Membership has its Privileges: Local TV Effort to Control Data and Destiny

Graham Media has developed the Membership for Broadcast Project, which received grant funding last year as part of the Google News Initiative Innovation Challenge. The goal within Graham’s stations is to identify and engage with as many viewers as possible on a scale seldom seen in local TV news. The process involves a new way of thinking about data, who should own it and who should control it. Electronic News explores the initiative to offer a roadmap for other stations that may want to try something similar.

Unlocking the Cult of Early-Stage High-Tech Startup Founders

In this paper, we unlock the cult of high-tech startup founders by taking a sample case study and observing various early-stage founders. Performing ethnographic studies has pointed us in the direction to use patents as a qualifier for technological credibility which serves as an inspiration to such startup founders. When the newbie startup founders are seeking funding, they need to define traits of the success laid out by top high-tech companies that were once startups. We observed 300 early-stage high-tech startup founders around the world, while some of them were in college, some quit college and others start after getting substantial work experience. The high-tech startup world is full of innovative ideas to solve big problems and introduce the workable tech solution to their respective markets. We performed a case study of an early-stage startup that won an innovation challenge and how they struggled to reach credibility and revenue success. Overall, we define this outcome as a cult among the early-stage high-tech startup founders while unlocking revenue success, patenting to scale innovation and human element.

Problem-Oriented Technology Innovation and Participatory Technology Assessment in China

China is developing an ‘innovation-oriented nation' and meanwhile meeting challenges in both innovation practice and research. This chapter contributes to the book that introduces a problem-oriented approach to develop innovation research to a Chinese context that responses to the increasing challenges. Three questions will be focused on: 1) What are the main problems and challenges of innovation and research in China to become a front runner in the knowledge economy? 2) What is a problem-oriented innovation approach? and 3) How does it conceptualize the China's innovation challenge? Briefly, this chapter deepens the understanding of a new conceptual framework of a problem-oriented approach to innovation research and suggests new methods of technology assessment to China. It also provides implications for researchers in other cultural contexts around the world.

Open Collaborative Innovation at Colombia's National Spectrum Agency

This chapter describes the implementation of the Open Collaborative Innovation Program in Colombia's National Spectrum Agency (from Spanish, ANE). Six universities participated in the program. The model implemented was based on previous models developed by Ramírez-Salazar; Chesbrough; VanGudy; and Davila, Epstein, and Shelton (2008). The objective of the implementation was to propose solutions to reduce the number of complaints related to the illegal use of the spectrum in Colombia. The innovation challenge for universities was to find answers to solve the problem previously mentioned. Three solving teams were formed. Movimiento Espectral was the winning team with its solution called “Clausula de la Cultura.” The model was validated by ANE executives who deemed it adequate to conduct external projects that provide solutions to institutional challenges.