Innovation round up - July 08

DESIGN & CULTURE INNOVATION SPECIAL

BMW GINA - Ever seen a car clad in material? An interesting new approach to forgoing heavy, expensive metals for a thin, plyable fabric skin. Also have a look at BMWs beautiful new building, BMW Welt

ROTATING SKYSCRAPER - Only in Dubai ....

YOUNG & RESTLESS IN CHINA - Watch and learn about the wave of young talent in China, and how different young people are making the most of the wave of change. More brilliance from Frontline. PS This was also on SBS this week.

MONOCLE REVEAL THEIR MOST LIVABLE CITIES - With a slant towards architecture and urban design, the magazine takes a fresh look at what it is to be a livable city

DESIGN THINKING - Thinking like a designer can transform the way you develop products, services, processes—and even strategy. Written by the head of IDEO.

HERMES TAKES LUXURY TO A NEW LEVEL - If you have a spare 6m euros, why not lash out and get a Eurocopter fitted out in Hermes?

HOW TO REUSE BUILDINGS - Have a look at this beautiful solution on turning a old derelict building into something sculptural and new - just drop a new house inside the old. Kind of like this bookstore in a church in Holland

FUTURE INNOVATION SPECIAL

THE FUTURE OF MOBILE PHONES - Watch Jan Chipchase, head researcher at Nokia, give a really interesting presentation on his recent research and the role of mobiles. See his excellent blog here.

THE FUTURE OF BOOKS - With the advent of the Kindle, Amazons digital book, Economist explores the future of print. Will we see books become disparate and broken down into pieces as we did with the digital revolution in music and film?

THE FUTURE OF ROBOTS - The use of robotic labour is increasing as it becomes cheaper to build and implement. In an age where birth rates are dropping, and the population is aging, will we see robots become an important part of domestic life??

THE FUTURE OF TELCO RETAIL - Let T-Life take you on a (fully branded, subversive, commercially business case proven) journey

THE FUTURE OF BANKING - This study from Deloitte Research identifies major market drivers and operational challenges that financial institutions will likely face over the next four years and pin-points the strategies and practices recommended to create the "Hallmarks of Success."

iPhone already making an impact

Those of you in Australia, particularly Melbourne and Sydney, will know the hype and subsequent sales of iPhones at Optus, Vodafone and Telstra stores over the weekend was hard to ignore. The launch of the 3G phone had much lead up coverage and consumer excitement, to the point where I personally witnessed the queue outside Melbourne's T-Life store in the Bourke St Mall. When I asked if I could just go in the store for a look (not at the iPhone) I was told to join the queue by the security people on the front door - I was waiting for some line like 'not in those shoes', as if it was some desirable night club ... not sure if Telstra will ever reach those heights.

And so the conversations and work begins on iphone ready internet banking (and other related functions).

ANZ have already launched something capable of working with the iPhone (has their java app failed then?) - this from their press release: "The initial functionality available to iPhone users visiting anz.com will include the tailor-made webpage and the choice of functions including Contact us, Locate us, and View Regular anz.com, as well as the ability to use the normal ANZ internet banking service. Over the coming weeks and months the purpose built iPhone banking service will be expanded to include View account balances, View your transaction history, Transfer between your accounts and Pay anyone." Baby steps for ANZ, but platform and compatability/rendering issues will be the first hurdle.

Commsec are allowing trades using the iPhone - "CommSec clients with iPhones can login anywhere, keep up to date with market news and prices, research companies and their performance, monitor their stock portfolio, and buy and sell shares." Interesting point made in the press release - "Rather than just accessing a website through the iPhone, the new purpose-built CommSec iPhone Edition enables customers to make the most of iPhone touch-screen functionality." This is an important distinction to make, to ensure we know they've taken the unique user experience of the iPhone into account, not just the fact that its a mobile. There's a demo you can watch here.

Jim at Netbanker gives us a good overview here on Kiwibanks iPhone offering, and also reveals the initial customer reaction of the BofA solution (and some background on BofA and Paypal apps). Again, an interesting point - "Their main complaint: it's not really a native app, just a front door to the bank's existing mobile site." This again emphasises the importance of the context and environment of the experience is as important as the task and functionality on offer - they must be aligned.

How important is this speed to market for the bank brands, to be associated with one of the most anticipated products in years... to finally get their IB platforms to meet REAL mobile phone standards??

