The Rapid Innovation Cycle—An innovation and market testing process for new products and services development Chris D. McCoy1, Zubin Chagpar2, and Igor Tasic3 1
University of California, Berkeley, USA
[email protected] 1 IE Business School, Madrid, Spain 2 IE Business School, Madrid, Spain
[email protected] 3 Atlantico Partners,
[email protected]
ABSTRACT The Rapid Innovation Cycle (RIC) is an innovation and market testing process that was developed in 2011 out of the need to assess the market potential for new product and service innovations in hopes to improve economic conditions in Spain (Figure 1). The belief is that technology and service innovations represent a strong component of the economic strength of any country (Nothhaft, 2011). The Rapid Innovation Cycle consists of four key phases: Opportunity Recognition, Solution Selection, Market Experimentation and Experimental Results. In each of these four phases, various steps are taken to 1) find a market opportunity 2) define a solution within a given set of constraints (Tasic, 2008), 3) create a market test to assess demand for the proposed solution and 4) use quantitative market test results to make wellinformed decisions on a given business venture.
I INTRODUCTION A. Motivations For This Study In late 2010 in Madrid, Spain, a product “idea” for smartphones was generated. But upon verbally describing the market opportunity, sufficient doubt was expressed amongst fellow engineers, business colleagues, friends and others whether this “idea” would be a market success. After hours of tiring and depressing speculations about its market potential (or lack thereof), the inventor decided to build a prototype to better explain the “idea” which would become a “minimum viable product” (MVP). A MVP can represent both a physical product or a semi-functional service (via a website, advertisement, etc.). Each MVP has their own opportunities and challenges. However, what typically is a simple prototyping endeavor in the U.S., the search for a local, low-volume manufacturer in Madrid, Spain proved to be difficult. Additionally, the concept of “inventing” something new received further speculation and awkward looks as culturally it was apparent that invention and innovation were uncommon and unwelcome.
Even in its short existence, the Rapid Innovation Cycle has now been used at the high school, undergraduate and graduate levels in order to assist new entrepreneurs, innovators and anyone else who wants to discover if their next big product or service innovation will succeed in the “unforgiving marketplace” (Blank, 2012). A typical challenge to starting a business is understanding product-market fit as these decisions are largely based on assumptions and market trends (Ries, 2011). The RIC aims to address this challenge by applying a series of qualitative and quantitative tools in typical business decision processes. Application of the RIC has helped several startups understand their markets and reduce time finding a sustainable business model. Two RIC cycle based startup companies are described, one from each type of market test: product- and service-oriented. Keywords: Hands-on, Rapid Innovation, Rapid Prototyping, Innovation Process, Minimum Viable Product, Market Testing, Effectuation, Crowd Funding, Crowd Sourcing.
Figure 1: The overall global youth unemployment rates for various countries with Spain topping the chart with 43.5 percent. Source: Eurostat.
Noting these significant product development and entrepreneurial challenges present in Spain, the connection was quickly drawn to its economic recession. In 2010, general unemployment was approximately ~20 percent and for youth, nearly 50 percent (Figure 1). Robert Solow—a Nobel Prize winning economist— claims that 80 percent of a country’s economic strength is based on technical innovation. These technical innovations create business competitive advantage thereby creating long-lasting local jobs in manufacturing, packaging, shipping, design, administrative services, sales, marketing, etc. While Nothhaft focuses on the entrepreneurial challenges present in the United States, the motivations for technological innovation remain valid within any country (Nothhaft, 2011). Other significant barriers common to entrepreneurship also noted in Spain are summarized by Sarasvathy (2004). Because of this need a course on innovation and a new process—the Rapid Innovation Cycle—were created.
B. Creating the Rapid Innovation Cycle The observation of how new products and services were createad (described in the case section) catalyzed the Rapid Innovation Cycle and drove the creation of the course Hands-on Rapid Innovation (@HandsOnRI). The course being based on the following pillars: A set of innovation tools, an entrepreneurial mindset (Kelley, 2010) and the Rapid Innovation Cycle. The combination yields a highly project based, intensive and hands on course on innovation (Figure 2).
