WITH SPECIALIZED BIKES
Using WhatsApp to distribute a weekly newspaper
On the right track
19
21
24
SPARK LABS
THE OCTUNNUMI
5 BITS OF HIKING GEAR
Putting human-centered design front and centre to help individuals and businesses develop
Debut novel by fantasy fiction author Trevor Alan Foris, accompanied by an app to discover hidden layers of the book
Enjoy the sun and get some hiking done during lockdown
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EDITOR’S VOICE Globally we have found ourselves in difficult times. Covid-19 is touching families, businesses and structures like nothing before in our lifetime. I hope that you are coping as well as you can. Beyond that it becomes difficult, or even trite to know exactly what to say, to such a wide audience who will have been touched in so many different ways. Fingers crossed we can all pull through this in the not too distant future. This issue was produced during the UK lockdown in May 2020. We are fortunate in many ways because most interview we conduct are remote, and that’s the way this edition was put together, with minimal change to our normal way of working.
“Globally we’ve found ourselves in difficult times.”
Thanks to everyone involved, it was a really interesting edition to work on. You may notice we have a new look. We thought it was about time, so let us know what you think and as always get in touch if you have a story to tell or an idea that we can work on in tandem. Best james@globalinnovationmagazine.com
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GREENHOUSE LIVING Project Sustainability
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Niklas Dahlström is a building engineer at Greenhouse Living. He talked to us about how they are building ‘nature houses’ for a new generation of consumers, who want integrated sustainability, climate and technology as part of their living arrangements.
Can you tell us about your background, where you were brought up, your academics and your early career? For as long as I can remember I have always had an interest in houses, mostly villas. Therefore I decided to enroll in an education where I could learn to design and build my own house some day. In my secondary level education I chose the technical program but soon realized that I (at that time) was a bit more interested in biology and environmental studies so I switched to that. Later on I got back on track with my higher education at the school of engineering in Jönköping, Sweden. Here I combined ecological building methods with engineering. After some studies in Germany with exciting courses such as tunneling and geotechnological engineering it was time for me to apply for jobs. I got a really nice job offer from a prefabricated house building company, in a small village with ‘longhouse’ tradition close to Nässjö, where I grew up before I moved to Jönköping in the early 1990s. I decided that I wanted to explore design and architecture and got my masters at KTH, Royal School of Engineering in Stockholm. I moved to Gothenburg and worked in an office specialized in designing SPA:s and swimming facilities. In my spare time I started my company, Darking, parallel to being employed. After a couple of years working with many different projects at another office together with a 2 year project management program (night time and weekends) I moved to Malmö and shortly after decided to be committed to my own company and focused on ecological buildings.
Can you tell us about the company you work for, and what your role is there? One of my companies is Greenhouse Living and it started out as a consultantcy group with 4 different consultant firms working together. We are now four partners that have built up knowledge around ‘nature houses’. We are an interdisciplinary team with different backgrounds such as architects, civil engineers, wastewater experts and all of us have a passion for sustainable solutions. It is possible for us to design, plan, manage, erect and create these buildings from start to finish. Lately we have been working on nature house concepts that can be adapted to urban areas and local food production. Our focus right now is to raise money to build a pilot project and introduce it to different cities in Sweden and around the globe. At Greenhouse Living I am very much engaged in answering technical questions and providing solutions regarding nature houses. I like to work in many different fields and i am always trying to expand my knowledge. Sometimes I am a project manager, giving customers economic and technical advice, sometimes I work on procurement and so on. Tell us about NatureHouse? According to the eco-architect Bengt Warne (nature house guru and architect) he defined them as buildings that do not pollute or destroy our environment but instead contribute towards and bring happiness and pleasure to the inhabitants. When we work with nature houses we define them by four factors: it should contain/include, a climate envelope that brings light and adds heat and extends the season, sustainable materials
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should be used as much as possible. It should include waste water sewage systems that reuse their nutrients and it should minimize the use of energy. Apart from that I also believe it should include the social and spatial experience to enrich the human being.
“It creates this positive atmosphere that can´t be described in words. I love the joy of seeing your own food growing, knowing where the food comes from and minimizing your ecological footprint.”
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Being inside a nature house gives you the feeling of calm and being whole, lungs filled with fresh air, the smell of plants, these amazing structures that life has created. It creates this positive atmosphere that can´t be described in words. I love the joy of seeing your own food growing, knowing where the food comes from and minimizing your ecological footprint. It’s exciting to see that you can make a difference just by living in these kinds of houses with plants and flowers, that you can avoid transport, reduce eutrophication and water usage. Nature houses have a pay-back time and return of investment that is really beneficial compared to normal homes. You produce your own food, you do not need to buy food from far away, with possible pesticides, lousy working conditions and chemical fertilizers etc. Why did you start NatureHouse, where did the interest come from?
For a long time, healthy eating and green homegrown food has been a passion of mine. Being able to produce your own food is very inspiring and feels so natural and obvious. I felt so fortunate and excited when Fredrik Olson got back to me, (we met during a collaboration between two architectural studios we worked for at that time) and introduced me to the concept of buildings that really focus on growing food with a beautiful and heavenly environment. After talking to and meeting my now colleagues, Anders Solvarm in his amazing and welcoming home he introduced me to Dan-Eric Archer. In sharing a mutual goal of making the world more sustainable we started Greenhouse Living.
