Crowdsourcing vs. Technology Scouting in a B2B setting

Unrestricted © Siemens AG 2014. All rights reserved

Crowdsourcing vs. Technology Scouting in a B2B settingDr. Michael Heiss

Siemens Corporate Technology | March 2014

Page 2 March 2014 Corporate Technology Unrestricted © Siemens AG 2014. All rights reserved

Crowdsourcing vs. Technology Scouting:Two different approaches for technology sourcing

Technology Scouting: search for offeringsCrowdsourcing: let many people contribute

What is the difference?

Let many people know your needs

Receive many contributions

Visualization: many contributors (clouds) contribute to one goal (sun) Visualization: try to find the one who has skills you need

Search in databases and internet

Many technology offerings

written by yourself written by others


Crowdsourcing vs. Technology Scouting:Two different approaches for technology sourcing

• “Technology scouting is a systematic approach by companies whereby they assign part of their staff or employ external consultants to gather information in the field of science and technology and through which they facilitate or execute technology sourcing. Technology scouting is either directed at a specific technological area or undirected, identifying relevant developments in technological white spaces. Technology scouting relies on formal and informal information sources, including the personal networks of the scouts.”(Source: Rohrbeck via http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technology_Scouting )

• “Crowdsourcing is the practice of obtaining needed services, ideas, or content by soliciting contributions from a large group of people, and especially from an online community, rather than from traditional employees or suppliers.”(Source Merriam Webster via http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crowdsourcing )

Examples:

• Co-Ideation, Idea Contests

• Call-for-Proposals

• Corporate Problem solving

Technology Scouting: search for offeringsCrowdsourcing: let many people contribute

Definitions

Let many people know your needs

Receive many contributions Search in databases and internet

Many technology offerings

written by yourself written by others

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technology_Scouting

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crowdsourcing


Crowdsourcing vs. Technology Scouting:Do you want to be visible with your needs or not?

• See everybody without being visible• Be visible for everybody

Scouting: “good vision”Crowdsourcing: “good visibility”

Visibility

Visualization: be visible Visualization: have a good overview over all but be not visbile yourself


Crowdsourcing vs. Technology Scouting:Would you like to decide who is contributing?

• Don’t call us, we call you.• Hope to receive the right submissions

Scouting: activeCrowdsourcing: passive

Control of submission stream

Visualization: wait and hope that an important technology is contributed Visualization: do not wait – if you identify a partner with an important technology, take it


Consider how much you want to disclose when selecting the right open innovation approach

Overview over frequently used open innovation approaches

• Search field and companyare visible

• Pre-qualification for participants possible but complicated

• Search field and company not visible

• Need to manage large number of databases

Idea-Contests ScoutingE-Brokering

company

competitors

customers

end-customers

universities & research

startups & establishedtechnology providers

experts

searchfield

companycompetitors

customers



experts

searchfield

E-Broker

companycustomers



experts

searchfield

A B….A gets info from B

• E-broker sends request to a propriatary (closed) list of experts

• Anonymity and black-list possible

Databases& SearchEngines

competitors

Crowdsourcing Scouting


Conclusion

Scouting

E-Brokering & Innovation Portal

Idea Contests

Agenda

company

competitors

customers

end-customers



experts

searchfield


Designs for emotional LED solutions (Osram)

Disruptive ICT trends

Products & solutions for urban markets and city de-velopment (Siemens India)

Sustainable company and portfolio ideas (Siemens)

Smart Grid Innovation Contest (part I & II)

The effort for external idea contests is significantly larger than for internal idea contests

2009 2010

Inno

vatio

nJa

ms

Inte

rnal

co

ntes

tsE

xter

nal

cont

ests

Business opportunities for the "Future of Hubs" (Siemens Mobility)

Anti-Piracy issues & technical & legal solutions

2011 2012

Future Business opportu-nities for high-voltage switchgears (E T HS)

Business opportunities for "Future of Metals" (I MT)

2013

Data Driven Services

http://led-emotionalize.com/?PHPSESSID=f7f9efb0baedf2df41cdfb39c142ad3f

https://hubs-innovation-contest.mobility.siemens.com/start.php

https://hubs-innovation-contest.mobility.siemens.com/start.php

http://intranet.ct.siemens.de/de/cto/cto_oi/si-jam/index.html

http://atvieg16sa.ww300.siemens.net:8085/oiLandingPage/


Example: Siemens Smart Grid Innovation ContestThe contribution quality is higher in a closed setting

Phase II: Call for Research Proposals,for universities only, 10-12/2011

Phase I: Public Idea Contest,for everybody, 4-6/2011

Submission & social ranking

Evaluation by Siemens

Jurydecision

Award ceremony

(incl. MVC1))Rec. by MVC1)

1) Rec. By MVC: Recommendation by Most Valuable Contributors, pre-evaluated by Core-Team

Abstract submission(Qualification)

Submissionof full

proposal

RTR2)

decision

Contracting&

implementation

RTR2)

accept/deny

2) RTR: Research Topic Responsible (from Siemens)

Topic cluster NDA Research Topic (confidential)

• All submissions

• All comments

• Crowd ranking (5 stars)

• Internal ranking (5 stars): public

• no internal comments!

