Discrete Innovation Of 3M

Loose and tight innovate The mechanism enables 3M to minimize the risk of innovation and ensure that products with genuine business prospects are finally acquired. business The success of chemistry.

One evening in 1990, an engineer at 3M's Central Academy walked out of the office despondily and worked hard for years. fibre The research and development results have long been stranded due to the failure to find suitable commercial uses. For this reason, he didn't even make a few jokes with his colleagues as usual and leave again.

But time has changed everything. The news came from the United States in 2005 that made the engineer finally smile. Aiming at the shortage of power supply caused by the defects of traditional power transmission, 3M has successfully developed a reinforced composite aluminum conductor (ACCR) and has been successfully applied to business. Among them, the patented technology is the application of this engineer's ceramic fiber research and development results.

"Ceramic fibers and electric wires are two seemingly dissimilar products. They met 15 years later and produced a truly commercialized use. This is the power of 3M's discrete innovation. " Liu Yaoqi, general manager of 3M Asia Pacific R & D center and general manager of 3M China research and development center, said Dr.

Creative dispersion

3M is famous for its courage to innovate and products. In its 100 years of history, it has developed over 60 thousand kinds of high quality products. From household products to medical supplies, transportation and construction, commerce, education, electronics and communications have greatly changed the way people live and work.

"Outside 3M is a discrete innovation. From dishcloth to computer screen, from the hook on the wall to the film on the car, as well as the parts on the spacecraft, they look like a horse. " Liu Yaoqi said, "in fact, the process of producing new products, new technologies and new ideas in the early stage is very discrete. But the most unique innovation culture of 3M is to connect these scattered ideas in a comprehensive way. Under such a mechanism, cooperation between 3M departments and cooperation among countries becomes a very natural thing. Innovative ideas are constantly emerging and snowball is getting bigger and bigger.

There are two main types of 3M Innovation: one is market oriented innovation, that is, what customers need, and what 3M develops, which is about 70%-80%. The Hangzhou Bay Bridge is an example of this innovation. As we all know, because the cross sea bridge needs special needs across the sea, if the steel bar is chosen as the load-bearing of the pier, the anti-corrosion technology will become the key to the success of the project. The main market of 3M anticorrosion products was oil and natural gas pipeline anticorrosion. After knowing the needs of customers, 3M China team cooperated with local anticorrosive manufacturers. After two years, we developed products suitable for corrosion prevention of steel pipe columns. Not only can it resist the long-term invasion and immersion of seawater, but also its corrosion protection can last for several decades, successfully solving the problems of customers.

The other is technology oriented innovation, that is, first technology, then application, which is about 20%-30%. One of the most innovative technologies of 3M is the multilayer optical brightening technology currently used in LCD. It is this technology that has opened up a new business area for the global ultra thin optical film and has formed a broad blue ocean market in 3M. This membrane technology is widely used in flat screen televisions, computer monitors, notebook computers and mobile phone screens. Its purpose is to improve brightness, improve picture quality and reduce energy consumption.

"Over the past 100 years, 3M has been able to produce innovative products continuously, and it is inseparable from the good interaction process between market driven and technology driven." Liu Yaoqi said.

NPI mechanism convergence creativity

3M has been transformed into an astonishing product commercialization speed. Every year, nearly 500 kinds of new products are developed and promoted, and 3 new products are developed on average every two days. 3M has a new product vitality index, specifically measuring the speed of innovation, and encouraging various departments to continue to introduce new ideas. At present, the average annual sales revenue of 36-37% in China comes from the new products developed in the past 5 years. In order to keep pace with China's rapid development, 3M R & D center has set up a new product vitality index for the R & D team to reach 45% in the next 5 years.

For discrete innovation 3M, how do they manage the new product development process, and ensure the success rate of R & D?