Figure 3: The Rapid Innovation Cycle (RIC) is an innovation process intended to help innovators, entrepreneurs, executives, etc. determine market viability of their new product or service innovation. The four key phases are shown along with typical cycle times
II THE RAPID INNOVATION CYCLE The Rapid Innovation Cycle (Figure 3, Figure 4) is a four step innovation process designed originally for anyone who is responsible for generating product or service innovations that are sustainable and profitable within their company or startup (these people will be referred to as RIC participants).
Figure 4: The RIC cycle phases and their key components.
Figure 2: The key pillars of the course Hands-on Rapid Innovation (Twitter.com handle @HandsOnRI).
The product development process of both case studies highlighted both the local cultural and environmental challenges present to innovation as well as serving as the first execution of the RIC and will be described in the results section.
Unlike checklists, algorithms or other processes that suggest one is “done” upon completing a set of steps or by inputting data, the RIC requires that within each cycle, the RIC participant(s) draw valuable insights from the collected data from the market test and make an informed decision whether the product, service or internal solution should be executed and scaled up (this is similar to the Ries “build-test-learn” cycle for software companies) (Ries, 2011). The process can be used iteratively with varying cycle times, solving market needs both in the short term and the long term; however the examples in this research focused on short-term time-to-market projects (long-term time-to-market example would be the 3D printing of biological structures such as human organs or bone and heavily relies on significant and time intensive scientific or technological advancements). Lastly, it is interesting to note that while many people have a theoretical background on how business works and
how to successfully launch new companies, fewer have practical experience; and thus success rate of new companies is low (a rule of thumb success rate often cited by Venture Capital partners is about 1 in 10). The Rapid Innovation Cycle seeks to provide a low-risk method to practice business thereby ideally improving the success rate of entrepreneurial startup companies and / or intraprenurial corporate projects. The conventional hurdles to enter the marketplace are sufficiently large to prevent the majority of people interested in innovation from ever attempting to start a business that revolves around a product or service idea. Typical factors affecting innovation are a region’s education and human capital, governance and corruption, macroeconomic management, regulatory framework and gender equity (López-Claros, 2010). It is unclear how reducing the barriers to creating innovative companies via innovation processes like the RIC might impact the public—would quality decrease? Would people’s safety be put at risk? Would innovation happen at a faster rate? Would large companies be challenged by underdogs, thereby improving product and service offerings in general? However, it is hypothesized that the Rapid Innovation Cycle can actually help answer these questions in the sense that if an entrepreneur and their team execute successful market tests that suggest positive return on investment for their business opportunity, they can be more confident about investing more into their customers, the product, the service and the business in general rather than lose it investing in an unwanted product or service solution. Venkataraman (2003) describes that “a fear of realizing the downside of creating a new business biases one towards analysis. A bias for analysis significantly decreases the probability of business entry, but increases the probability of success.” The data collected from the RIC should assist these types of analyses and therefore increase the probability of building a successful business.
A. Opportunity Recognition (OR) The first phase of cycle allows anyone using the RIC to identify market opportunities. Sarasvathy (2002) describes “opportunity recognition” as an obvious existence of both supply and demand that is identified and is consequently brought into existence by a new or existing firm. In the context of the RIC, this phase typically includes effective brainstorming, seeing problems as opportunities, constantly looking at the world with fresh eyes, asking questions like: “what bothers you? What causes you pain in your business? What keeps you up at night?”, looking for workarounds (Figure 5), traveling and any other form of seeing the world around the observer as a source for numerous market opportunities.
Figure 5: An example how looking for workarounds can help identify a problem and define a market accepted solution. A simple door wedge is nothing new, but applying it to a different problem and adding features that may be interesting to different customers present new business opportunities. People exposed to this “market experiment” subjectively said they would pay about $US 4.00 for a gadget that costs less than $US 0.40 to produce. The next step would be to actually sell at that price and see what percentage of people would actually pay the “claimed” buying price of $US 4.00. Also a price skimming strategy could also be used.
“Entrepreneurial opportunities are rarely found, they have to be created and earned.” (Venkatamaran, 2003) Sarasvathy (2002) further identifies an entrepreneurial opportunity consisting of three key characteristics: 1) A new idea / invention that will possibly lead to the achievement to one or more economic ends, 2) beliefs about things favorable to the achievement of these possible valuable ends, and 3) actions that generate and implement those ends through specific new economic artifacts. At the end of the Opportunity Recognition phase, the user has a large number of recognized market opportunities and some ideas of technical solutions for them. But now, the participants need to choose the best or most promising opportunity depending on their goals. This filtering process happens in the Solution Selection phase.
