"Uber" innovation: Travis Kalanick

Aquí el artículo original desde Knowledge@Wharton

Extracto introductorio:

"Travis Kalanick is no stranger to corporate fisticuffs. The tech entrepreneur brought down the wrath of the film and music industries after starting a peer-to-peer service in 1998 called Scour, which was similar to Napster in that it allowed consumers to swap digital media files with each other. Two years later, filmmakers and TV producers sued his company for copyright infringement to the tune of $250 billion. Scour went out of business.

Kalanick later developed a content delivery system that he called his "revenge business" because, ironically, some of his former entertainment industry foes ended up becoming clients, according to a February article in Fortune. While this company, Red Swoosh, initially ran into financial problems, it would be sold for $15 million to Akamai Technologies in 2007 -- but not before Kalanick became so destitute that he had to move in with his mother. Fortune described the 30-something UCLA dropout as "brilliant," but "brash and headstrong" and "happy to charge off a cliff with an innovative idea."

He seems to be charging headlong off that cliff again with his latest venture, Uber. The three-year-old San Francisco start-up provides private car service -- mostly using a fleet of higher-end vehicles, including sleek black Lincoln town cars but also taxis -- to customers who love the site's white-glove service and do not mind the premium pricing. Riders summon the cars using a smartphone app. But the company also has attracted the ire of municipalities such as New York City, San Francisco, Boston, Washington, D.C., and Chicago. Officials in those cities say Uber's service runs afoul of local rules designed to ensure pricing transparency and public safety, among other allegations. Moreover, Uber is also fighting a lawsuit filed by taxi companies."

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¿Qué se puede anotar?

1. Que en todas partes se "cuecen habas"; ingenuamente pensaba que el tema-problema de la intervención-regulación al servicio de Taxis era sólo de por acá, del mundo del subdesarrollo :-/

2. Que la tecnología (as usual) sigue siendo la fuerza monumental cuando se trata de "poner patas arriba" (y así eventualmente mejorar) un producto/servicio anquilosado en privilegios y bajo el sopor de la falta de competidores :-)

3. Que a los innovadores de verdad (como a Travis Kalanick) no sólo los distingue todo lo que ya se ha dicho aquí y en muchas partes sobre su creatividad y coraje, sino además su total disposición a (pase lo que pase) re-escribir las "reglas"; o mejor, eliminarlas del todo; lo que sin duda los hace más simpáticos aún (para el suscrito :-)

Un decálogo para emprendedores innovadores

Aquí la página de Apps.co de dónde fue tomada

"Nosotros los emprendedores Apps.co creemos en:

1.El riesgo como tu compañero de aventura, lo que es Robin a Batman o Pinky a Cerebro.

2.La necesidad de revisar muy bien tu emprendimiento si crees que lo único que necesitas es dinero.

3.Que tu éxito depende de tu capacidad de probar y validar tus hipótesis en el mercado, trabajar en red y crear comunidades.

4.Apasionarse por el emprendimiento. Pero no dejar que está sea la única consejera en la toma de tus decisiones. La razón y la perseverancia te llevan a materializar tu pasión y tener resultados.

5.Que si creas una propuesta de valor que apasione tanto a tus clientes no podrán imaginar sus días sin ti.

6.Que el camino al éxito está pavimentado con lecciones de aquellos que fallaron y aprendieron de sus errores. Fallar es clave, si no lo haces duda de tu emprendimiento.

7.Las ideas compartidas se enriquecen y multiplican. Escondidas se debilitan y mueren.

8.Que la creatividad e innovación te ayudan a descubrir los caminos. La creatividad ilumina tu camino y el aprendizaje continuo afirma tus pasos.

9.Que las intuiciones no son negocios, los negocios se construyen con perseverancia, trabajo duro y pasión.

10.Que el tamaño del reto es directamente proporcional a los desafíos que tienes que enfrentar y a las recompensas que podrás obtener."

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¿Y quién califica como emprendedor innovador?

R/ El que no se rinde jamás: lo logra, o, (triste pero valientemente) perece en el esfuerzo :-)

Investigación de Mercados y Big Data

Aquí la entrada completa desde Innovations Tools

Extracto introductorio:

"The combination of Big Data and ethnographics can be a potent toolset for uncovering innovation opportunities, as a growing number researchers are discovering.

For many years, marketing has been in love with Big Data as a means of discerning what customers want and delivering products and services to them. In this role, it has been a lagging indicator, telling us what consumers are doing and have done, but it has been of limited utility by itself as a driver of innovation.

At the same time, ethnography has been growing in importance as a tool to "go deep" and understand what challenges customers are having by observing them in their natural environment. Often, this illuminates jobs to be done and pain points that cannot be discovered in any other way. This type of input tends to be more reliable than focus groups, where customers are brought into a sanitized environment and asked a series of questions. Taking them out of the context in which they use a product tends to skew their answers, and once again is backward looking. Consumers can easily tell us what they are using and doing today, but are notoriously bad at articulating what their unmet or future needs may be. For example, a focus group could have never envisioned the Apple iPhone."

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Parece como si finalmente todo el esfuerzo (de algunos pioneros) de construir una ciencia desde el marketing, una que resuelva óptimamente, velozmente, y continuamente las "necesidades básicas" del ser humano, estuviera coronando. Son buenas noticias sin duda, porque resuelto lo anotado, quizá podamos finalmente empezar a ver más allá del agite diario del sueño y los apetitos, con unos ojos y una visión que hasta ahora no hemos tenido; que no han tenido tampoco los que desde siempre han dormido y apetecido en calma :-)

Tele[a distancia]Comunicación - Innovación - Local[cerca]ización

Aquí el reciente Special Report from The Economist: A sense of place

Extracto introductorio:

"THERE WAS SOMETHING odd about the black car at the junction of Sutter and Hyde Streets. It was an ordinary saloon. Its windows were clear, and it looked in good condition. And yet, as the lights changed and the car pulled away into the bright San Francisco morning, a question remained. Why was it sporting a luxuriant pink moustache at its front?

