Automakers - Ascendancy to Advancement

Cars are no longer just cars -- they have become "computers on wheels." Cars now have more computing power than PCs or smart phones, running on millions of lines of software code, and loaded with sensors - “Smart Planet”

For the first time in the last 10 years, Auto companies have dominated into the top league of the world’s most innovative companies list released by Boston Consulting Group.  While Toyota has leapfrogged into the top 5 of the list, Ford and BMW have moved into the top 10 list. 

This is interesting as, this implies the shift in strategy from being Customer Delight to Innovation gaining prominence across industries to succeed in the new century. 

BCG says an increasing emphasis on more fuel-efficiency, intelligent safety systems, and in-vehicle and vehicle-to-vehicle communications is driving much of the renewed innovation in the auto sector

Perhaps it's because auto companies have become technology companies

The dominance of innovation will be more rapid as customer delight will become order of the day for survival and companies will move ahead towards continuous innovation to be successful  

The changing dynamics of the globalization will make more organizations to move towards collaborative innovation to stay sustained in high growth platform.  Design thinking and inclusive innovation within the organization and innovation outsourcing will help enterprises to move up the value chain faster in a volatile and ever changing business environment.

Tesla’s bid to produce a self-driving electric car, BMW’s  light-weight assembly for electric cars and GM  electric-car aspirations are few other interesting stories besides Autonomous cars and Cars on Hydrogen/Water as fuel which are expected to happen in due course.

“The bar is continuing to rise for what it means to be a world-class innovator,” says Andrew Taylor, a BCG partner who works on innovation strategy. 

Innovation is no longer the buzzword of tech firms, but companies in all industries must be on top of their creative game to compete.

 

T Margabandhu

Marggo India