B. Solution Selection (SS) Amongst the number of potential market opportunities generated in the previous OR phase, the RIC participants evaluate which idea is best suited for market testing. The plethora of ideas is quickly filtered by time limitations, financial constraints, the team’s technical abilities and the availability of other resources. All filtered ideas should be saved for future venture development. The “typical” market study which assesses competition, market size (both in revenue and people), trends, and other information relevant to a market / industry represents one component of solution selection but are far from the most important selection criteria. Traditional marketing studies are conducted with the assumption that the customers within this segment actually know what they want from a product or service. Consumers however have been academically proven to be unpredictable when they make purchase decisions (Armstrong, 1991). In fact, a typical quote (often referred to as the business tycoon Henry Ford) that describes such situations is
“If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.”
(Slocum, 1992) and / or the more familiar PESTLE, SWOT and “Porter’s 5 Forces” business analyses.
Additionally, the popular Steve Jobs was quoted in 1998 in Business Week to have said:
Once an opportunity is selected within the means and constraints of the RIC participants, the process of creating a market test begins.
“...people don’t know what they want until you show it to them.” Therefore, market studies can be used for supplemental information but not as the sole basis for the success of a future venture. Often their figures illustrating market potential can help place some financial importance and sustainability on a recognized opportunity. In addition to filtering based on the financial projections, other constraints such as time, resources and competition should be evaluated. The team that will develop the market test(s) needs to be qualified to either build or manage the construction of the market test—which can take many forms: physical product prototype, a service prototype, a mock website, a live website, survey, interviews with potential customers, teaser advertisements, etc. Anything that can be used to represent the market opportunity, collect feedback and assess the market acceptance of the solution. Clearly, a market test can be outsourced but the team needs to understand the financial, time and technical limitations. Table 1: Criteria for filtering market opportunities in the Solution Selection phase of the RIC.
Time Time window of market opportunity Technology development roadmap Time available to invest by founder(s), team, etc. Complexity of market test Expected time needed to collect sufficient market data
Resources Team capability to build, develop and execute market test Financial Access to specialized tools, equipment, locations, expertise Networks
Competition Pre-existing systems of use Larger players in the same or similar markets Direct competition Size and strength of direct competition
Clear, measurable and useful test metrics
One Solution Selection process is well described by Tasic (2008) using the effectuation model. Effectuation is the process of making decisions during times of uncertainty by understanding the resources currently available to the decision maker (or team) and their affordable losses. Other potential filtering methods include but are not limited to the Analytic Hierarchy Process as described in
C. Market Experimentation (ME) This part of the RIC is when participants begin committing personal resources to successfully executing the market test in order to transform ideas into products and services. If the first two phases are done well, the market test will be buildable, measure key variables in the target market, highlight the potential of the product and / or service. These data provide the RIC participants with invaluable information and insight into the viability of their recognized opportunity thereby reducing venture risk and uncertainty. Keep in mind that a decision to abort a recognized opportunity is a valid decision and can be seen as a success in the fact that an immense amount of time, effort and energy will be spared from developing something that is not marketable at this time. Market tests from a very basic level, should produce some mix of qualitative and quantifiable data by which the RIC participants can gain insight on their recognized opportunity. Additionally, because the opportunity was selected keeping in mind how the market test would be defined the work is now executing on building the market test. The market tests described below are mere examples and RIC participants are only bound by their creativity and the degree to which they are willing to bend or break moral, ethical and governmental laws in order to make innovative and insightful market tests. Product-oriented Market Tests Market tests that evaluate the viability of a product are typically in the form of a physical prototype. In the context of market testing, the term: “minimum viable product” aka MVP is often used (Ries, 2011) and is a product that is at a point in its development where a customer is willing to “pay” to obtain the product. For product market tests, this is typically a payment in the form of cash. But in the world online market places and platform websites, often times customers make equally significant purchase-like gestures via user registrations, offering personal information, completing tasks and freemium-style payments. The main goal of the prototype is to show how a new product works rather than simply explain the idea or concept. Many people struggle to understand a new innovation without seeing or touching it in person. Additionally, it non-discretely demonstrates a personal investment and commitment to the venture (helpful when pitching to an investor or potential co-founder). Even more powerful are the prototypes that are 100 percent functional and can be purchased (albeit at a reduced quality, reduced customer service, etc.). Not all prototypes have to be “incomplete” or unpolished per the common perception of a prototype, but the cost per part is typically high in traditional manufacturing in low volumes, and for market testing, only as many parts as
necessary to get sufficient data should be made (affordable loss). In the context of the course Hands-on Rapid Innovation, prototyping is broken down into three categories based on available development time. They are informally known as “office hacking”, “24 hour prototyping” and “48 hour prototyping.”