Some interesting speakers

From Ted.com is Jan Chipchase, Senior Researcher at Nokia and writer of the excellent FuturePerfect blog. Watch his presentation, very good.

Also of interest is Lift conference, with a mix of speakers. I'm watching Paul Barnett at the moment. Interesting. Colin Henderson from Bankwatch gives a presentation on banking too.

T-Life is coming to Melbourne

Taking over the old Niketown in central Melbourne is T-Life, a new learning and concept store from Telstra. Looks like it will be an immersive brand experience space (the old Niketown was spread across 2 huge floors), but you feel Telstra have a biot of work to do to endear themselves to the Australian public before they can be seen as fun as Nike. Of course the Sydney store is up and running thanks to a very fashionable launch, and has been since late last year - lets see how its foray into the Melbourne market goes ... eggs in one basket?

The next step in open innovation from McKinsey

From McKinsey Quarterly:

The creation of knowledge, products, and services by online communities of companies and consumers is still in its earliest stages. Who knows where it will lead?

For most companies, innovation is a proprietary activity conducted largely inside the organization in a series of closely managed steps. Over the last decade, however, a few consumer product, fashion, and technology businesses have been opening up the product-development process to new ideas hatched outside their walls—from suppliers, independent inventors, and university labs.

Executives in a number of companies are now considering the next step in this trend toward more open innovation. For one thing, they are looking at ways to delegate more of the management of innovation to networks of suppliers and independent specialists that interact with each other to cocreate products and services. They also hope to get their customers into the act. If a company could use technology to link these outsiders into its development projects, could it come up with better ideas for new products and develop those ideas more quickly and cheaply than it can today? Suppose that a wireless carrier, say, were to orchestrate the design of a new generation of mobile devices through an open network of interested customers, software engineers, and component suppliers, all working interactively with one another. "

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Innovation round up - June 08

LAWS OF SIMPLICITY - John Maeda, from MIT and one of the best thinkers on the planet, presents this interesting blog on the simple and useful things he stumbles across in his travels. See his work at - http://www.maedastudio.com/index.php

TRIPIT - Keep track of your entire trip - airfares, car hire, accom, activities, with this one site.

THE WALL IS THE DESK OF THE FUTURE - "Understanding not only the issues, but also the links between issues is a must in today's complex world. Yet, this is very difficult to achieve without a visual aid. That is where the wall is very helpful and gives all participants of a meeting a common reference point"

CEOs ARE CRITICAL TO CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE - Customer experience success requires CEO nurturing. It is a core business imperative, not a "nice to have" initiative.

STYLESHAKE - Ladies, design your own fashion. Then get it sent to you to wear within 10 days. Slightly poor usability/layout, but keep at it.

WHAT NEWSPAPERS STILL DON'T KNOW ABOUT THE WEB - Why is Google making more money everyday while newspapers are making less?

HELLO WORLD - Large Japanese bank/mobile/telco company introduces their brand, services, news. Hope you speak Japanese.

NETBASICS - Raises awareness of net security with this series of animated films

MSNBC SPECTRA - Get your news on this incredible interface

SONY ERICSSONS LATEST & GREATEST IDEAS - Latest products, ideas, releases. I like this one - http://hk.release-your-music.com/hk/en/

COMMONWEALTH BANK'S IMMERSIVE CAR LOAN PAGE - Some impressive campaign and animation - all this for a landing page? Commbank have also advertised their cash management / trading combo - http://www.bettertogether.com.au/

ING LETS CUSTOMERS BID ON HOMES THAT AREN'T FOR SALE -
The bank's WoonWaarUWilt ("LiveWhereYouWant") initiative, which launched yesterday, lets clients make an offer on the house they'd love to own.

BACK TO BASICS BANKING - James says beware.

APPLE iPHONE AND BANKING - The image with the stats is worth looking at this link alone - 98% browsing, 94% using email!

DESIGNING BANKS - Have a read and watch of this interesting blog

PROXYDEMOCRACY - Helps investors use their voting power to hold corporations accountable

MONEYAISLE - Watch banks participate in auctions for your business. Read Charis' review here

CHECKINGFINDER - Enter a US postcode - for example 10110 - and see what customers can see. I like the simplicity of Search > Review > Open

Interesting roundtable on lateral thinking

From The Banker:

In many parts of the world, the global economy is being driven as much by trade in information, ideas and services,as by trade in physical goods. Organisations that were able to achieve success and predominance through sheer productivity and massive scale are now fewer and far between. Increasingly, it is the ability to think laterally, to operate on an agile basis, to react to global trends quickly and, above all, to innovate that will determine the sustainability of an organisation in future.