Can you talk us through your approach to getting projects off the ground with a customer, what are the main discussion points and considerations in making it a reality? Many customers have heard and seen these kinds of houses and get back to us and express their fascination and desire to get a building like this. Often it starts out with a discussion within the group, sometimes even before we reply to the customers. The customer gives us the input we need such as detail regarding a site with photos and descriptions. They express their dreams and wishes of how they want to live and so on. Most of all we have to focus on the clients budget and find possibilities accordingly. This is a big discussion since a climate shell can cost more than a normal house in the first instance. However there are so many positives to this. It gives you a sense of extra space, it extends the seasons, plants can grow better and bigger and you can have a more exotic variation to harvest. The space can also be used as an extra living room and for much more social activities regardless of the weather.
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Have you seen a rise in demand for your services in recent years? Why do you think that is?
Can you share a book, podcast or website that you find inspiring and tell us why?
We have and we do work hard to promote nature houses and this way of living. Now we see an increased interest and there are many early adopters of this concept. A lot of people find this very exotic and it gives them an opportunity to create their own paradise, in a sustainable way.
I just listened to the Steve Jobs biography by Walter Isacsson. For me it was very inspiring to read about all the things Steve managed to achieve in his lifetime. His search for perfection, simplicity and purity fascinates me. He really managed to make a difference in the computer business in terms of design. He stretched many boundaries to things no one else had ever seen before. Keeping the focus and aiming for a higher goal and not settling for something less than what you want, that just feels so right. That is a great inspiration.
Is there a particular exciting project you are working on at the moment? Anders and I are working on a new concept house that occupies a lot of thinking in our mutual company ‘Naturhusvillan’. The house project is called Atri and has sprung up from the shape of the trees at the site and in our swedish forests. It has the shape of a triangle and it has a lot of new design features which have been carefully designed and tested. We have for instance invented our own glass system in wood for the greenhouse and will make a waste water system with a vertical green wall. We have really pushed ourselves hard not to compromise on the sustainable features. This is a second generation nature house.
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CUPCLUB Reusing, recycling and making the most of what we have created, is not always convenient and easy to achieve. However much we believe in it. That’s where Cupclub comes in. CupClub is a returnable packaging service for hot and cold drinks which aims to make it easier for us all to reduce our consumption of single-use plastics. Global Innovation Magazine spoke to Safia Qureshi, the Founder and CEO of CupClub to find out more about how it all started, and where their ambitions lie.
Tell us a bit about yourself?
Tell us about the business?
I was born and raised in London and Lahore. I am very interested in the cross section of design, architecture (built environment) and environmental impact. I’m a qualified Architect so I look at everything through the lens of design and problem solving at scale. I’m deeply curious about things I don’t understand and I’m not afraid to come from the outside, into a new challenge to understand how I can make things better. My passions and goals are always around trying to make things more sustainable for people and the planet. I’m also a new mother. I have a oneyear-old and it’s more important for me to look at the next generation and to think about how we are leaving our environment in a better state than when it was given to us.
It’s quite strange how it evolved. When people ask me if I always wanted to create a new food system– the answer is no. It definitely wasn’t something I grew up thinking about. I have and I’ve always had a passion for developing products that are tangible, so from a very early age I wanted to make work that people could touch, feel and use irrespective of their background, economic status or abilities. Products and services that were synonymous with our everyday society, that have value and worth.
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I pursued a career in Architecture because it met a lot of those requirements. I’m lucky in that I designed and worked on some great buildings. These buildings however were mostly private and I couldn’t see a future where I would have confidence in knowing that that space was going to be accessible
for anybody to use. I decided to set up an agency and come up with interesting briefs that could either tackle environmental issues or design ways of improving the lives of people. CupClub started in the studio as one of my earliest work. It was just a side project. We went into it not knowing what would happen.The drinks packaging industry had very serious problems on recyclability with high figures in terms of global consumption and so that became a very attractive place for us to start the journey. Our first question was ‘how do we use less?’ We know consumerism is going to rise and we have a global population with over 60% of people living in cities. So how do we design for these people in a way that is clever, better and more design driven?
We also know that resources are finite, the world is finite, so how do we re-design a service people are currently enjoying in a way where we introduce the concept of reuse? For me it was critical to engineer a better way to distribute beverages , without single-use packaging. opened a lot of questions; how do we engineer it? What does the return journey look like? How is it controlled? And what is the business model? We spent the first two years between 2015 and 2017 researching and designing the service, analysing the market and developing a brand that would be of interest to consumers and brands. From 2017 onwards we achieved some good investment from various sources, NGOs including the Ellen MacArthur Foundation and we spun CupClub out of the agency into a startup. That’s how it all started! So how does it work in the real world? How we wanted to design it, was in a way very similar to how people currently experience takeaway. The way consumers currently buy, we wanted to mimic that as much as possible for a number of reasons. To make it easy for a brand to say yes and to make it easy for a user to sign up. The least amount of changes means that we have a higher rate of adoption or opportunity. What we’ve done is that we have designed a way that when you come into a store and make an order for a cappuccino for example, you will be asked if you want a ‘reusable’ with that and if you say yes (if it’s the first time) you pay with your card and you put in your email address and that is you, opting in
to use CupClub. Through that process the retailer records what you have bought and you get the order, in our cup and that’s basically it. Through that we can work out where you are and we are able to tell you where to put the cup back when you are finished. You can return it to any network of drop points across cafes/stores. What has the reaction been like from partners and consumers? Very good, we are at the stage now where our data shows we are about 12 seconds slower than current serving time, in comparison to paper cups. As we design for impact, our goal is to sell into all the major high street brands,because by volume that’s where we can bring the biggest change. Commercial teams for major brands will measure things like serving speed and speed of transaction. Common questions we are asking ourselves constantly are things like will this slow down transaction time? Besides the cost of the product, we also measure the cost of time. When we launched in Palo Alto we measured these KPIs so we could build a comparison to paper cups.So that’s really where we are at the moment. We are trying to optimise and that’s a good place to be. It’s a good result from starting up a couple of years ago to where we are today.