designed to be representative of the product concept so that potential customers can give more accurate feedback on whether or not it is a product they would buy. A minimum viable product should be the goal of a physical prototype but is not a requirement to learn something about the potential market of the product. Clear market validating data—for example—is when a monetary exchange can be made for the MVP. This gives pricing feedback and market validation. However, a product prototype can also take the form of a mock advertisement or a website. If realistic images of a product can be modeled and placed in a website or advertisement where potential customers could either buy or place on hold the product, then this also serves as a market test. The challenge here however is that maybe people will not buy a physical product sight unseen, especially if the use case of the product is not explicitly clear. Most product innovations offer new ways to solve problems and illustrating the product’s advantages can present a challenge to entrepreneurs and innovators.
Figure 6: MIT D-Lab Discovery: Kinetic Nametag - Prototype.
The office hacking can be observed in Figure 6 above and the concept is to use whatever you might be able to find in an office storage supply room and use to demonstrate the product concept. You likely could not sell this to a customer but it would be much more effective at conveying the product idea than a simple set of words or a drawing in the above example a ratcheting mechanism. “24 hour prototyping” includes more in-depth options for design and development. This can be buying screws, nails, tools and other supplies in a hardware or technology store. The idea being that if you have a set of tools, the materials and the desire to build something in less than 24 hours, you can find stores that will likely have something for you to construct a functional prototype. This may also be small garage shops that have 1 or 2 mills and will custom hand mill your piece but this is typically expensive. Additionally some 3D printing services offer customized parts in small quantities and sizes in less than 24 hour hours. The first BuddyGripper prototype was built in less than 24 hours (Figure 7). “48 hour prototyping” is the next level of physical prototyping in that more time is available to allow materials to be shipped, received, glued, cured, installed, assembled and tested. This also includes rapid prototyping services such as www.firstcut.com, www.protomold.com, www.you3dit.com, and other websites that offer prototyping services to quickly bring a design to physical form. More services that fit each of these descriptions can be found at www.handsonrapidinnovation.com/rapid-innovationtools/ These rapid prototyping tools are a few of many ways to help construct product-oriented market tests–which are
Figure 7: The BuddyGripper product prototype illustrating the entire Rapid Innovation Cycle process.
Crowd funding sites like www.kickstarter.com (U.S.A.) and www.lanzanos.com (Spain) are perfect examples of where inventors and entrepreneurs can go submit their prototypes and receive funding if the investing community believes their product has value. Now a finished product can be created using pre-order money. These sites are typically populated by entrepreneurs, innovators and early adopters. Early and late majority customers will likely be tougher customers to attract. Read more from Moore (1999) about “crossing the chasm” and for other ways to attain mass market success. Service-oriented Market tests Service-oriented market tests are typically in the form of advertising, mock up websites and small teams posing as staff from yet-to-be-built services. The challenge is to sufficiently convince potential customers that a service that does x, y, and z activities actually exists and that it is ready to receive clients. However, the cost of setting up the service may be prohibitively costly and therefore, a market test that offers insight on whether a market exists at a sustainable price point should be conducted before any heavy investment is made. In 2012, the concept of market testing regaining popularity (perpetual beta) and tools to conduct them are essentially free. The tools most RIC participants use are a combination of website design templates and user analytics.
Table 2: A short list of free website templates and web analytics software that are great tools for service-oriented market tests.
