Singapore Entrepreneurship

A sharp colleague of mine wrote this - Good read.


Our commercialisation efforts need to be more targeted and market-driven, and in Singapore's context, its being able to identify and tap into a regional demand. Whether that's for quality healthcare, aerospace MRO, professional services, etc, that's the billion dollar question. Quite amazingly, I've heard annecdotal lamentations that ST Eng, for example, has the capability to create just about any part of an aircraft (yes, literally any part), yet we do not have the ability to design and build a fully Made in Singapore aircraft (i.e. the real Singapore Flyer). Even the Chinese are beginning to move into this space; Airbus has recently opened its E$320mil A320 assembly factory in Tianjin. As for who will buy a Made in China A320, well... but the point is - there's the verve and audacity with the Chinese to take on such traditionally European or American strongholds (BMWs and Audis included), that if we don't step up and do so, we're forever lost...

Singapore is well honed in our abilities to do servicing, product modifications and incremental engineering improvements, but are weak with the creationist aspects... Ironic, if you see that most of our public R&D funding has gone into the "back end" research (academic and RIs), rather than to spur commercialisation.

Do we go the way of Taiwan and build capability ground up (ie. start from market, then work backwards to bluesky research), or continue to pour money into research with no requirement for "productisation". Is the continued "thirst for knowledge" (papers, patents, etc) going to be sufficient to see us through, our would we need a generation of savvy technopreneurs, to take these ideas to market whilst also having the ability to halt projects, if the market need isn't there?

Rethink by Nokia after their one-trick donkey (the 5800) flopped (and flopped big) and almost killed them in Q1 2009? =) The lesson there is - if you want to mimic Apple's iPhone model, you need to know what the market wants (market driven = demand-led), and have the
user interface and broader market (ie. the Apps developers) to back it up.

Commercialisation needs to be driven by wheeler-dealer sales & marketers,
not lawyers. :-) Lawyers ensure that the patents themselves are worded to
provide the needed coverage/protection. That's the primary function of
patents - defense of a concept/idea. IP is only a means to securitise an
idea, not monetise it, and hence should be pursued as a means to an end,
and not an end in itself.

Beyond the quick fix, we need to fundamentally rewire how we treat IP. Is
it more equitable to use the RIs as a proving grounds to train
scientists/research personnel for full-time positions (so that private
companies can quickly tap onto an available and operationally ready talent
pool), than fund RIs in tandem with our Universities with virtually
indistinguishable KPIs (papers, patents). Instead, I suggest that A* RIs
be asked to deliver on % sales from new product launches in last 5 yrs.
This is one of the toughest KPIs to deliver on consistently, coz it forces
a maniacal focus on the market, and adjust product development activities
accordingly to deliver. =)

If one takes a hard look at successful big MNCs (e.g. Apple, Google,
Microsoft, IBM, GE, Intel, Lenovo, HP, Nokia, Disney....). Besides having
visionary (often charismatic) leadership, invariably these are companies
with innovation at the core of their DNA. They also happen to sell
products/services that everybody wants - and want enough to pay good
premiums for (e.g. iPhone). In their highest form, these may even be
products that people need (e.g. Intel, Windows, etc); one-of-a-kind
differentiated products that change the way we do things or maybe even set
industry standards. Notably, many of these companies today are already at
the peak (some past peak) of the chart below. For example, GE famously
hived off its core to pursue the services route, arguably weakening the
company.