What’s next? There are always lessons learnt at every stage.The first thing for us was to build a credible product and service to test and then get some feedback. Through that process we have developed and refined the system. We are now Gen3 of our product so we’ve been through so many different stages of optimisation and improvements. Our next stage is to focus on optimisation as we become more commercially attractive for larger retailers and brands. That means reducing the cost per order and optimising a lot of our operations. We are developing operations to create efficiency at scale. We are also looking to attract the greatest talent in the market and grow the team to really support some of the big brands in our customer base. We want to make our product and service readily available across multiple cities.
Finally are there any podcasts, books or programmes you would recommend to our readers? I really enjoy listening to Guy Raz from the podcast ‘How I built this’. He mostly interviews Founders and CEOs who have a strong product. I love listening to some of the stories on there, because they have faced similar challenges. So for anybody who is interested in designing and developing tangible products, it’s always a good one! You can find out more about CupClub at https://cupclub.com
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A NEW WAY FOR NEWS Twitter can occasionally throw out stories of inspiration and hope, and at the moment they are more than welcome to camp out on my timeline. During the Covid-19 pandemic, traditional business models, and economies are being tested to a degree that the word ‘challenging’ probably doesn’t really cover. However, as always during difficult times we find that new ideas and processes can really come into their own, often out of necessity.
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Simon Allison, a South African based journalist tweeted a story of change and inspiration recently, about how using Whatsapp to disseminate a weekly newspaper was really catching on, and not only that, it was helping young journalists learn their trade at the same time.
respond to the pandemic. I think it’s imperative for journalists to get that information out to the public in a truthful way, onto a platform where the people are. We need to try different platforms
We spoke to Simon to find out a bit more about the initiative.
Are your fellows on this project dispersed across the region?
Tell me a little bit about yourself and your background.
They are from different countries but they are all in Johannesburg in the moment on lockdown.
My name is Simon Allison and I am the African Editor for the Mail and Guardian newspaper. I’ve been a journalist for about a decade. All of that time as a foreign correspondent with most of that time focused on the African continent but I’ve reported from all over. I am South African, I was educated in South Africa and did my Masters in London. I have been doing journalism pretty much ever since. The Mail and Guardian is an independent South African newspaper, it’s a weekly and it was established around the end of apartheid. It was an anti apartheid newspaper and wrote lots of articles about the injustice of the government etc. ‘KAS Media’ are a donor organisation to us and they have stepped in in the last few weeks to assist us with reporting on the African content specifically. They are funding a few journalists to help me report basically. So how are you coping in trying to complete your work presently? This has been a real whirlwind. The Coronavirus pandemic is having a catastrophic effect on media outfits throughout the world. This has made things very difficult over the last few weeks and we are looking at new ways of working because of this. One of the things we are experimenting with is a new kind of publication. Almost everyone we know that is not a journalist, they seem to get their news via WhatsApp, this is true in South Africa and in many other parts of the continent. No professional media houses, at least in Africa, have made a concerted effort to reach people using this platform, so we are experimenting with a new kind of publication. About 2 to 3 weeks ago now I had the idea of starting a WhatsApp publication in a PDF format. This is something that has been trialled in Zimbabwe by an organisation called ‘263 Chat’. We figured let’s give it a go and see if we can pull it off on a continental level.
and approaches and the response so far has been pretty good.
So tell me, how does this work in a practical sense? Think of it as a weekly newspaper for all intents and purposes. It is a weekly publication that goes out every Saturday. The fellows and I will have a discussion sometime in the week about the stories that they’re interested in and also the ones that I want them to do. We have two editions out already. So is the idea that I get it onto my WhatsApp, either via requesting it, or being sent it from a friend and then send it out to the groups that I’m involved in? That’s exactly the idea. So how do you track data and analytics on this because normally we have analytics integrated into our platforms, how do you keep a tag on that? That’s a great question and the answer is at this time with great difficulty. We can get proxy figures. We ask people to email or WhatsApp us to subscribe for free and for the very first issue the only promotion we did regarding this was a tweet that I put out. However, at the end of that week we had 4000 subscribers. These are people that have saved a number in a phone and sent us a message. If you take that as some kind of proxy for the numbers of people reading it, we think our actual readership is much larger. We think there is an enormous readership potentially. The next step is to try and see if WhatsApp themselves will assist or work with us in some way, because they have ways of tracking this date, so we would like to see if they can assist and give us some kind of metrics. We can then use this information to talk to advertisers and donors. At the moment the phase we are in is proof of concept just showing that there is demand for this kind of thing and that it can be done. We will then see if we can find a way to make it sustainable.
