It’s the same concept behind recycling. Every person, every extra bottle counts. In an effort to save print media, I still subscribe to magazines, and today, I just got the March issue of Fast Company, the special issue on innovation. This year’s list of “50 most innovative companies” ranks Facebook first (in front of Apple, Amazon and Google), Twitter last, and IDEO—the world’s largest design consultancy, 35th. Confounding.
What exactly makes someone or some company innovative? Is Tom Davies (featured on pg. 44) particularly innovative for framing custom glasses during an “age of customization” where Jeff Chu writes, “You can customize almost anything: your sneakers, your Twitter interface, your car, your kitchen cabinets, your own face”? Davies’ innovation lies in the production process: a proprietary web-based system called Supertool allows him to plug in measurements and chug out blueprints, parts lists, and custom glasses ready to be shipped from Shenzhen, China. Kind of cool, like how he has his own YouTube channel…I guess.
Facebook ranks first for its “rapid deployment and iteration”: pushing code out for daily user testing, weekly product updates, and monthly hackathons. First Solar ranks 6th for being the first solar supplier to cross the $1-per-watt mark ($0.85/watt by the end of 2009, roughly on par with conventional power). Novartis ranks 8th for focusing its research and development on rare diseases and biotech. Intel, 14th, for its new single-chip cloud computer. BYD (Chinese car & battery maker), 16th, for its all-electric, full-size E6, which runs on a nontoxic lithium-ion ferrous phosphate battery (which costs 50% less than standard lithium-ion batteries but last longer, with an expected life of 2,000 charge cycles with 200 miles per full charge). Okay.
I haven’t even gotten to 20th and have already seen HP, Cisco, and IBM make the list…but then it gets more interesting. The Indian Premier League, 22nd, for pretty much reinventing cricket; BMW Group DesignworksUSA, 25th, for partnering with Starbucks to HP and designing everything from the Saeco Xsmall coffeemaker to the Whitestar Signature surgical platform (umm, what??); Synthetic Genomics, 26th, for teaming up with ExxonMobil and engineering super-algae biofuel; Frito-Lay, 28th, for heating oil from solar concentration, capturing manufacturing waste-water and cleaning it back to drinking-water quality, using biomass boilers burning pecan shells and cottonseed, introducing the first fully compostable chip bag…and more.
Now to the companies I really care about and surprised me for showing up in any kind of listing, albeit an innovative one. 32nd: Diller Scofidio + Renfro vs. 44th: MVRDV?? Of course anyone who knows anything about arch firms would think that the dutch MVRDV is way beyond the NYC-based Scofidio firm in terms of radical, visionary utopias—I mean philosophical city planning designs of vertical suburbias and whatnot. Scofidio? They’ve got NY’s High Line park and the Lincoln Center’s Tully Hall.
Two more companies worth mentioning are the NY-based digital agency, Firstborn (33rd), and Glam Media (37th), the mastermind behind the #1 network for women, glam.com. Firstborn has developed “a knack for hard-core programming most of its hipster colleagues can’t match”. For instance, it created a complex application breaking down the different layers of a 3-D model, which allows consumers to render a car in 16 million color options. Literally. The company has also released an open source 3-D facemapping application for photos, making them more than just a pretty digital agency. Glam Media claims to be the pioneer and global leader of “vertical media”, a model that connects brand advertisers with consumers online via a “vertically integrated women’s network of 1,500 blogs”. They’re not really content creators or a portal…just a highly effective monetization company helping advertisers reach their female audiences while increasing ad revenues for women’s lifestyle and fashion bloggers.
I think I’ve already illustrated my point: innovation is not quantifiable, and this list seems rather arbitrary comparing big tech companies to small media firms to two random “cool-looking” arch firms. With that said, I think Fast Company actually wants us to take “rankings” with a grain of salt and just marvel at all the different types of innovations happening around the world right now, not only in the tech industry. But since people love lists and Fast Company loves people who love them, here are the top 10 most innovative design companies according to FC:
BMW Group DesignworksUSA
IDEO
Rockwell Group
Pentagram
Ammunition
Fuseproject
Frog Design
Potion
Attik
WET Design
Five are here in the Bay Area, some I’ve visited and talked to personally, a few more have rejected me but kept my resume and portfolio on file (hopefully). Second point of this post: There is no place like home for innovation.
Robert Safian writes in the Letter from the Editor, “I cannot reveal the details of the proprietary algorithm that underlies our Most Innovative Companies list. It isn’t because I’d have to kill you afterward. Truth is: It doesn’t exist.”
I think the real meaning of innovation should be measured by its usage.See if it can solve people's problem and if people accept it and using it.To be an innovative company,the company should keep listening to what people say they need and then meet their needs.
