Quick note
I'm not a huge fan of sending automated Happy New Year emails to our customers, partners, and friends. For many years, I've instead tried to send more personal messages or books to everyone we've been working with during the year. This year, like a
Hot Takes
I usually write my articles here before posting them on LinkedIn. I'm doing the opposite for once: posting on LinkedIn first and sending you there. The discussion about the current TikTok mess is just too eventful to edit an article here with many updates. Also, the discussion on
AI
In my eyes, the only device remotely interesting presented at the latest CES Las Vegas (the Consumer Electronic Show) was NVIDIA's Project DIGITS. A $3,000 personal AI supercomputer the size of a Mac Mini that will deliver the power of large-scale AI models directly to your desk.
Newsletter
Not in a bad mood, I promise. But can we stop freaking out every time Zuckerberg claims I'm "just in it for the money"? Instead, let’s focus on radical innovation: how can big brand names regain direct control over their core audiences...
Culture
When discussing the tools of value creation and positioning for innovative ventures, I often explain that in Europe, France is one of the most risk-averse national cultures worldwide, just slightly more optimistic than Japan. For reference, Hofstede's Uncertainty Avoidance Index (UAI) gives the top countries risk-averse (very high
Newsletter
I've been reading a lot about China lately. Having worked there for more than a decade—teaching MBA classes to young Chinese business leaders while consulting for European firms in the market—I wouldn’t claim to be a fully-fledged expert, but I’m far from naive. For
Strategy
For me, one of the always best scenes of Moneyball scene is when Oakland A's General Manager Billy Beane (played by Brad Pitt) gets lectured by an unknown assistant Peter Brand (played by Jonah Hill). Peter doesn't care about conventional baseball wisdom where picking athletes as
Newsletter
YouTube’s steady takeover of the living room is a fascinating case study of how innovation is not about competing on products. The platform understands this very well, as it has become a serious contender in the battle for something both finite and universal: your time.
Hot Takes
Juicero was a startup that launched an expensive, Wi-Fi-connected juicing machine that cost $400 at launch and was later reduced to $200. The idea was to be a Nespresso-like business only with proprietary juice packs that users inserted into a beautiful machine to produce fresh juice. The company wasn'
Culture
A more personal discussion this week on what it means to be who you are when dealing with complex business issues.
Hot Takes
Barring a few visionary companies that consistently navigate the innovator’s dilemma and pursue transformative innovation, most organizations achieve radical breakthroughs only when teetering on the edge of catastrophe. Crisis remains the most potent driver of innovation—not pleasant or comfortable, but it forces a reckoning and compels strategic questions
Strategy
In the world of corporate innovation, there’s a parallel that rings with the same fatalistic undertone as “Nobody gets fired for buying IBM.” You're not going to be fired for running an innovation pipeline. It sounds harmless, but underneath, we have the same play-safe logic from most