As I was figuring out how to do this I got in touch with ‘CAS Media’ who I know very well to explain, “hey guys this is what we’re doing, what do you think?”. They have 3 media fellows, who have scholarships to study journalism and these 3 students got in touch with me independently and said we are stuck in lockdown and we want to do some journalism, can we do something to assist? I wanted to offer them some work but we had no budget, but CAS Media stepped up and lept at this idea, so we had the program up and running very quickly. That was a quick turnaround. The usual timelines don’t apply at the moment. Who knows what the world is gonna look like in the next six months, so we figured if we have an idea we need to get out there and see if it works as soon as possible. There is also another factor regarding this, which is misinformation, which is a big threat in being able to GLOBAL INNOVATION MAGAZINE 2020 | 13
It sounds like it has potential. It has. It has also been so much fun. There are lots of really interesting journalistic challenges that this format throws up. The Mail and Guardian would normally run a story of between 800 and 1200 words, something like that. Pretty standard stuff. You get to WhatsApp and you have to factor in, what do audiences read on WhatsApp? They definitely don’t read 1200 word features, 1200 words doesn’t work on WhatsApp so we have had to optimise the design to work on a smartphone. Do you know what does work though ? 250 words. We are changing features from 1000 words down to 250 words and at first it felt like I was chopping off parts of my body, but as I took a step back and looked at the end product I realised a lot of those 1000 words didn’t need to be there. You can actually get a lot done with 250 words if those words are used well and if you are smart about it. It’s quick bites, it’s easy reading and it’s a totally different thing. So what kind of feedback have you had? I have had situations where the PDF has been sent to WhatsApp groups I am involved in, from completely different directions. Someone from South Sudan sent it to the WhatsApp group, from a completely different direction. Then you start to think how on earth did that happen? That’s the power of this platform. Is there a website or blog or piece of writing that has been influential upon this work? ‘263 Chat’ https://www.263chat.com/ in Zimbabwe are the pioneers of this PDF model and they deserve a shout out as they have broken the ground on this. It is one of these ideas when you tell people about it, it is like a lightbulb going on. It is completely intuitive and makes absolute sense. I’ve spoken to a lot of people about it. We have had newspapers speak to us, NGOs and interest from people that invest in ideas. If we get this right it has the potential to be a whole different platform for media. This is a way in which you can bring the aesthetics and quality of print media into the digital world. Websites are a different thing entirely and you don’t get the feeling of reading a newspaper via a website really. This way of reading via the PDF, in short form, it gives you that feeling. It looks and feels like a newspaper as you go through it. I think it’s a game changer, so ‘263 Chat’ is something I would definitely recommend people check out.
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INNOVATING WITH SPECIALIZED BIKES Innovation is a term bandied around, often without due respect to the amount of blood, toil and concentration it actually takes to innovate, and improve. It takes complete dedication to do it right. Specialized is one company that does it right. Established in 1974, Specialized is a private company which at its core, at its heart, still commits to innovation in everything it does.
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‘Innovate and inspire to improve riders’ lives’ is the company’s goal, so Global Innovation Magazine talked to Mark Cote from Specialized to see how that manifests itself into the company’s structure and actions.’ Tell us a bit about your background? At one point I did lead the innovation team at Specialized, but now I lead the ‘Active’ bikes category. I grew up in Maine, New England in the north east of the United States. I did triathlon from age 6 and fell in love with bikes and then I fell in love with tinkering and the engineering of bikes. I went to University at MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) on the east coast, in Boston, to do mechanical engineering and I was very fortunate to study cycling aerodynamics in the early 2000’s which was a very unique situation, as there were only a couple of wind tunnels in the world at the time. I graduated in 2007 and after doing a brief stint with some consulting at Tesla I started at Specialized in 2007 and have been there for 13 years full time. What was it about bikes that grabbed you at a young age? Everybody gets there in a different way in our industry, the bike was freedom for me growing up. Maine is a fairly quiet place. It’s dark and it’s cold at times, but when you have 8 weeks of summer it’s amazing. I grew up swimming and got into a triathlon. I did my first triathlon when I was six. Whether it be for competition or for transportation (getting around) it was freedom of expression, racing was a great way for us to see the world. If I could qualify for a big race I got to see a whole new part of the world and in my youth I raced on the national team and it exposed me to more of the world and that was my relationship with bikes. Since then I have just been a passionate lover of bikes. You mentioned that you led the innovation team at one stage? I have held various roles. Throughout all of that I’ve been very focused on innovation and this comes with an extremely high focus on the rider. We are very fortunate to have a company that is private and a CEO who is completely rider and ride focused. We don’t have to overly convince anyone that an idea is good, so if an idea is crazy
or left field and has a big enough benefit for the rider, in my experience we’ve been able to get it funded. Back in 2010/11 we were pitching to build a windtunnel to do aerodynamic research. In the sporting world, without motors, there’s not too many companies that have wind tunnels and they are very rarely commissioned. This was a great moment where all the engineers that wanted to build a bike windtunnel came out of the woodwork and pulled together to build a cycling specific windtunnel at our headquarters. I think that project is testament to how the organisation works. We were a bunch of 26-year-olds not quite sure on how much it was going to cost, but quite clear that it’s going to give us huge technical benefit, so we went forward. It has been an awesome development and we have had it for around 8 years now. It has been transformational to our product line.