How Do You Rank or Measure Innovation?
by Serena Wu on February 19, 2010
It’s the same concept behind recycling. Every person, every extra bottle counts. In an effort to save print media, I still subscribe to magazines, and today, I just got the March issue of Fast Company, the special issue on innovation. This year’s list of “50 most innovative companies” ranks Facebook first (in front of Apple, Amazon and Google), Twitter last, and IDEO—the world’s largest design consultancy, 35th. Confounding.
What exactly makes someone or some company innovative? Is Tom Davies (featured on pg. 44) particularly innovative for framing custom glasses during an “age of customization” where Jeff Chu writes, “You can customize almost anything: your sneakers, your Twitter interface, your car, your kitchen cabinets, your own face”? Davies’ innovation lies in the production process: a proprietary web-based system called Supertool allows him to plug in measurements and chug out blueprints, parts lists, and custom glasses ready to be shipped from Shenzhen, China. Kind of cool, like how he has his own YouTube channel…I guess.
Facebook ranks first for its “rapid deployment and iteration”: pushing code out for daily user testing, weekly product updates, and monthly hackathons. First Solar ranks 6th for being the first solar supplier to cross the $1-per-watt mark ($0.85/watt by the end of 2009, roughly on par with conventional power). Novartis ranks 8th for focusing its research and development on rare diseases and biotech. Intel, 14th, for its new single-chip cloud computer. BYD (Chinese car & battery maker), 16th, for its all-electric, full-size E6, which runs on a nontoxic lithium-ion ferrous phosphate battery (which costs 50% less than standard lithium-ion batteries but last longer, with an expected life of 2,000 charge cycles with 200 miles per full charge). Okay.
I haven’t even gotten to 20th and have already seen HP, Cisco, and IBM make the list…but then it gets more interesting. The Indian Premier League, 22nd, for pretty much reinventing cricket; BMW Group DesignworksUSA, 25th, for partnering with Starbucks to HP and designing everything from the Saeco Xsmall coffeemaker to the Whitestar Signature surgical platform (umm, what??); Synthetic Genomics, 26th, for teaming up with ExxonMobil and engineering super-algae biofuel; Frito-Lay, 28th, for heating oil from solar concentration, capturing manufacturing waste-water and cleaning it back to drinking-water quality, using biomass boilers burning pecan shells and cottonseed, introducing the first fully compostable chip bag…and more.
Now to the companies I really care about and surprised me for showing up in any kind of listing, albeit an innovative one. 32nd: Diller Scofidio + Renfro vs. 44th: MVRDV?? Of course anyone who knows anything about arch firms would think that the dutch MVRDV is way beyond the NYC-based Scofidio firm in terms of radical, visionary utopias—I mean philosophical city planning designs of vertical suburbias and whatnot. Scofidio? They’ve got NY’s High Line park and the Lincoln Center’s Tully Hall.
Two more companies worth mentioning are the NY-based digital agency, Firstborn (33rd), and Glam Media (37th), the mastermind behind the #1 network for women, glam.com. Firstborn has developed “a knack for hard-core programming most of its hipster colleagues can’t match”. For instance, it created a complex application breaking down the different layers of a 3-D model, which allows consumers to render a car in 16 million color options. Literally. The company has also released an open source 3-D facemapping application for photos, making them more than just a pretty digital agency. Glam Media claims to be the pioneer and global leader of “vertical media”, a model that connects brand advertisers with consumers online via a “vertically integrated women’s network of 1,500 blogs”. They’re not really content creators or a portal…just a highly effective monetization company helping advertisers reach their female audiences while increasing ad revenues for women’s lifestyle and fashion bloggers.
I think I’ve already illustrated my point: innovation is not quantifiable, and this list seems rather arbitrary comparing big tech companies to small media firms to two random “cool-looking” arch firms. With that said, I think Fast Company actually wants us to take “rankings” with a grain of salt and just marvel at all the different types of innovations happening around the world right now, not only in the tech industry. But since people love lists and Fast Company loves people who love them, here are the top 10 most innovative design companies according to FC:
Five are here in the Bay Area, some I’ve visited and talked to personally, a few more have rejected me but kept my resume and portfolio on file (hopefully). Second point of this post: There is no place like home for innovation.
Robert Safian writes in the Letter from the Editor, “I cannot reveal the details of the proprietary algorithm that underlies our Most Innovative Companies list. It isn’t because I’d have to kill you afterward. Truth is: It doesn’t exist.”
Tagged as: companies, design firms, fast company, Innovation, media firms, tech firms, top 50