Free Website Templates
Free Analytics
www.wordpress.com
Google Analytics
www.wix.com www.drupal.org www.joomla.org
Crazy Egg Alexa Compete
More similar services and tools can be found at www.handsonrapidinnovation.com/rapidinnovation-tools For example, a 3D printing service that utilizes local networks of 3D printers in order to bring customer ideas to life conducted a service-oriented market test in order to observe the public response to the service offering (Figure 8). The team used a combination of physical flyer advertisements in addition to a minimal Google AdWords campaign that pointed potential customers to the website www.you3dit.com and then Google Analytics recorded the user traffic. The website was built using a template and the service was described using a number of borrowed and teamgenerated images to describe the service.
customer service, forums, user communities, user feedback, multiple store locations, media and press coverage, etc. The audience needs to be the target market but non-target markets that are specialized in innovation, such as the “innovator” and “early adopter” segments (Moore, 1991). Additionally, the network of RIC participants and advocates also represent a similar segment of potential employees and because they understand the process, can offer insight not only via their participation in the experiment, but based on their experience and expertise executing market experiments via the RIC cycle. The goal of the RIC is to learn about the product or service in order to make the best next move for the product / service and team. Common data that is pulled from market experiments are: customer interest, customer segmentation, price points, product / service feedback (strengths / weaknesses), market demand, customer pain points, other opportunities and many others. The metrics of interest for business are the market demand and the size of that demand. From the engineering side, the product or service feedback is typically very useful. III CASE STUDIES & INITIAL RESULTS The following case study examples were taken primarily from RIC cycles executed by the authors but supported by commentaries based on RICs executed by students and supporters of the process.
A. Methodology The following case studies generally followed the four phases Rapid Innovation Cycle process, making datadriven decisions at the end of each experiment and conducting cycle iterations as necessary. Each case study below represents the most recent data collected for each of the both types of market studies: product- and serviceoriented.
Figure 8: www.you3dit.com is a service-oriented market test to gauge market interest in 3D printing services available for the general public and not just engineers. The key features here for this market test are the domain (it actually exists and was purchased by the RIC participants), a believable and well defined “service description”, and a method to know if people are interested in the service, the “customer form.”
D. Experimental Results (ER) This is the last phase of the RIC where the participants have data from their market tests and they generate insight in order to make a business decision on the new venture. In an ideal market experiment, the output data is not only clear and believable, but also correlates in real market interest in the product or service. The results however are always non-ideal because the market experiment can never actually represent the true product or service offering. They can offer a near exact replica of the offering but typically a product is encapsulated with
Future academic studies will leverage a better defined methodology, with comparable output metrics and will take into consideration the proposed experimental suggestions made by Ries (2011): varying crossfunctional teams (RIC participants), changing cycle times, changing development platforms, etc. The main point being to increase the level of uncertainty of the solution to a given problem while maintaining the ability to measure objectively the quality of the outcome.
B. Case 1: www.BuddyGripper.com The BuddyGripper is a gadget for smartphone users who need / want to take better images on their camera phones. Unlike the Glif, Oona and other smartphone tripod mounts, the BuddyGripper is universal for all smartphones, can be 3D printed in multiple colors and has a series of adaptors to enhance the user experience. The BuddyGripper is built using the latest design and manufacturing technologies in order to give the customer the best possible product at the lowest possible cost. The BuddyGripper represents a product-oriented market test.
suggestions and some market trending info. What lacked however was pricing data because no one actually paid for the device. Lastly, the means of selecting beta testers lacked any effort on the “customer” thus, there was no “risk” or investment on behalf of the beta tester / prospective customer. As of summer 2012, sales are low but the revenues equal roughly the financial investment.
C. Case 2: www.you3Dit.com
Figure 9: The BuddyGripper “Puts professionalism in your pocket.” Designed and built in November 2010, the market experiment began 27 December 2010 using 20x initial prototypes, Facebook.com and AdWords to draw potential customers to a Wordpress website equipped with Google Analytics and Amazon.com Payment services. The experiment continues in 2012 and the product and business continue to grow.
You3Dit.com is a web services for anyone who wants to bring a product idea or personalized gift to life via 3D printing (Figure 8). Unlike 3D printing services like www.shapeways.com and www.pokono.com who only accept 3D CAD files that are ready for 3D printing, you3Dit.com allows anyone to submit an idea, concept, drawing, or CAD file to a team of designers that then submit final 3D print ready files to one of a network of 3D printers that is local to the customer, significantly reducing lead time and cost. www.you3Dit.com represents a service-oriented market test.