Where does innovation come from then? Some companies are quite formulaic about it and we certainly seem to know the recipe that can result in innovation. To stand out you need to take a leap and look at what would be a meaningful change, otherwise it’s too easy to just do evolutionary development, way too easy. For us, what we have observed is that we can make all the strategy documents in the world but what we usually find is that if you can make a moment or a galvanising project that can pull resources together then that can be a great catalyst for innovation. An example being in around 2009 a small group of engineers got together with the intent being, to start looking at electric bikes. There were some prototype’s going around but it was still very workshop, garage and ad hoc. It hadn’t really gotten to the point where there were some really good E bikes and being a performance company, we really didn’t want to produce something that was, ‘pedestrian’.
What is it within your culture that would allow that type of work to just go forward and occur? There are a couple of things about our culture that drive innovation. The first is that there is very little hierarchy which has been incredibly intentional over the years. It doesn’t matter what your position is or what your title is, they don’t matter. We don’t have VP’s or anything like that in the company, it’s flat, so that allows anyone from an intern to someone who’s been there for 20 years to come up with an idea. It’s the idea that wins not the ego. With that being said once you sell the idea you have to deliver, so it kind of attracts very audacious people that want to go after audacious acts. Sometimes there is a sense of surprise when you get the opportunity to do it but the onus is then on you to deliver. I gave the example of the windtunnel earlier on but there has been tens and tens of examples over the years that have really set the identity of innovation at Specialized.
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Our E bikes have had investment into the bike and the team for many years now, lots of investment. However In 2011 what we came up with was pretty staggering, people were locked away in a room for a long period of time coming up with that prototype. We asked our CEO to give it a trial and immediately his face lit up. He had an immense smile as he drove it around the car park. That was a £6000 bike in 2011 and we weren’t known for that type of bike when we launched it. We launched in Valencia in Spain and everyone was wearing capes, like Superman because that’s what it felt like. That forged our E bikes, it’s a category known as ‘Turbo’ for us. The main mantra is ‘it’s you, only faster’ and it needed to feel like you just have superhero legs. It has to be smooth and powerful and it can’t feel like a machine. It just has to feel like an extension of you. This led to us going after ‘mountain’ and this was much more core to our brand, answering questions like what can we do with an integrated electric mountain bike? That’s probably where innovation really comes from, when you take this crazy idea that’s way ahead of its time and you mash it with something that your customers come to you for. You are probably bringing it just a little bit too early, but you do it in a way that is so authentic and so real in relation to what you stand for. When you do that people have to take notice. That came with the launch of the Turbo Levo in 2015. That was our first integrated electric mountain bike and since then that bike has become a phenomenon and we’re onto a third generation of it. They are amazing bikes We don’t spare any expense on how we build them and if you’re going to spend the time, effort and investment you need to build something very robust and fun. It needs to be very floaty on the trail, you don’t want it to be a big and heavy beast. There’s a lot of innovation that goes into that. It’s been great to watch it happen and at Specialized since the early 2000’s we have worked really hard on the development of carbon composites, and since then, wheels, then tyres and now electronic systems. Electric bikes are certainly an investment for the consumer, that needs some careful thinking about. The work that we’re doing on electronic bikes at the moment is so complex. The average selling price actually has been increasing over the last few years, but they will go up and the price will also go down, across the market. The average ownership age is not increasing though so what this indicates to us is that people are really valuing the upgrade to electric bikes, but almost as if it’s a transportation choice, a choice in replacing cars. That’s the mission that I’m driving at Active at the moment, for bikes to be your preferred form of transport. There are some barriers to that in some countries whether that be traffic or the weather but if we think in a very smart way, the benefits are really quite large. Benefits from the mind to the body, through to helping with environmental issues. So we are very focused on how we overcome the obstacles.
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What are your days looking like presently? Specialized is a pretty dynamic place. My team is stretched between three offices. Morgan Hill in California which is a global support centre. Product development, structural development and carbon development sits there, as does the studio for biomechanics. We have around 400 people here, 70 odd are engineers. We have a team in Cham Switzerland which is our E bike hub, which is right in the middle of Switzerland, a beautiful spot right amongst the Alps so the riding there is great. We have our motor and battery development there. We also have a hub in Taipei, Taiwan and between those 3 offices that’s how we get the stuff done. I get on around six and then we are talking through strategy with the Europe team, then we may get into some of the product team meetings with Morgan Hill. Usually I’m in one or two labs during the day checking out prototyping or structural testing, that type of thing. We have a great program called ‘SBCU’ (Specialized Bicycle Components University) where we bring in retailers or prosumers and talk tech, so they are usually in during the week and we will ride with them or have lunch and get rider feedback. At noon, every single day a ride is occurring, it’s sacrilegious, every single day the ride leaves at 12:15. If you want to go hard you can go hard. We have Friday afternoon Championships where we have a jersey that kind of thing, 3 out of 4 weeks in the summer months some kind of pro will turn up and it can get very fast and competitive. Then in the afternoon there’s lots of strategy or deep thinking work time and then we close off the day and we check in with Taiwan for an update on the development program. We’re going for 24 hours a day really across the globe which helps speed up development. What’s your approach towards collaboration? you have so much expertise inhouse, do you ever have to go outside? Do you see that as a benefit, working with academics or other companies? We have a lot of strong people and ideas in the company, but we are always seeking outside thoughts and feedback. Presently, we are probably about 50-50 in terms of the innovations whether they come from inside or outside. We’ve got really good at being able to identify experts, to come in from outside. So