The issues:

• The changing global consumer
• The role of technology
• Embedding innovation in culture
• The future of innovation
• The new operating model

Have a look here.

Innovation round up - May 08

BE KIND REWIND - Get into this site - don't worry, you'll feel like you've 'broken the internet' but persist to get to the 'Google' page

NEW BLACKBERRY TO TAKE ON iPHONE - For all you crackberry addicts out there, there's a new toy

DON'T IGNORE BLOGGING - By 2012, more than 145 million people—67% of the US Internet population—will be reading blogs at least once a month - its an important medium!

37 SIGNALS - A range of really interesting web based database and CRM tools, as well as Campfire, a chat tool for working groups

BIT LITERACY - Too many emails, documents, websites? It's all too much. "Information overload" is discussed at the water cooler, bemoaned in the press. Mark from GoodExperience is behind it.

GOOGLE FRIEND CONNECT - Google is introducing a Web site tool called Friend Connect today that promises to extend the reach of social networks such as Facebook to any site that wants to use the tool.

AUSTRALIANS PREFER MOBILES OVER LANDLINES - 90% of household consumers have both a fixed line phone and mobile phone, with 45% preferring to use mobiles as their main voice communications. Also of interest from CallCentres.net - 58% of respondents were either "very" or "extremely satisfied" using a speech recognition system - an 11% increase on the findings of a similar survey in 2005

HAPPY JETTING - Have some fun with Jet Blue, click on the Flight Simulator for example

HOW 8 CEOs APPROACHED THEIR FIRST 90 DAYS - Being able to take charge quickly and effectively in the first months of a CEO role becomes an important leadership competency.

GAMING INDUSTRY AT FOREFRONT OF CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE, AND MAKING $$ - Learn what 'time-to-extinction' means ... it has something to do with an empty wallet

The Future of Banking - still on track?

This is 2 years old now - is it still relevant? Or just fantasy?

Innovation round-up - April 08

WELCOME BACK SPRING - From a large hardware chain - look at the spend on this campaign!

GET OUT AND PLAY - Nokia launches this site showing a stop animation film - pretty nice.

HEY NIELSEN - Voice your opinion about ... anything! Nielsen research brings you this interesting site/concept.

WATCH MARISSA MAYER FROM GOOGLE SPEAK ON INNOVATION - Watch Marissa Mayer speak on Innovation, Design & Simplicity.



Also watch her colleague Jonathon Rosenburg.

FAIRFAX LAUNCHES NEW 'YOUTH PORTAL' - Fairfax's answer to Citysearch - its not bad!!

COMMBANK RELEASES PODCASTS ON MORTGAGE TOPICS - Listen to 5 step-by-step episodes of Home Buying Know How.

BOQ LETS YOU BANK YOUR WAY - A potentially cryptic and confusing nav reveals an interesting site appealing to life events and stages.

Microsoft, somehow, tells us how to be human in the year 2020

'Computer technologies are not neutral – they are laden with human, cultural and social values. We need to define a new agenda for human-computer interaction in the 21st century – one that anticipates and shapes the impact of technology rather than simply reacts to it.' Download this interesting presentation here.

FT Business of Mobile Conference

The FT Business of Moble conference, May 19 & 20 in Brussels looks pretty interesting. Good speakers from Orange, Skype, Yahoo, Intel, Blomberg, BBC, MTV, NBC, etc. Themes include Understanding Mobile Media Consumption, Delivering Mobile Content, Lessons in Mobile Marketing, Tomorrow's Mobile Partnerships, etc. Looks like FT have an interesting calendar of events this year too.

eBay Australia's PayPal mandate has no chance…

Welcome to a new contributor - Montza joins TheBankChannel, and begins with this entry on eBays PayPal palaver:

I was sitting on a plane last night catching up on all this eBay Australia PayPal 'mandate' news. I now see that the RBA have jumped into the following the ACCC announcement to investigate this a bit further (perhaps on the back of some close public and media scrutiny).

To think that eBay Australia has a chance of mandating PayPal is beyond me. I will call it here and now on the record – it just won't happen. There are many good reasons for this.