Table 3: the BuddyGripper RIC executed in 2010.
Opportunity Recognition:
Solution Selection:
User had no way to take a picture or video without asking for help from a passerby or stranger
How to temporarily affix a tripod to a smart phone? Tape, magnets, custom smart phone cases, suction cup, customized widget, earphone or charging port connector.
Experimental Results Both qualitative and quantitative results. Only 6 respondents from 20 requests Mixed responses, “bulky”, “pretty neat”, “doesn’t look ‘cool’.” “Doesn’t feel like a finished product.”
Market Experimentation An easily manufactured MVP was designed (November 2010), fabricated 24 December 2010 and sent to “avid iPhone camera” users via a Facebook “wall post.” Total cost: $US500.
From this initial beta tester group, the BuddyGripper team was able to quickly see where the strengths and weaknesses are for this market test. Having background demographics of the user group would have better defined the target customer, but regardless, there were clear product design recommendations, price point
Figure 10: www.you3Dit.com—a 3D printing service that brings creative ideas to life—was launched as a market test in Madrid, Spain using a combined set of physical flyers / announcements, a basic website equipped Google Analytics, a customer submission form and a minimal Google Adwords campaign. Table 4: The RIC cycle as applied to you3Dit.com.
Opportunity Recognition:
Solution Selection:
Avid Shapeways.com customer becomes frustrated with long lead times, inaccessibility of service to non-engineers and the costs associated with current 3D printing services.
Offer a service that leverages a network of 3D printers local to the customer and outsource the design of customer parts to low-cost global talent.
Experimental Results
Market Experimentation
In the first week, 103 A basic website that visits to the website, 71 allows people to submit unique hits, average time text, a picture or a 3D
on website: 3m13s, 95 percent coming from Spain, 0 people submitted an order. As of 23 August, there have been 3 paying clients, 1 currently interested. Clients are paying approximately 100x more than cost of plastic and energy utilized to make the part.
CAD file ready for 3D printing. A service description, along with flyers and a Google Adwords campaign to drive traffic to the website.
As web analytics data was collected (Figure 11), continued promotion of the site via websites such as facebook.com, checkthis.com, and twitter.com (among other social media sites), the RIC participants awaited the most important data: interested customers willing to upload an idea, drawing or a 3D CAD file. The important fact to remember for this service-oriented market test that the RIC participants did not have direct access to 3D printing capabilities, nor did they have dedicated 3D CAD design teams, nor did they invest a huge marketing and advertising budget. Total development cost for this market test—including time invested by the team—was less than $US 1k.
IV CONCLUSIONS The Rapid Innovation Cycle has shown success in providing a framework for entrepreneurs, innovators and people responsible for innovation to generate new ideas and test them in the unforgiving marketplace. By solving common problems using technology, building a prototype within given resources and constraints, presenting that service or product prototype to the market and reflecting on collected market data, these RIC participants are able to make better decisions about the future of the business. Whether or not further iterations are made to the first market test, whether or not the company pivots or if the project is abandoned and saved for another day, these individuals and teams will have ideally saved the critical resources of time, money and effort using the RIC process. Given the newness of the methodology however, much more data is needed from other RIC users to fully confirm the relative success of the process. It is even hypothesized that a more realistic description would be the Rapid Innovation Spiral (RIS) in the sense that each time an iteration is made, more knowledge is learned and the product or service market test evolves with time. Using the RIC cycle for each product- and serviceoriented market test, the following data-based decisions were made:
The BuddyGripper product had mixed and poor initial reviews from 9 out of 24 beta testers. Customer pricing ranged from $US 5-15 and as the product evolved and the MVP has been sold to over 50 people over the span of 2 years with little or no business development. The initial RIC cycle was completed within 1 month of the construction of the first prototype. The RIC cycle has been conducted numerous times now to assess the market interest and pricing of related products and new designs.
You3Dit.com now has had 5 independent customers, brought to the service mainly through word of mouth marketing. However, the website data suggests some interest from the general public and the RIC cycle can be conducted again to clarify if the longer-thanaverage site duration is due to interest in the service or confusion. Only 1 RIC iteration was conducted but more are planned for the future.
