Innovation and IP Strategy: Even More Important Now

In Vijay Govindarajan's blog, "Strategy and Innovation," his April 12th entry responds to a recent BusinessWeek article, "Is Innovation Too Costly in Hard Times?"

From the article, IBM Chief Executive Samuel Palmisano, states, "Some may be tempted to hunker down, to scale back their investment in innovation. While that might make sense during a cyclical downturn, it's a mistake when you're going through a major shift in the global economy."

Vijay echoes that sentiment in his video on the blog: "Innovation has become more important, not less important."

He goes on to say that post-recession, the competitive business landscape changes, and that new winners and new losers emerge. The new winners are those who have found ways to continue innovating in smart, different, yet cost conscious ways.

We could not agree more! But we would add that intellectual property (IP) is a key component of an innovation strategy.

The "right" IP portfolio that effectively backs your lean, mean innovation process is an essential piece of creating success out of the downturn. It is every company's challenge and opportunity to shift market position and emerge as a more powerful entity as the economy shifts upward.

Shrewd analysis of your IP portfolio will lead to more strategic, directed actions for both building on the opportunity areas and divesting IP from less critical technology and product areas.

Do you know enough about your IP portfolio to make these business-critical decisions? Has this information been correctly matched up with internal business shifts to take full advantage of repositioning in the economy?

Conducting the work to answer these questions, paired with company business objectives, will set the course for markedly better results reaching into the coming economic upturn.