What eBay Australia are trying to do is holistic control of the buying and selling process. Sure, there is good merit and arguably good intentions through PayPal's buyer protection, but at the end of the day, eBay are asking the ACCC to support banning any other form of transacting for eBay items on the basis of consumer protection/safety alone.

This does not cut it; we don't live in a society where we reduce consumer risk through eliminating consumer choice. If the buyer wants the protection of PayPal and the seller does not offer it, then the seller does not generate a sale… Pretty simple, if PayPal is so safe and protects buyers then consumer demand will organically drive uptake. For me, domestically, I am more than happy to pay my bank 20 cents for an internet banking transfer; it only takes 24hrs and costs the seller nothing – I've bought and sold over 400 times on eBay.

PayPal's first mover advantage is a good thing and should be noted. They have the jump in our market for online payments and the RBA are. The banks need to crack the whip on this whole EFTPOS online expansion thing; goodness knows how… Perhaps stored value is the way to go? After all, none of us have a pin and card swipe attached to our laptops [yet].

If they (eBay Australia) get this whole PayPal thing up, the ACCC is allowing a monopoly exemption which not only sets precedents for PayPal, it clears the runway for PayPal to take-off by expanding its footprint in the same direction it's pursuing in the US and Europe.

Let's cut to the chase, PayPal have a financial services to operate in Australia, and they provide a very convenient service for eBay buyers, sellers, and many other non-eBay users… But, they won't stop there, I believe PayPal have full intent of becoming a direct bank in this country, and the only barrier is a banking license either through application or [more probably] through acquisition of an undervalued Aussie bank.

For the record, I'm an eBay shareholder and I work for an Australian bank.

Thanks Mont - looking forward to reading your thoughts and ideas over the coming months.

2020 Summit reveals innovative thinking for Australia

For those overseas, or those Australians living under a rock, Prime Minister Kevin Rudds 2020 Summit wrapped up over the weekend, with 1000 delegates coming together across 10 streams to discuss the future ideas and vision of the country - Climate change, indigenous affairs, global and local security, governance, creativity, education, health, productivity, economy, and community were discussed in intensive workshops (of 100 people in each!) to reveal a range of blue sky thinking and ideas for the next decade plus. Relating to this blog, most of the senior bank and finance leaders in the country were involved, with NAB mentioned for their support of microfinancing by the Prime Minister in his closing address. Also, there were some interesting creative folk there too, with our more prominent film and TV stars the poster children for this group. Hugh Jackman, Cate Blanchett, etc (What? No Nicole?).

Its unique in my experience to have such a summit, where people from all areas of expertise and representation can come together to discuss what matters most to their country. The ideas and plans from this conference will now be considered by the government, with all initiatives to be responded to, positive or negative, before years end.

Read the initial report here. I encourage you to see what the combination of 1000 great minds and points of view can create, or perhaps conversely can compromise to create a lack of progress - time will tell the outcome of these ideas.

Interview with Pixars Brad Bird on creativity

From McKinsey Quarterly:

If there’s one thing successful innovators have shown over the years, it’s that great ideas come from unexpected places. Who could have predicted that bicycle mechanics would develop the airplane or that the US Department of Defense would give rise to a freewheeling communications platform like the Internet?

Senior executives looking for ideas about how to make their companies more innovative can also seek inspiration in surprising sources. Exhibit One: Brad Bird, Pixar’s two-time Oscar-winning director. Bird’s hands-on approach to fostering creativity among animators holds powerful lessons for any executive hoping to nurture innovation in teams and organizations.

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Hyperconnectivity, Unified Communications, whatever you call it, its here

I saw a presentation this morning on 2.0 and other such things, you know the ones, the ones that constantly talk about 'gen y's collaborating with their peers on social network sites like MySpace' (isnt MySpace pretty dead now?) ... whilst it was interesting, I'd heard it all before, for aboout 2 years at similar presentations, but I got the impression the audience (and even the speaker!) was hearing it for the first time ... theres something about baby boomers who marvel at this idea that there are more ways to communicate and contact people (and collaborate!) than through the phone and email.

The real piece of interest for me is the connection to the contact centre - how the IP capability will create a truly medium independent environment that enables all kinds of specialised, targeted, routed contact for bankers. Nortel call it HyperConnectivity, Microsoft call it Unified Communications. I've talked about these before.