Overall, these two Rapid Innovation Cycle market tests would benefit from more structured metrics, better understanding of what represents the Minimum Viable Product and in general, more conclusive data. The next step for the Rapid Innovation Cycle is to improve the outputs to the Market Experiment so that better decisions can be made in shorter time frames with less resources.
Figure 11: Google Analytics data for www.you3Dit.com during the market experimentation phase. Key metrics to note are the Avg. Visit Duration which is high implying user interest and engagement. The Bounce Rate is unfortunately high and represents the percentage of visitors who leave the site within 10 seconds or less of visiting the site.
Lastly, as suggested by (Ries, 2009), future work will include the general application of the RIC cycle in order to test the success of different innovation models and processes. Holding specific variables constant, it is hypothesized that users of a RIC-like process will be more successful in long-term entrepreneurial success as opposed to users of different methodologies. Because metrics will vary across the various market tests, the authors will continue to look for universal measurements that can be compared across market test type, technology or industry. Of the 100 plus students exposed to RIC and the tools taught alongside this process, two have won business plan competitions (Venture Labs at Instituto de Empresa 2011,
ActuaUPM 2012, Seedcamp Jan. 2012), 5 have formed companies (HivePlay.com, BuddyGripper.com, Minggler.com, Race4Awareness.org, You3Dit.com) and many more continue to use the process to generate new businesses and improve existing ones. The subject, “Hands-on Rapid Innovation” which is largely based on the Rapid Innovation Cycle, was created and taught at the number one technical school in Spain (Fall 2011) and has been taught at the IE Business School in September 2012. IE Business school is recognized as a worldwide top 10 MBA program as deemed by the Financial Times and the Wall Street Journal. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The authors would like to extend their warmest thanks for all the people herein who believed in our mission to reduce unemployment in Spain using innovation. Each of these people helped bring Hands-on Rapid Innovation to life via their hard work, dedication, effort, time, financial support, extension of their professional networks and constant and unwavering support. Thank you: Mr. Luis Herrera, Mr. Walter Foxworth, Prof. Miguel Hermans (UPM), Prof. Erik Schlie (IE Business School), Prof. Joseph Pistrui (IE Business Schoool), Prof. Maria Dolores Banos (UPCT), Ms. Sara Merino, BEST Madrid, Mr. Aristides Senra (ActuaUPM) and Mr. Michael Shashoua. REFERENCES Blank, S, Dorf, B., (2012) The Startup Owner’s Manual: Volume 1. K&S Ranch Publishing. 2012. Brown, B. (2010) “The power of vulnerability.” Retrieved January 11, 2011, from http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/brene_brown_on_vulnerability. html Brown, B. (2012) “Listening to Shame.” Retrieved August 20, 2012, from http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/brene_brown_listening_to_sham e.html Ferriss, T., (2009) The Four Hour Workweek. Random House Inc. 2009. Kelley, D.J., Bosma, N., Ernesto-Amorós, J. (2010) “GEM: Global Entrepreneurship Monitor: 2010 Global Report.” Babson, Universidad del Desarrollo. López-Claros, A., Mata, Y.N (2010) Policies and Institutions Underpinning Country Innovation: Results from the Innovation Capacity Index. Moore, G. (1991) Crossing the Chasm: Marketing and selling hightech products to mainstream customers. Harper Business, New York. Nothhaft, H., (2011) Great Again: Revitalizing America’s Entrepreneurial Leadership. Harvard Business Review Press, Massachusetts. Ries, E., (2011) The Lean Startup. Crown Publishing. 2011. Stewart, C. (1999) Driving Over Lemons: an optimist in Spain. Vintage eBooks, Random House Inc. New York. Tasic, I., Andreassi, T., (2008) “Strategy and Entrepreneurship: decision and creation under uncertainty.” J. of Int’l Conf. of the Production and Operations Mgmt. Society. Vol.1 No. 1, June 2008. Sarasvathy, S. (2001) “What makes entrepreneurs, entrepreneurial.” Social Science Research Network. Vol., pp. 1-9. Sarasvathy, S., Dew, N., Velamuri, S.R., Venkataraman, S., (2002) “A testable typology of entrepreneurial opportunity: extensiions of Shane & Venkataraman (2000)” Academy of Management Review. Sarasvathy, S. (2002) “Three views of entrepreneural opportunity” Invited book chapter in the Entrepreneurship Handbook edited by Acs.
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