{"id":878,"date":"2009-10-07T19:12:07","date_gmt":"2009-10-08T01:12:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/workingknowledge.com\/blog\/?p=878"},"modified":"2023-03-02T21:28:32","modified_gmt":"2023-03-03T03:28:32","slug":"open-innovation-at-kraft","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.workingknowledge.com\/blog\/open-innovation-at-kraft\/","title":{"rendered":"Kraft: the &#8220;$40 Billion Start-Up&#8221; Spurs Innovation"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Point<\/strong>: Open innovation can accelerate new product development<\/p>\n<p><strong>Story<\/strong>: When Irene Rosenfeld took over as CEO of Kraft, she saw an anemic innovation pipeline. <a href=\"http:\/\/workingknowledge.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/10\/IrenePhoto.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"right size-thumbnail wp-image-879\" title=\"IrenePhoto\" src=\"http:\/\/workingknowledge.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/10\/IrenePhoto-92x150.jpg\" alt=\"IrenePhoto\" width=\"92\" height=\"150\" \/><\/a>The company had 2000 corporate R&amp;D staff &#8212; scientists, engineers and chemists &#8212; but new products weren&#8217;t flowing rapidly enough.\u00a0\u00a0 Her solution to encourage innovation?\u00a0 To get everyone to &#8220;Think of Kraft as a $40 billion start-up,&#8221; she said at the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.wbfny.com\">World Business Forum<\/a> on October 7, 2009.\u00a0 One way to emulate start-up thinking is to be open to new ideas from anywhere and quickly turn them into something valuable. Kraft reached out beyond its corporate R&amp;D to enlist the help of employees across the whole company, as well as suppliers and partners, to spur innovation.<\/p>\n<p>For example, Kraft runs an online &#8220;Innovate with Kraft&#8221; program whereby anyone can submit product ideas.\u00a0 Although skeptics call such programs gimmicks or fads, Rosenfeld maintains that they&#8217;re not gimmicks if the programs and the ideas generated from them are being used.<\/p>\n<p>Kraft&#8217;s recent new product introduction, Bagel-fuls (frozen bagels pre-filled with Philadelphia brand Cream Cheese), for example, came from an unsolicited idea from a third-generation bagel maker in a niche market. The idea was a win-win for both companies: it solved some technical challenges that Kraft had faced in delivering a bagel and cheese combo, and it expanded the bagel-makers product beyond his niche.<\/p>\n<p>Rosenfeld also mentioned the value of platform-based innovation (ideas that span multiple brands and geographies) in the innovation process.\u00a0 Now, &#8220;Our innovation pipeline is quite full,&#8221; Rosenfeld remarked, with new products coming out in four core areas: Snacking, Quick Meals, Premium and Health &amp; Wellness.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Action<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li> Look for ideas in the corners: reach out to employees and suppliers, especially niche people, to uncover obscure ideas that merit more widespread use<\/li>\n<li> Celebrate the use of submitted ideas to show the value of participation in innovation submission programs.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>For more information:<\/strong><br \/>\nIrene Rosenfeld at the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.wbfny.com\">World Business Forum<\/a> on Oct 6, 2009 #wbf09<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/money\/companies\/management\/profile\/2008-12-10-ceo-forum-kraft-irene-rosenfeld_N.htm\">http:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/money\/companies\/management\/profile\/2008-12-10-ceo-forum-kraft-irene-rosenfeld_N.htm<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Staggs, Sandy. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ideaconnection.com\/interviews\/00058-Fostering-Innovation-at-Kraft-Foods.html\">Foster Innovation at Kraft Foods<\/a>, Oct 27, 2008.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2009\/09\/09\/business\/09food.html\">New York Times<\/a>, Sept. 9, 2009<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Kraft used open innovation to accelerate new product development. Kraft CEO Irene Rosenfeld shared her advice at the World Business Forum on Oct. 7, 2009.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[71,19,11,34],"tags":[371,223,210,373,380,224,378,202],"class_list":["post-878","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-case-study","category-ceo","category-innovation","category-strategy","tag-innovation","tag-irene-rosenfeld","tag-kraft","tag-new-product-development","tag-open-innovation","tag-platform-based-innovation","tag-rd","tag-world-business-forum"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.workingknowledge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/878","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.workingknowledge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.workingknowledge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.workingknowledge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.workingknowledge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=878"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.workingknowledge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/878\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2267,"href":"http:\/\/www.workingknowledge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/878\/revisions\/2267"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.workingknowledge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=878"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.workingknowledge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=878"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.workingknowledge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=878"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}