many people think that when you get your first patent it’s worth so much, but the idea is worth 5% the rest of the work is making it real and taking it to market. That’s not to say that great ideas are not valuable but there’s a lot of blood sweat and tears that go into making the idea a reality. We have created a culture that is quite humble. We don’t get cocky and we don’t act like we have all the answers, because we don’t. So how do you foster collaboration? Very clear problem statements. One of our CEOs favourite sayings is ‘what problems are we trying to solve?’ so defining that for a rider and then opening it up to a broader audience or to specifically a team is key to what we do. That kicks off the concept phase in the early stages and that’s great because you don’t have to be a designer, an engineer or product designer, you’re just a person and you have to come up with a creative solution. That can be through the design of a prototype for example and that really helps to clarify the question and open up all the different solutions that can come, so that’s how I like to kick off these projects. We don’t want it to be hierarchical or too competitive. The important thing is getting the good ideas to float to the top. Can you share any podcasts that you’re listening to presently? Some of these are slightly more obvious, but on my feed right now I listen to ‘99% Invisible by Roman Mars’ and How I Built This by Guy Raz’. Lance Armstrong does two podcasts one called ‘The Move’ and ‘The Forward’. ‘The Forward’ is about entrepreneurs and leaders he connects with and you can think what you will
about Lance Armstrong, but he is certainly an engaging host. Tim Ferris’s ‘Tribe of Mentors’ is also worth a listen. Are there any books that you would share? Jim Collins ‘Turning the Flywheel’, I found it to be an engaging read as he talks about the innovation engines that run a company and defining your innovation path. That’s been transformational to read. Andy Cunningham who is a good friend of our company, wrote a book called ‘Get to Aha!’ about brand identity which was really interesting. ‘The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing’ by Al Ries is also worth a read. What’s the future looking like for Specialized? We are at an interesting intersection. Looking forward, the company is approaching 50 years in private hands, so it’s an interesting moment. As COVID-19 has changed the world it is going to change cycling, I think. We have seen pop-up bike lanes happening in places like New Zealand and cities instantly becoming more bike friendly. The changes that are happening to the infrastructure across the world are moving very fast. There is a great sense of urgency, so we are really looking at how we can cut timelines on projects. We are putting all our force and power regarding innovation into the future of transport. Nobody is betting on a bike company to be the future of transportation, but we are definitely betting on ourselves. We think there is so much that we can bring to the table.
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SPARK LABS
Spark Works puts human-centered design front and centre to help individuals and businesses develop, especially in regards to innovation. Global Innovation Magazine spoke to Linda Armbruster to learn more about the work that they do.
Tell me a bit about your background? Yes, so my background is in art and design. I studied here in Zurich many years ago, back then I was interested in art and media. When I started I wanted to be an artist, a creative, but after a period of time of study I realised, the field of art was too abstract for me, too much focused on aesthetics and the ability of the artist to sell himself. Design, on the other hand, is very much about value creation and that’s the part I was missing.
‘Students took their learnings into the world, sharing the spark with others and starting innovation initiatives of their own’
After working a couple of years in the field of design, I then did a Masters in Strategic Design at the design akademie Berlin, looking at methodologies like design thinking, lean, agile etc. The program was very much focused on designing innovation processes, which got me interested in joining the design thinking program at the HPI d-school in Potsdam. After this I came back to Zürich, and met Alan (my co-founder). He was running Spark Labs (our research and education entity at ETHZ) back then. He and I started working together and soon founded Spark Works, our for profit consultancy. Today, I teach at ETHZ (after I went to Stanford
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and did the program on design thinking for educators) and have been running Spark Works for the last four years now. What was the idea in starting up Spark Works? We saw a big opportunity for something that was more focused on application, not only research and education. The students we educated at Spark Labs, took their learnings out into the world and into the organisations they would later work for, sharing the spark with others and starting innovation initiatives of their own. Also corporate partners from industry, kept coming back for support as they needed to explore new ways to innovate and maintain their competitive advantage. So we took that to expand beyond Spark Labs and serve a growing industry need. How does this work in the real world? There are two sides to what we do. One is market driven and aimed at developing new products, services and solutions. We use a lot of methodologies like lean startup and design thinking, off early in the innovation process to understand
the customer needs, especially with larger organisations. We conduct qualitative research, fieldwork and interviews. We do observations and secret shopping to step into the shoes of the user. How does it feel to be a customer using the product/ service, compared to the experience of using a competitor’s product?
own style of innovation culture.
We collect data and then translate those insights into actionable frameworks (such as personas or customer journeys) and novel solutions. The ideas we have are data driven. We always test our assumptions, so going back to the customer for validation is critical in our work. Rapid prototyping and user testings (for example in design sprints) help iteratively refine our concepts.
ETL (Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders): Leadership in a Crisis, which I recently listened to, it might be useful to anyone leading an organisation.
As an example we have recently worked with an insurance provider. They were looking at the household insurance market specifically for shared premises. They saw a growing market for this as it’s not just students living in these premises but also young professionals. We identified a couple of insights for this market segment, one example is that today, young people are used to Netflix and monthly subscriptions. They don’t want to sign up for two year subscriptions, especially when flat mates come and go. Also, often those young people don’t necessarily have a house full of expensive items, they would use IKEA or they may upcycle some of their family household items. What they do have are single items that are valuable to them, that might be a laptop or a smartphone. So the key is to make sure that these items are covered, and covered in any case, whether it is accidentally dropping their phone or having some kind of water damage. That means ensuring that the trust in the insurance provider is always there.
Any books?
