Last year Zinnov’s ‘R&D Globalization Council, 2008-09’ received much enthusiasm and acclaim for creating a platform for a liberal exchange of dialogue among senior leaders from the R&D fraternity around some of the industry’s key challenges and issues. This experience was further enhanced by pertinent frameworks and detailed research reports, created by Zinnov which provided rare insights into the industry’s functioning, citing some of the best case studies.

Owing to the overwhelming response and feedback received from the Indian R&D fraternity, we were able to scale this format in geographies such as U.S and China. This is nothing short of phenomenal and is a testimony of our successful advancement towards excellence.

   
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Key highlights of R&D Globalization Council 2008-09:

Innovation Metrics: The Innovation Metrics emphasizes innovation and helps understand how different elements of innovation tie-in together. Success of the Globalization Model has prompted organizations to look overseas for innovation, opening before them the huge opportunity to unleash the innovative talent present in various global locations. However, to innovate successfully, companies must deploy the required resources, implement right processes and create a culture of innovation. And one of the most challenging aspects of innovation for global centers today is to make a higher percentage contribution in the overall innovation output of the organization. The Innovation Metrics helps to study key components like innovation culture and processes used to build an innovation lifecycle, and also to measure the effectiveness and sustenance of this lifecycle.

Globalization Maturity Model: In order to expedite innovation and to service the ever-expanding and ever-changing customer base, organizations have set up engineering centers in several locations across the globe. To formulate the right short-term and long-term strategies for each global center and to align these with the global business strategy is an exacting task. The ‘Global Maturity Model’ was thus designed to help organizations evaluate the efficiency of their global centers and product teams, and subsequently devise befitting strategies.

R&D Way Forward: This special report highlighted aspects that the Indian R&D industry has to bear in mind to move up the value chain and become true partners of their respective HQs. Forecasting some of the near-term challenges it also highlights aspects that will help strengthen the ecosystem for COEs in India. This study took up examples of organizations that have leveraged the convergence of favourable factors and have rebadged the India centre as value centres and moved away from pure cost arbitrage. The tagline is that in the wake of the current economic crisis, India centres need to focus on creating synergies between their local leadership here and business unit heads at the HQ.

Chinese R&D Markets Better Understood: In January ’09, we launched the study, “R&D Globalization – A China Perspective” that brought into purviewthe entire R&D offshoring market in China. This unprecedented study focusing on the MNC R&D subsidiary landscape as well as the market for R&D service providers showcased China’s R&D capabilities, in addition to some key challenges and drivers for growth. The study opened, to our council members, the gate to the Chinese R&D market and the vast opportunity it presents them with!