Public: Selected Siemens experts:

Recruiting of participants: via social media (e.g. LinkedIn groups)

15 000 € (total)+ Berlin trip

1 Mio. € budget (total)

• Nothing, except the generic topic cluster description

• no crowd ranking

• Abstract submission• Full research proposal submission• Internal comments• Communication with submitter• Decisions

Public & Peers:RTR2)+Selected Siemens experts:

via SCOPUS all authors of scientific papers in the field were invited

• 100 countries

• 35 000 unique visitors

• 1 500 registered users

• 500 ideas

• 5 000 comments & evaluations

• 300 000 minutes on the site

• 40 countries

• 200 universities

• 400 registered users

• 172 abstracts submitted

• 25 accepted for full proposal

• 10 to be contractedPa

rtic

ipa

nts

Re

su

lts

Awareness & branding High quality research proposalsTop experts

Vis

ible

Pro

ce

ss

IT platform from


Lessons Learned from the Siemens Smart Grid Innovation Contest

Emotions Seismograph / Timeline

Page 11 March 2014 Corporate Technology

The „stock market price“ of the project shows how challenging an global external idea contest is

# Comments

1 Doubtfully at the beginning

2

Too many proposals that were not in Siemens business

Loss of both power sponsors

3 Some interesting submitted ideas

4 New confidentiality policy disrupted

plans and caused extra challenges for the tool

5 Definition of Research Topic Clusters

and Detailed Research Question

6 The Award Ceremony in Berlin and the

community feeling hat was very positive

7 Technical issues behind the scene

8

The contest was successfully launched and immediate response was positive, but quality of submissions at the beginning not convincing

9 Very high quality of submission;

due to the high number of submissions high effort

10 Contracting on the way

Preparation Idea Contest Online13.4-15.6.2011

Jury Preparation21.7.2011

Topic Definition for

CfP

CfP Online4.10.-30.11.2011

1.4. 15.6. 21.7. 15.9. 4.10. 30.11. 14.12.

positive

negative

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

Aggregated Emotions Seismograph / Timeline:

“estimated Return on Invest based on your own investment”

time

Award Ceremony

Berlin 15.9.2011

Evaluation of proposals

10

Research Topic Responsibles from BUCore Team

1


Lessons Learned of the Siemens Smart Grid Call-for-Proposals

Ownership

Project needs to be fully adopted by the Business Unit – Project Lead from Business Unit.

Management support from CTO level required.

A wide spread management support leads to robustness against organizational changes.

Early involvement of Product Managers.

Confidentiality

The more concrete the search field description, leads to a trade off between

the more valuable the submissions the higher the risk of disclosing Siemens strategies.

The higher the security level of the tool, the more expensive, less flexible, more complex to handle.

The quality of the submissions is higher if it is submitted in a closed environment (not public) - at least in a highly competitive search field.

Timing

It is more important to align the contest with the Siemens budget planning than with the academic year.

First receive all the submissions before making accept/deny decisions.

Recruiting of Submitters

SCOPUS gave us access to all the scientists who published in the search field.

Optimization

Having a pre-qualification process ensures that the Siemens Experts spend most of their time with the best proposals and ensures that only trusted submitters have access to the more confidential information.

Limiting the words and having a tool-enforced structure helps to focus submitters answers – helps to minimize Siemens effort for evaluating.

Explaining what type of proposals Siemens wants and does not want helps to optimize the expectation of the submitters and the workload for Siemens.

Very high usability is required for the web tool both for submitters and backend operations – End to end process/workflow support.

backup


Conclusion

Scouting

E-Brokering and Innovation Portals

Idea Contests

Agenda

companycompetitors

customers



experts

searchfield

E-Broker


Companies

~ 15 challenges submitted with predominantly excellent results

Efficient and market oriented approach to find leading edge technologies

Innovation Seeker

Problem Solvers

Huge Network of ~ 3 Mio Solvers

Large corporations, SMEs

Start-ups

Universities, R&D organizations

Consultants

Individual Experts

E-Brokers send the request to a proprietary (closed) list of experts

http://images.google.de/imgres?imgurl=http://www.repsa.org.au/Portals/0/contentImages/BASF%20Logo.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.repsa.org.au/Default.aspx?tabid=82&h=472&w=945&sz=22&hl=de&start=2&um=1&usg=__EIYoSUDE-uxNg7Ys-1_o4SgZiV8=&tbnid=TG7L6AMV_xh6iM:&tbnh=74&tbnw=148&prev=/images?q=BASF+logo&um=1&hl=de

http://images.google.de/imgres?imgurl=http://www.cargofacts.com/symposium/images/Logos/Boeing_logo-blue.gif&imgrefurl=http://www.cargofacts.com/symposium/program.htm&h=178&w=702&sz=7&hl=de&start=3&um=1&usg=__ohKDtKWtg5DmVfqZwDVXtyQzeQA=&tbnid=IMnc_OLgljGJ5M:&tbnh=35&tbnw=140&prev=/images?q=Boeing+logo&um=1&hl=de&sa=N

http://images.google.de/imgres?imgurl=http://www.biodeutschland.org/cfo-gipf/SAP-Logo.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.biodeutschland.org/cfo-gipf/cfo-gipf.php&h=551&w=945&sz=36&hl=de&start=2&um=1&usg=__dVxBTnbGykjRhnG_sUG79vfq9S0=&tbnid=9f5hdQ6CnNYH3M:&tbnh=86&tbnw=148&prev=/images?q=SAP+logo&um=1&hl=de&sa=N