"Although the 3M R & D and operation field is extremely extensive, we focus on 46 core platforms for innovation." Liu Yaoqi said. These 46 core technology platforms include various materials and technology platforms, such as adhesives, films, etc., as well as various processing technology platforms, such as micro replication, surface treatment, and cutting-edge basic sciences, such as nanotechnology, biotechnology, and new energy technologies. In the future, 3M will adjust the quantity and content of core platforms according to market demand.

It is understood that before the introduction of new product commercialization process (NPI), 3M's innovation activities are relatively casual, and there is no unified process to regulate and control the process of innovation. Creativity always comes green from the beginning to the end, but it may not be until the end that few customers need this product.

3M company must ensure that the annual R & D investment and creativity do not play the role of "water drift", and there must be an efficient transformation mechanism. "Now, when the idea is selected, it will enter a very strict management process. There are several stages and several thresholds for product evaluation, and there are many examinations, and management has intervened a lot." According to Liu Yaoqi, in 2004, 3M's managers introduced a very mature mechanism inside the new product commercialization process (NPI), which included 7 links: putting forth innovative ideas (Ideation), forming concepts (Concept), feasibility analysis (Feasibility), product development (Development), quantifying production (Scale up), entering the market (Launch), and introspection and improvement (Post-launch). After the implementation of NPI in 3M, the entry of products into the market is only a part of management rather than an end. Through this systematic new product development process, we can help new products with business prospects to enter the market successfully.

After the feasibility of new product development was established, 3M began to fight the team and worked out a complete set of risk control plans, from the development, manufacturing, distribution, customer use to the final disposal process, and put forward a full set of R & D and commissioning programs. "Our innovation is a complete process." Liu Yaoqi said. Such a loose and tight innovation mechanism will enable 3M to minimize innovation risks and ensure the commercialization of products with genuine business prospects.

But these can not guarantee that all the beautiful ideas and ideas can be transformed into "instant" products, and many products are stifled in the embryonic stage of creativity. "The idea of innovation is ultimately 10% of commercialization." "This is very cruel for other good ideas," Liu Yaoqi said. But 3M also has a "Resurrection mechanism" that can be traced back to the items that had been strangled. Therefore, the beginning of this article is often seen in 3M company.

Culture creates inspiration.

3M's creativity is not born in nature. One of the secrets of 3M's innovation is striving to create an internal environment conducive to innovation. It not only includes annual sales of about 6% per year for technology research and product development. Even in the 2009 financial crisis, it maintained 5.6% of R & D investment, and more importantly, set up an enterprise culture conducive to innovation.

To motivate engineers, 3M will organize extensive brainstorming sessions on formal and informal occasions. The technology forum is the traditional activity of 3M company for over 50 years. The technical forum of the Chinese team is the most active in the world. "My task for the technology forum is to allocate funds, give them time and encourage them to do so. As for what kind of activities they organize and how to spend the money, I will not ask. I believe they must be doing meaningful work. This is a spontaneous process. " Liu Yaoqi said.

In addition, 3M China R & D center has developed an innovative management mode with unique Chinese characteristics -- the "28 hour innovation competition", which promotes the training of potential senior engineers. According to Liu Yaoqi, in a match in 2008, 3M divided the staff into 15 groups according to different departments, four or five people as a group and 150 yuan per team for the participants. In the two projects that were not announced in advance, employees were asked to start the product design and physical model in 28 hours starting from half past eight a.m. on Friday, and show them to the judges at the scene. In this competition, 6 entries from 15 teams were recorded as inventions and 1 patent applications. The event attracted 3M global companies to follow suit.

The innovation of 3M is a chain reaction. At the same time, every technology platform is serving multiple business departments. 3M has an open concept: "products belong to the business department and technology belongs to the whole company". 3M encourages any technical department or business department to cross sectoral cooperation without approval, and the company allows each employee to use 15% of their working hours to innovate freely - to do some personal interest work programmes, whether or not they are directly beneficial to the company's current needs. "These systems can not be achieved by every company." Liu Yaoqi said.