We are really excited about this work. Are there any podcasts or videos you would want to share with our readers ?
High Resolution: Great series on how some of the best companies (in my opinion) approach, communicate and deploy design.
The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg. Very interesting in regards to innovation, as we know how hard it is to change an organisation’s culture and habits. Creating routines are a great way to start. You can learn more about Spark Labs at https://www.sparklabs.ch Spark Works at https://www.sparkworks.ch and Sparkademy at https://www.sparkademy.com
On the basis of the findings, the insurance team and us developed a product over several iterations and built various prototype‘s. We took it all the way through to a validated concept and a viable business model. This was taken to the company’s management board and financing was agreed for a minimal viable product. The MVP was then developed by a specialist provider working in the insurance field. That’s where Spark Works usually pulls out, as the next steps are very much about the implementation, but the client continued and the product is now on the market. You mentioned there was another side to what you do? Yes, one side is very market and solution driven. The other side is very similar to the famous analogy regarding fishing, in that if you give a person a fish they can eat for a day, if you give them a fishing rod, they will be able to eat for several days. In context, what does this mean? It is very much about working with the organisation to develop their innovation skills and capabilities internally, as these skills are very much needed for long-term agile, customer-centred work. Together with management we define long-term goals for innovation and then design a (sustainable) plan of action that is aligned with the organisations strategy. We have a spin-off program which is called Sparkademy. It offers a scalable corporate certification program, designed to identify and enable change agents to foster an innovation culture. The program is designed to align an organisation’s innovation objectives, identify potential innovation catalysts and foster the skill set needed to develop internal innovation enablers, supporting companies to promote and sustain their GLOBAL INNOVATION MAGAZINE 2020 | 21
let us introduce ourselves.
We are pencil and coffee a digital solutions agency Web design, Twitter Management, Facebook Management, Online Marketing
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and Coffee Single_v2.indd 1
18/10/201
THE OCTUNNUMI The Octunnumi Fosbit Files Prologue, debut novel by fantasy fiction author Trevor Alan Foris, is causing quite a stir in the book world – and not just because of the gripping narrative. We managed to catch up with Scariodintt Publisharys, the publishing house of this exceptional piece of, one could call it… art, to find out more about why the angst and just how this is more than a great read…
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So, what sets this apart from your average novel and just how is this more than a great read? The Octunnumi offers pure escapism… an invitation to the magical. We wanted to do it justice, so in order to take advantage of associated digital technology we initially created an online virtual reading experience which allowed for the use of interactive elements… elements that are not feasible in print. So an eBook? Well, yes in the true sense of the word electronic – but no, not in the visuals. Our fabulous team were able to create a beautiful page-turning virtual digital book with some lovely interaction. However, it seems that you just cannot beat the real thing – our readers, whilst enjoying the virtual option, were asking for a physical book. A physical book, it appears, cannot be substituted. And to be honest, we have to agree. The joy of being drawn to that one cover that invites you to select it from the many on offer, there really is nothing like it – the feel, the look, and of course the smell – old or new – the redolence of a printed book has the ability to awaken the emotions. You don’t get that with digital! Even though we still love our virtual publications, physical books continue to offer something more – something magical. It was this that inspired us to take our publications from the virtual to the physical. Leaving the interactive elements behind? You would think so, yes, but we really did not want to compromise on the immersive reading experience that is The Octunnumi, and with all of the truly amazing technological advances we have at our fingertips these days, we wanted to create a reading adventure to match the narrative, so the idea of introducing some fun elements in the form of augmented reality on, in, and throughout the book, was born. Of course, it is all down to the fabulous talent that is Fiona Merrilees that it was even possible for us to consider the use of AR and we are constantly in awe of Fiona’s ability to turn our ramblings into reality via our app. Yes, The Octunnumi app… it’s free to use, 24 | GLOBAL INNOVAION MAGAZINE 2020
and complements the book…? Yes, that’s right. The Octunnumi app, downloadable from Apple or Google, allows you to access the hidden layers of The Octunnumi – this epic fantasy is already quite something – both the visual and tactile finishes complement each other, making it a stunning item in its own right but we wanted to offer so much more…we wanted it to have life over and above a literary/aesthetic level. With the addition of pages going live with new AR on an ongoing basis, the potential for new content is limitless and is being added continuously… a full list of what is currently available is on the app and also our website, with announcements of enhancements becoming active being posted periodically on our twitter feed. There is also an awesome original music score created by Kirby Spencer – there are not many books that have that listed on their copyright page and it is fabulous – so make sure you have your sound on loud! And yes, it does complement the book but there are also other aspects to it – for example, each copy of The Octunnumi comes with a language guide – or the ‘3 T’s’ – Tarelen Tongue Twisters – as we have termed them – presented in the form of a booklet which can also be used as a page holder while reading. However, even with the meticulous phonic breakdown provided by our Tarelen language expert, Lorin, it is still a tricky language to grasp. Because of this, we developed an audio version too – which, thanks to the dulcet tones of the marvellous Simon Jackson, who made an incredible voiceover for each Tarelen word and name, you can now pop over to the app and hear it for yourself – so, for the reader who likes to get their fantasy language just so, it’s a perfect combination. So, would I be right in assuming this is just scratching the surface? Oh, for sure – we have only just begun to understand the scope of what can be done. To have such a dynamic storyline to work with, the boundaries needed to be pushed – quite literally. The app offers the opportunity to venture deeper than the cover, page and text, expanding the everywhere but nowhere aspect of The Octunnumi, exploring the hidden in plain sight angle, and so introducing you to the world of The Octunnumi, the Tarelens, and the others that live in the lands they protect – insights to their habitat… that sort of thing – but mostly it will give you
the chance to acquaint yourself with the Mechamata – The Octunnumi’s very own fusion of the automata and the mechanical. As an added bonus to the AR additions being made for everyone with a copy, there are also limited edition ARs that can only be accessed on a select number of books, so whether you buy a first edition or a millionth, you will still have something that only a few others have. And the response to these innovations? Well, that’s where the angst comes in. Our readers have been absolutely amazing.
