Ford Lags in Alt-Energy Patents

Posted by: Michael Arndt on November 04, 2009

Ford Motor may have cheered investors with back-to-back reports this week that it netted almost $1 billion in the third quarter and increased its market share and year-over-year sales in October. (See this report from my BW colleague David Welch.) But the No. 3 car seller in the U.S. is laps behind in the alternative energy race, says a new study from Thomson Reuters.

The financial info company tallied patents and patent applications in alternative energy, an area it considers to be a proxy for automotive innovation, from 2008 through 2009’s first quarter. Ford finished 12th, with 137 patent grants and filings. No. 1 Toyota Motor had 2,899—or 21 times more than Ford. Even General Motors bested Ford, coming in fourth, with 451 patent documents. (GM also outsells Ford, as does Toyota.)

Thomson Reuters also examined patent data in two other areas on the forefront of innovation—vehicle security and navigation—in 2003 and again in 2008 and the first quarter of this year. Ford didn’t make the top 20 in any of these rankings.

Not to dump too much on Ford, I should note that it is moving up in alt-energy patents. In 2003, the carmaker wasn’t even in the top 20, with 43 grants and applications. In 2008, it was 13th, with 116. I have asked Ford for a response, but haven’t heard back.

For the record, here’s the top 12 list in alternative-powered vehicle patents in the most recent five-quarter period:

1. Toyota 2,899
2. Nissan 601
3. Hyundai 549
4. GM 451
5. Honda 449
6. Matsushita 383
7. Nippondenso 334
8. Sanyo 219
9. Sumitomo 198
10. Hitachi 196
11. Bosch 144
12. Ford 137

Mayo Clinic to Telemonitor Heart Patients

Posted by: Michael Arndt on November 05, 2009

Mayo Clinic is moving toward becoming more of a virtual hospital. The not-for-profit complex just announced a telemedicine collaboration this morning with a Swiss semiconductor company, STMicroelectronics, to monitor the condition of cardiac patients from outside their hospital rooms. Patients would wear a lightweight device that would pick up such information as heart and breathing rates and beam the data to medical personnel.

A trial involving 10 patients begins today (Nov. 5). These patients will be monitored while in the clinic in Rochester, Minn., to test the equipment and to train hospital personnel. Mayo plans to move on to a trial with discharged patients in early 2010, says Dr. Virend Somers, a consulting cardiologist and professor of medicine.

Talking with me before the official announcement, Somers acknowledged that telemedicine at Mayo is hardly brand new; the hospital has been taking readings from heart patients through at-home devices for years. But he said the STMicroelectronics technology should be more adaptable. For instance, it might be programmed to send real-time data 24/7, or for patients in less critical condition, it could record data and upload it once a day or week.

“The question is how can we make a comprehensive, unobtrusive, user-friendly, and economic remote monitoring system all together,” he said.

The device and monitoring system costs money, of course. The clinical trials are also aimed at finding out whether they’re worth it. Somers says he’s fairly certain it will lower both technology and personnel costs. Time will tell, as they say.

Innovation Is Back, Says Accenture—Or Is it?

Posted by: Michael Arndt on November 11, 2009

Nearly two years after the U.S. tumbled into a recession, business is starting to think about ways to grow again. And for many, this means spending more money on innovation, says anew study from Accenture. In a survey of 630 execs in the U.S. and the U.K., 48% said their companies had upped their innovation budgets from six months ago. A third said innovation outlays were flat.

There’s a gray lining in these numbers: One in every five companies is still cutting spending on the development of new products or services.

And there are other findings that suggest that companies really haven’t kicked their recession habits. While new products or services have the biggest potential to generate sales and profit, 74% of the respondents told Accenture that their companies were pursuing incremental advances, like line extensions. (How many varieties of Coca-Cola will we really drink?) Along the same lines, 66% said their companies were more interested in short-term gains than long-term ones. (Same question.)

In the U.S., at least, companies may not be getting better at innovation, either. Accenture said 73% of American respondents said their employers didn’t learn from mistakes. (In the U.K., only 30% were such slow learners.) Respondents blamed failed innovation mostly on inability to meet customer needs, being late to market, and incorrect pricing.

What’s going on at your companies? Are you seeing any lift in innovation allocations?

Patent Volume Isn't the Best Innovation Gauge

Posted by: Michael Arndt on November 22, 2009

Patent volume, based on new analysis, isn’t necessarily a valid proxy for innovation. Tallies of U.S. patent grants are published every year, giving IBM reason to strut since it invariably comes out on top. (Last year, as IBM notes here, it was the first entity to bag more than 4,000.) And recently I wagged a finger at Ford Motor in a blog post, based on patent data from Thomson Reuters that showed Ford ranked far behind in new patents for alternative energy and other innovative automotive technology.

But a study by the Patent Board, an intellectual-property consultancy, shows there are other—and better—ways to quantify innovation. The company looked at all active U.S. patents in one field, automobile collision-avoidance technology. Ranked by sheer volume, Honda Motor is No. 1, with 54. That’s almost twice second-place Panasonic, which has 28. (Only two U.S.-based companies make the Top 10: TRW Automotive, in fifth place with 22, and Delphi, which is tied for eighth with 17.)

