How can digital platforms, ecosystems and co-creation impact your business?
As a digital transformation guide, part of the job is to follow new technology, trends and developments. Lately, I participated in several innovative and inspiring sessions about different topics and I discovered an interesting trend: the rise of ecosystems and especially tech ecosystems. What exactly are ecosystems? What inspiring examples can we share and what opportunities do they offer for your company?
Ecosystem: or eCO-Creation System
The last couple of weeks I participated in several innovative and inspiring sessions about different topics.
- Lego Serious Play session hosted by LINKIT
- Blockchain knowledge session by Procam
- Co-creation training at the Design Thinking Academy
- Connect 2 Innovate event hosted by SAP & VNSG
One common trend in all sessions is the increasing impact of ecosystems. Whether it concerns developments in green energy, blockchain technology or innovation in general, all keynote speakers agreed: Tech-ecosystems are the future.
From co-creation to a tech-ecosystem
A tech-ecosystem is an interconnected, interdependent network of various actors that combine to create innovative products and services in tech. In our sharing economy we move from ‘value by exchange’ to ‘value by usage’, proven by famous examples like Airbnb and Uber. Co-creation evolved into an economic strategy where a strong network is most important when striving towards innovation. Competing organizations work together to set up types of co-creation towards business development and innovation. Co-creation in itself is not new. Many organizations have co-creation embedded in their business models and in their core values. What’s new is that these organizations turn co-creation with their customers, partners, suppliers and competitors into an ecosystem were all parties involved can add value and combine their expertise in their products and services and achieve innovation. Get inspired by the following organizations who have proven that co-creation and being part of an ecosystem is successful.
#1 Salesforce
Salesforce is a SaaS solution initially built for CRM and now the leading digital platform on which customers can build their custom solutions and interact easily. Organizations and customers can develop new app solutions on the platform and make them available on the App Exchange for others to use and add new features. In this way, organizations can build products – just like building with Lego blocks – and improve their products and solutions continuously.
#2 Lego
Talking about Lego: as a young kid, did you also play with Lego and dreamt of having your very own custom Lego block? This dream just might come true. Lego is celebrating its 10th birthday with an idea platform. Customers can submit new ideas and vote on the ideas of others, join contests and competitions and build add-ons to making their ideas reality. In this way Lego encourages interaction with their customers and while doing that create and reveal new demands and new markets.
Lego Serious Play session hosted by LINKIT
#3 Apple
The App Store is a great example of co-creation. How cool is it that – besides playing with Lego in real life – you can also play with Lego online! The Apple App Store enables companies to extend their business model and translate an offline game into an online game that can be played on smartphone or tablet. The possibilities are endless when companies and customers can develop and publish it on a marketplace.
Other interesting examples of companies working successfully together are Philips en Douwe Egberts creating the Senseo coffee machine or IKEA, DeWALT, DHL, and Unilever.
eCo-Create with Talent Peaks!
At Talent Peaks we believe in making impact through communication, collaboration, and co-creation That’s why we want to be part of your ecosystem, and we invite you to become part of ours. We want to co-create your digital transformation, not just for you, but together with you. Our approach in co-creation is based on design thinking fundamentals. This means understanding everything about you – your business, your challenges, your employees, your customers, your processes, your products, and your services – so that we can inspire you and work towards new ideas. For example, designing a new app or a new technology based on our combined knowledge, expertise, and networks and start developing, prototyping and testing it to make the dream come true.
Let’s explore the opportunities for your company
Sounds like a good idea? Would you like to learn more about our approach or are you ready to join our eCo-creation system? Let us know! We’d love to dig into the possibilities for your organization with you.