The moustache is the trade mark of Lyft, a ride-sharing service that began in the city this summer. Its drivers are private individuals who, in effect, rent out seats in their cars for a few dollars a time. Lyft’s cut is 20%. It works through a smartphone app. When you register as a customer, you supply your phone number and credit-card details. When you want a ride, you open the app and see a map with the locations of the nearest moustachioed motors. You tap to request a ride, and the app shows you your driver’s name, his rating by past passengers (out of five stars) and photos of him and his car. He will probably greet you with a friendly fist-bump. Afterwards you rate him and pay through the app. He rates you, too, so if you are poor company you may not get another Lyft." ...

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En verdad algo así no podría haber sucedido hace 30 años; no sólo porque aún no teníamos los c-phones, sino también porque vivíamos en una época en la que la "propiedad" o era desestimada por unos (hippies), o exageradamente estimada (hasta venerada) por otros: y tenida por símbolo de poder... En la carretera la cosa era (ligeramente) diferente... Lo interesante, y novedoso, de esta historia con la que comienza el Special Report, es la combinación (eventualmente m a s i v a) de 1)optimización económica, y 2)construcción de relacionamiento humano. Algo está pasando :-)

El DNA de los Innovadores (8): "Diversity of experience"

Aquí su página en Amazon

The Innovator's DNA: Mastering the Five Skills of Disruptive Innovators
Jeff Dyer (Author)
Hal Gregersen (Author)
Clayton M. Christensen (Author)

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Nunca se sabe cómo se van a "juntar los puntos" :-)

De esto puedo dar testimonio por experiencia propia. Y lo más sorprendente: la cantidad de veces, que una cantidad de gente, no alcanza jamás a dar el paso que permite "juntar los puntos", no obstante estar estos ahí: al frente de los ojos, a unos centímetros de la punta de la nariz.

El DNA de los Innovadores (7): "Tap Outside Experts"

Aquí su página en Amazon

The Innovator's DNA: Mastering the Five Skills of Disruptive Innovators
Jeff Dyer (Author)
Hal Gregersen (Author)
Clayton M. Christensen (Author)

***

La especialización del conocimiento (al lograrlo, al utilizarlo, etc.) es la gran ganancia, y pérdida al mismo tiempo, de la época moderna (1.500 DC en adelante). Quizá lo que los innovadores han descubierto vía el desarrollo de esta skill no es otra cosa que el inicio de un remedio a esta lamentable situación: que la ganancia TENGA QUE SER pérdida al mismo tiempo.

Blueseed: facilitando la innovación (una curiosidad... pero así están las cosas :-)

Ver aquí su sitio Web

"Blueseed is a project to station a ship 12 nautical miles from the coast of San Francisco, in international waters. The location will allow startup entrepreneurs from anywhere in the world to start or grow their company near Silicon Valley, without the need for a US work visa. The ship will be converted into a coworking and co-living space, and will have high-speed Internet access and daily transportation to the mainland via ferry boat. So far, over 1000 entrepreneurs from 60+ countries expressed interest in living on the ship. The project is backed by PayPal founder and Facebook early investor Peter Thiel. "

"Why Blueseed?

Because Google and Yahoo! and Intel and other famous companies that were co-founded by immigrant entrepreneurs, have created tens of thousands of jobs, and have built products and services that we all use every day. But who knows how many other companies we don’t have, because their immigrant co-founders were not allowed to remain in Silicon Valley?"

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"Why not simply telecommute?

Shane Mac, Director of Product at successful startup Zaarly, gives seven reasons why early-stage companies should start up in the same physical office space.

Many businesses can be run successfully from anywhere in the world, using collaboration software and teleconferencing. Other businesses are much more likely to succeed in an environment where people interact in person, and startups are a great example of that. Google, LinkedIn, Twitter, Groupon, Zynga – they didn’t start online; they started thanks to the serendipity of a place that allowed the founders to meet and work together with the talent they needed, face-to-face.

Risks of working remotely include employees missing interaction with colleagues, becoming physically drained by travel, growing unhappy, or being recruited by other companies. Peter Norvig, director of research for Google, said in a Forbes interview:

It’s 11 hours to Hyderabad. We do video conferences where we’re up late and they’re up early. Maybe a video conference is as good as a formal meeting, but there are no informal meetings. As a result, we lose the pace of work, and we lose trust.

Best-selling author Ori Brafman has a short video on how proximity plays a major role in helping individuals form instant connections with others. While telepresence using robots such as Vgo or Anybots is somewhat successful, iRobot CEO Colin Angle said, “The products that have launched so far are really videoconferencing on a remote, driveable platform. It has some appeal, but they don’t build a version of you in a remote location able to be as effective as you would in person.”

In November 2011, ABC News reported on the story of Amit Aharoni, an Israeli startup entrepreneur who, after creating 9 American jobs, received a letter from the US Citizenship and Immigration Serice (USCIS) denying his visa request and notifying him to leave the country immediately. Aharoni left for Vancouver and tried to run his company (an online cruise booking service) remotely via Skype. That didn’t quite work out, so he set to work on making his story public. After ABC World News picked up the story, USCIS reversed their decision within 24 hours. The moral is that running a startup remotely can be big enough of a pain to warrant mounting a media campaign, and that unless they manage to attract massive media attention, a startup entrepreneur without a valid visa may have to relocate their operations outside of the U.S."