Ranked by other metrics, though, Honda isn’t a leader. In a scorecard in November’sIntellectual Property Today, the Patent Board publishes five more ways to put a value on patent portfolios, including citations by other patent seekers, innovation cycle time, and age. Honda does no better than second and as poorly as sixth. Delphi leads, for instance, when it comes to having the newest patents, while Fuji Heavy Industries is fastest at turning ideas into patents.

Remember this when the list of 2009 patent winners is announced.

Top 10 Consumer Electronics Innovators

Posted by: Michael Arndt on November 25, 2009

Everyone loves a list, especially (at this blog at least) one that ranks innovative companies. We publish our own annual Top 50 roster, which you can see here. Strategos, an innovation consultancy that is owned by UTEK, just released a Top 10 list of its own.

The rankings overlap a bit—Apple, LG, Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony are on both—but the order is quite different. At BusinessWeek, Apple is first, followed by Google, Toyota, Microsoft, and Nintendo. Strategos puts LG in the lead, trailed immediately by Nintendo and Microsoft. As for Apple, it ranks 10th.

One obvious reason for the different lineups: The Strategos list includes only consumer electronics companies, while ours encompasses companies across all industries.

Since I first posted this, I had a chance to talk with Strategos CEO Peter Skarzynski about Apple’s relatively poor showing in the ranking, which is based on a consumer survey. Apple’s chief shortcoming, he says, is “uniqueness.” Its products are so common today that they seem commonplace. Even Microsoft, lifted by high scores for the Xbox and Zune, rates 15 points ahead of Apple on uniqueness.

LG also does well on uniqueness, as well as quality, usefulness, dependability, and, in some regions of the country, coolness.

Skarzynski says Apple’s results floored everyone at Strategos. “We triple- and quadruple-checked the data,” he says. They checked out.

Here’s the entire Strategos Top 10:

1. LG
2. Nintendo
3. Microsoft
4. Sony
5. Hitachi
6. Canon
7. Sharp
8. NetApp
9. Audiovox
10. Apple

We Like Chocolate and Beer. Cigarettes, Not That Much

Posted by: Michael Arndt on November 17, 2009

Turns out candy is dandy, at least during recessions. Beer is pretty OK, too, but cigarettes are a vice that even smokers increasingly say they ain’t worth it. Overall, says the latest customer satisfaction survey by the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business, American consumers are as happy with grocery-store goods as they were three months ago.

Among food companies, Hershey and Nestle both moved up 2 points while Mars gained 1 point from a year earlier, to an average score of 86 (out of a possible 100). That’s their highest score ever. The trio last had an upsurge that big in the 2001 recession and in 2004, when worries about the widening Iraq War and higher fuel prices had consumers scurrying back to comfort foods, says Ross School Professor Claes Fornell, who heads the index.

Not every comfort food maker is more beloved, however. Conagra’s standing dropped 7 points from a year earlier, to 78, an all-time low. Fornell attributes the decline to higher prices—Conagra jacked them up an average of 25%. Heinz retains its No. 1 ranking, with a score of 89.

Beer still hits the spot. Customers say they’re more satisfied with their beer buys than ever before, pushing the industry’s average score to 84. The biggest gainer: Anheuser-Busch, which rose 4 points to an all-time high of 85. Yes, the company is no longer American. But U.S. consumers appreciate its cheaper brands Natural Light and Busch. Meantime, Coors, which is generally pricier, sagged 2 points, to 81. Miller moved up 1 point, to 83.

Higher prices, this time from federal taxes that more than doubled, made smokers think less of cigarettes. Both Philip Morris and Reynolds American sagged to 72, falling 9 points and 8 points, respectively. Neither had ever been below 75.

Wrigley Goes into a New Category: Baked Snacks

Posted by: Michael Arndt on October 01, 2009

Wm Wrigley Jr. Co. is the biggest gum company in the world, but it’s only in Russia, among the Top 10 markets, where it has the leading candy, Orbit, according to my colleagues atBusinessWeek. So how best to boost sales in Russia? Well, it could roll out new flavors of Orbit—and Wrigley is, like clockwork. Or it could try an entirely new product. It’s doing that too, it turns out.

Wrigley, now a subsidiary of Mars, has begun selling what it calls “croutons” in Russia. These are individually wrapped snacks that look like baked flat breads or crackers and come in a variety of flavors. And they may well mark the first time Wrigley has moved from sweets into the savory category.

You won’t see a mention of this on Wrigley’s own Web site, but one of its top executives talked about the new product at a conference sponsored by DePaul University’s Center for Creativity & Innovation. The exec, Erwin Hinteregger, Wrigley’s director of emerging business territories and formerly director of global consumer innovation, told me the croutons were created by Wrigley’s Russian unit to meet a company-wide challenge to find new revenue streams.

Like most new products, the snack cracker isn't a huge seller, he said. He added, though, that Wrigley accepts that, knowing from previous launches that new brands take time to catch on—even with Wrigley's big marketing machine and well-oiled distribution network behind them.

Hinteregger said Wrigley is unlikely to expand sales of croutons to other markets—Russians may be unique in liking this kind of treat—but he added that the company's in-country team in China is now trying to develop new products/revenue streams there, based on the early results of the Russian addition.

Russia seems to be a good lab for Wrigley. The company is selling its first chocolates there, too, under the A. Korkunov brand, which Wrigley acquired in 2007. You can learn a bit about that candy on the company's site. Meantime, answer me this: What new products would you like to see from Wrigley?