You can’t buy Innovation

Last weekend I was interviewing a potential new staff member for a job we have going, and we started discussing various vendors strengths and weaknesses. I put forward that I would question buying hardware from a vendor who just copies everyone else and doesn’t innovate on their own undertaking.

The response from one of the people present was that you can buy innovation (eg Cisco buying back Nuova, HP buying 3Com and thus H3C). I didn’t respond at first to this statement because I wasn’t really sure how I felt. After some thought I have decided how I feel.

You cannot buy innovation, you can only buy innovative product lines. Innovation is an ongoing process

Anybody with a hefty wallet can buy a company who is making some new products and bring them into your own portfolio, but this is only buying an innovative product line. To be truly innovative is a corporate culture kind of thing. If your company does not believe in innovation as a way of life then purchasing any new products is only going to move you in very small baby steps – steps that will possibly become dead-ends without appropriate investment in research and development.

Corporate Culture can be changed or learned. Various companies throughout corporate history have brought in new management who have been able to change the core practices. Sometimes this can be through grass-roots change, or from a visionary new C-Level exec, but without fail it has required key changes be made to how the company does business and what values are important to them.

I’ve said it before, and I will say it again if you are just doing what everyone else is doing then why should I buy from you?

If you are waiting for the standards instead of innovating new ways to do things today, then I guess I will come back to you next refresh cycle – cos you cannot meet my needs today.

Maybe this is a naive view, and as always Im happy for those wiser than me to “show me the light”