Is the race too fast for Innovation?

 Are we going too fast? When was the last time an innovative product took market by surprise? Is your company innovating? Is the world innovating fast enough?

These are few questions I ask myself when I read news every day and see nothing but venture capital backed tech companies selling some service which at the end of the day might be disrupting market, but not creating any value for its investors. Bleeding accounts pleading investors to hold on for long-term returns has become a norm today. Eventually investors are looking for a bigger fool who would pay them back for their mistake. But what about product? When was the last time we saw an innovative product that totally changed the market? For me it was maybe a microwave, mobile phone, or an air fryer (Don’t know about innovation, but I just love it!). Weren’t these products launched more than two decades ago? and developed may be three to four decades back. What about the last ten years? Is it because innovation has stopped happening, or because innovative products don’t find investors to support them. I guess I have put forward too many questions to answer.

As far as my understanding goes, I think that its not that simple to answer these questions. In my opinion innovation takes time and patience, and frankly in today’s world that’s one thing that people and conglomerates don’t have. Where companies are under constant pressure to come out with a new phone every year since smart phone came to market, the product as such has improved, but not innovated. Almost a century ago, the story tellers would imagine that in 2020 there would be flying cars, vehicle running on water, food growing instantly, everyone travelling to space, and people living an artificially prolonged life. I guess the only innovation that has taken place is in the movies and not in the real life. We are still totally dependent on fossil fuel and the cars don’t even fly. Further, the stagnation in innovation is leading to an over usage and over dependence on already scarce resources. A few years ago I read an article mentioning that lithium reserves would last almost two centuries. Well, recent studies suggest that we might start facing shortage as soon as 2025.

My two cents on this! innovation is not something that happens in a day. It takes time, probably more than the world right now is willing to give, and it requires constant investment in R&D without thinking too much about returns. It also requires patiently creating markets for innovative products and not just killing products because they don’t seem to generate profit. Its believing in ideas and waiting for everyone else to believe in them, even though it takes time. In my opinion the investors across the world need to converge their funds to support innovation and help innovative products survive in the market. If this does not happen, then we probably won’t see cars running on water, even though the first car running on hydrogen was made as early as in 1960’s. 

Don’t let new ideas and product just succumb to the economics of business so soon. Be patient with them and let them breathe in the market. May be with further improvements and investments the cost would come down and the economics would work out. To quote an example, the mobile phones haven’t become cheaper with time, but still people pay for them because they can no longer live without them. There is no bigger proof to prove my point, “Innovation takes time in creating dependence”.

My concluding words are for the companies who make billions of dollars, but as soon as stagnation and recession hit them, the first solution they find is to reduce the R&D cost.

“COMPANIES CANNOT FIGHT THE COST OF STAGNATION BY INVESTING LESS IN INNOVATION”

 

Keep creating

Manan