There’s a quote… something along the lines of ‘creatives spend most of their time being misunderstood’ and in the beginning this was very much the case. At every stage we were hitting barriers – from the layout to the cover. Fortunately, we eventually found our team and we are now blessed with having phenomenal talent on board. We cannot thank them enough for all of the dedicated hard work each and every being involved with the production of The Octunnumi has brought to the finished product and continue to do so.
– there are currently a further eleven volumes planned… The Octunnumi Fosbit Files Prologue is available from: www.the-octunnumi.com
After that, it was a case of trying to convey the concept to our potential readership.
The Octunnumi really has something for everyone, techy minded or not – great narrative, great design and now great AR. On top of this, our readers have become our ambassadors – we are very lucky to have such a fabulous collective joining us. However, initially, some traditional outlets did struggle to see the potential in the crossover between technology and print, which is of course understandable. The threat of the eBook and online outlets to the High Street retailers, has been palpable and for a while, traditional publishing as a whole looked to be in trouble. The resulting backlash towards anything that is not traditional in the publishing world has been viewed with scepticism, especially anything technological – some stores even banning phones completely – so at the concept stage of The Octunnumi, the thought of inviting the very technology that threatens your existence into your house, or in this case, onto your shelves, was something of a hard sell. Fortunately, though, attitudes are changing and as soon as the buyers have sight of a copy, the benefits of encouraging a cross section of potential readers through the door has become apparent, and interest has spiked from all sectors, which is fabulous – we are very much about embracing the new, not ignoring it. What were the challenges in getting it off the ground? Getting the right people for the job.
We already knew that The Octunnumi had a strong following from the reaction to the online version but trying to find a way to share our vision for the physical book was quite a different challenge. As with all things unfamiliar, the biggest hurdle is to make the extraordinary seem ordinary. By its very nature, The Octunnumi is a visual delight – not only in its design and typography, but also its ability to cross between technological and traditional consumption – and there is a lot going on with this publication and that is not easily explained, especially when there is nothing to compare it with. Plenty of ups and downs then – any highlights? Without a doubt the feedback and support from our readers. They have been both gracious and complimentary with their kind words. Building a great team, of course, and seeing the finished product… but I think our biggest achievement is to be able to support the great work that Goodheart Animal Sanctuaries are doing – we are extremely proud to be associated with this marvellous charity, and each book sale generates a donation to their cause. https://www.goodheartanimalsanctuaries.com/ What’s next? Do you have another project lined up? You could say that. As mentioned, we are adding new content retrospectively to the current books so we are constantly working on that, and then there is the small matter of the continuation of The Octunnumi series GLOBAL INNOVATION MAGAZINE 2020 | 25
5 BITS OF HIKING GEAR FOR BACKPACKERS Hiking is great whatever time of year, so with a bit of spare time on our hands recently we have been enjoying the great outdoors in a multitude of ways. Sit back and revel in our top picks for the accompaniments to your hiking expedition, or ‘walk’ if you’re so inclined.
Millican Fraser Rucksack 18L Millican have produced a range entitled the Maverick collection, and from that we have Fraser The Rucksack which is a lightweight option that has hidden pockets and compression straps. Equally at home in a hotel, as on the hills. Millican is the real deal in so many ways, check them out at https://www.homeofmillican.com/ Millican Fraser Rucksack 18L
Millican Core Roll Pack Another option from Millican is the Core Roll Pack designed for the everyday. Simple and uncompromising in how it looks and made from 100% recycled post consumer plastic waste. Millican Core Roll Pack
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OHM Mountain Raid 1.6 Sleeping Bag From the OHM we have this Mountain Raid 1.6 sleeping bag. Several features are worth mentioning including the hood drawcord and the half length YKK zip pull. It’s easy to look after as well. Mountain Raid Sleeping Bag
Bridgedale Storm Sock Bridgedale Storm Sock - Bridgedale do good socks, that’s for sure. The lining is smooth, comfortable and contains Merino, which is known for its anti-odour and anti-bacterial properties. This sock draws moisture away from your skin, and with added Lycra you can be sure that it will be a snug fit. Men’s Waterproof Socks
ROCLITE G 345 GTX hiking boot from Inov-8 These award winning boots from Inov-8 https://www. inov-8.com/ are the world’s first hiking footwear to utilise Graphene (the world’s strongest material). Collaborating with graphene experts at The University of Manchester, inov-8 is the first brand in the world to use the Nobel Prize winning material in sports shoes and now hiking footwear. https://www.inov-8.com/roclite-g-345-gtx-mensgraphene-hiking-boot enet lam accae nobitincid eatur.
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4.5 media Global Innovation Magazine is the trading name of 4.5 media. To find out more viist - www.4point5media.com. To read more articles about innovation or to contact us visit Global Innovation Magazine Website
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