Its time to implement these ideas and systems and get these networks in place.

Read more on VOIP and IP Networks, HyperConnectivity, and Unified Communications.

Calling the future

From ITRadio:

"Smart call, your weekly call and contact centre podcast, is available for download. This week’s show peers into the future of the contact centre and explores the future role of video, maps and virtual reality in the delivery of customer service!

On this week’s podcast:

• Callcentres.net’s Dr Catriona Wallace analyses email in the contact centre and why it is languishing as a little-used channel.
• Bruce McCabe of S2 Intelligence looks at the future of the contact centre, explaining how voice analysis, video demonstrations and maps will become part of the customer service experience, but virtual reality probably will not.
• Reminders about next week’s Voice Leadership Forum, a two-day event that will focus debate on the role of voice biometrics in defeating identity fraud! SmartCall is the official media partner for the event! "

Heres the podcast in MP3.

Bulk update on the world of Customer Experience & Innovation

From Bruce Temkin, Guru of CX at Forrester: I just wanted to alert you about a new piece of research that I’m very excited about called “The Business Impact Of Customer Experience.” It establishes a link, objectively, between customer experience and consumer loyalty. You can read more about it in my blog: "Customer Experience Matters".

BANK OF AMERICA PARTNERS MIT FOR BANKING RESEARCH LAB: Bank of America is investing up to $25 million over five years in a collaboration with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to create a banking research and development laboratory.

SCOTIABANK PILOTS SOCIAL NETWORK FOR STAFF: Canada's Scotiabank is using technology from Microsoft to introduce an internal Web 2.0 social networking platform aimed at encouraging information sharing and collaboration among its staff.

CITI INTRODUCES MOBILE SERVICES TO CARDHOLDERS WITH FIRETHORN: Citi is teaming with m-banking outfit Firethorn to provide its credit card customers with access to real-time account information via their handsets.

Indonesia aspires to be a cashless society: "Services provided by the banking industry have now taken a leap to the next level, creating a society where cash distribution between various parties is minimal. The benefit of this cashless society system will result in major efficiencies in costs and minimize the risk of handling and distributing cash. We are pleased to announce that this year's APCONEX will address all these initiatives," adds Pak Pramono.

Consistency – The Key to a Great Customer Experience…Every Time: Many companies fail to provide a consistent experience because they focus on one customer touchpoint while completely overlooking others. How often have we heard about an otherwise four star hotel stay ruined by the one star service? The truth is nothing hurts your brand more than failing to provide a consistent experience across all customer touchpoints.

Customer Experience Calculators: So what kind of impact is the Customer Experience having on your business? Find out by first figuring out some of the facts you should know about your customers (but probably don't).

Innovation round up - March 08

Some of the links from my March Innovatione Newsletter. The others you would have seen here already.

JOIN THE SWEDISH ARMED FORCES - Give this tough site a go. Very interesting.

QUIET SPACE - A beautiful site for IKEA, using some incredible video footage

CALL CENTRES: WHAT'S NEW, WHAT MATTERS - Call centres are increasingly being viewed as a key defense to defection, and a tool to improve customer loyalty

MOTOROLA CITY - Let us show you how we can help seamlessly deliver real-time information into the hands of the people who need it most so they can focus on their mission, not the technology.

LET YOUR WORRIES GO - Excellent viral site from Northern Mutual Insurance, and wouldnt have been that hard either. Eject your worries across the landscape.

RBC EMPLOYS STUDENTS TO BLOG - Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) is looking to tap the 'Facebook generation' with the launch of a financial advice blog for students that can be accessed via its fan page on the social networking site

Hate Phone Menus? You'll love Fonolo

From SpeechTechMag:

Fonolo, a Toronto-based company, today began closed beta testing of a service that it says will make it faster and less frustrating to call large companies. The service is expected to be available for public beta testing in the summer; full commercial rollout is expected in the fall.

The service, called Deep Dialing, automatically "spiders" a company’s interactive voice response (IVR) systems, creating a visual transcript of the IVR script for the user to read. Users start by finding the company they need on the Fonolo Web site, then visually scanning through the phone menu on their computers’ or mobile devices’ Web browser and clicking on the appropriate point. Fonolo then dials the company, navigates the phone system, and calls the user’s phone. When the user answers, he is connected to the desired point in the menu."

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