End of March 2014 our Innovation Portal will go live:focus on content – not on tools and traffic generation

Siemens Innovation Portal

A Siemens branded Innovation Portal at the NineSigma’s NineSights Managed Galleries

List of our needs with a one-page description for each of them

Be visible for potential submitters as a real person

…

• A common market place for new technologies

• a one-stop-shop for solvers and seekersincluding:


Conclusion

Scouting

E-Brokering and Innovation Portal

Idea Contests

Agenda

companycustomers



experts

searchfield

Databases& SearchEngines

competitors


Lesson Learned from Technology Scouting:the right balance of involvement is key for success

e + m

Probability of success

0% 10% 100%

0%

high

e + m + sThe aspired effort of the Manager m and the Experts e in relation to the planned total effort of a scouting project (including the effort of the Scout s)

20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90%

Impact of the planned involvement of management and internal experts on the scouting success (=new collaboration with the identified partner) under typical practical boundary conditions

If you plan to involve the operative experts for more than 30%, the risk is high that they will not do it.

In our setting a 10% involvement has the highest success rate.

Source: A. Oertl, M. Heiss, IEEE ITMC 2014

If the project is completely done in the operative unit, the risk is high that the date to completion is delayed or the scouting is not done systematically (quality?).


Proprietary Databases

Primary source

Expected outcome

Key methodology

> 50 Mio docs (Scopus, RDDS, IPAS-BUS)

Access to publications from reputable universities, companies

Patent database

Key-Experts,Description of USP

More than 100 different databases are the sourceResults are collected in the Scouting Platform

~ 35.000 experts (Enterprise social media platform)

Internal networks in related field often already exist with relevant information

Siemens Experts that were not known can be identified and informal discussion held Identification of use-cases& Business Units contacts

TechnoWeb MergeFlow

Continuous screening of changes in publicly available sources

High-end monitoring technologies based on semantic technologies

Emerging activities

>3GB docs p.d. (websites, blogs, forums, rss feed.)

> 100 databases, >100.000 offerings (SBIR, EEN, etc.)

Search term-based screening of external technology marketplaces (huge number of very recent offerings!)

Business-driven information gathering (direct contact to target)Technology offerings

Public Databases

Scouting Platform


An aggregated (multiple databases), dynamically weighted, multiple keyword search increases speed

Siemens PDC-Method: self-developed Excel-PlugIn, data aggregation by mergeflow

Multiple search keywords and number of hits

List of Technology Offerings

Aggregation of different databases

Keyword occurrence

Ranking according to keyword weights

Dynamic weights

http://www.mergeflow.com/


Keyword search alone is not sufficient, you need also methods to identify the „unknown unknowns“

News analysis (in general RSS-feeds) via mergeflow

Example: connection graph of companies that are mentioned in the same news

Other views: tag clouds, similar news,geographical, people, technologies,and others

The mergeflow tool collects all specified RSS-feeds (e.g. news) or search-feeds from the whole internet and offers different views on it

http://www.mergeflow.com/


The Scouting Platform collects all cooperation proposals and the corresponding evaluation (Intranet)

Siemens Scouting Platform: an extended, customized version of IdeaNet from Hyve AG

Action item tracing,Status tracing

Visualization of target organization

Peer commentsand enrichment

Corporate-wide transparencydocumentation of all communication with the target organizations

Filter options

Detailed evaluationavailable

http://www.hyve.de/

http://www.hyve.de/


Conclusion

Scouting

E-Brokering and Innovation Portal

Idea Contests

Agenda


Conclusion of Challenges

• In a B2B setting you need to attract professionals to participate.

• Professionals usually prefer a closed setting like Call-for-Proposals or closed communities.

The value of social media based crowd sourcing is higher for intranet or extranetsettings than for open internet settings.

• The balanced involvement of operative experts and management is key for successful scouting projects.

Do not try to plan an unrealistic involvement of them but only the minimalrequired involvement for being successful and add value for them in every meeting.

• The effort to establish an own Innovation Portal is also for large enterprises undesirably high. Lots of effort is spent for IT related issues like IT-security and usability and for attracting possible submitters.

Focus on the content and use a branded Innovation Portal at an established technologymarket place.

Crowdsourcing / Idea Contests

Innovation Portals

Technology Scouting

Page 24 March 2014 Corporate Technology

Dr. Michael HeissPrincipal Open Innovation and Scouting

Siemens AGCorporate TechnologyTechnology and Innovation Management

Email: michael.heiss @ siemens.comPhone & Mobile: +43-664-88 55 15 26

siemens.com/answers

Contact

Source: www.flickr.com/photos/michaelheiss (including photos from slides 2-5)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/michaelheiss