Innovation and Entrepreneurship: Insights from a Serial Entrepreneur

This report provides insights into the mindset and strategies of a successful serial entrepreneur, Matt Robinson, and explores the importance of innovation in business. It discusses the theories of disruptive innovation and entrepreneurship innovation and their relevance in today's business world. The report also highlights the different types of innovation and their impact on business success.

Opportunity
Innovation and
Entrepreneurship

Contents
About Entrepreneur.....................................................................................................................................3
Questions from Entrepreneur.......................................................................................................................3
Analyze data and information......................................................................................................................4
Relate to theory...........................................................................................................................................5
Conclusion...................................................................................................................................................8
References...................................................................................................................................................9

About Entrepreneur
When business ideas get converted into reality then it forms money making companies.
Entrepreneurs are those people who take financial risks so they can earn profit. They try to
identify business opportunity i.e. develop a system where products/services can be sold for
earning huge amount of money (Gagliardi, 2013). This report is based on Matt Robinson, UK
based serial entrepreneur. He is started GoCardless; an organization which manages and arrange
recurring payments of business. This organization currently value more than £400m and its
growth rate is also remarkable. Nested is another venture of Matt Robinson, it is basically a two
sided business where company assist seller in selling their home and buyers in buying new
house. Nested become very popular in no time as The Sunday Times Fast Track named it
“Disruptor to watch”.
Matt Robinson is a Law graduate from Oxford University. He has achieved a lot in very
less time as he has founded two companies that has values in millions. His mindset is different
others, he sold stakes in his old enterprise so he can do something different. Although he is a law
student but his ability to work on different subjects provides him an edge over others. He started
new venture after finding that more than 60% properties, register for online sale, went unsold.
People withdrew their advertisements because of an ineffective ecosystem. He found a gap and
brought disruption in whole market.
Questions from Entrepreneur
Asking right questions is important to find correct information. Matt Robinson is a young
entrepreneur but he has experience of running two companies. Below are few questions which
will be asked from him:
1. How to you make decisions about where to invest your money?
2. An organization needs various resources to run its operations, according to you, which
resource is most important?
3. Do you think that a person cannot become entrepreneur without having new ideas in his/her
mind?

4. What is the importance of innovation management in today’s business world?
5. What kind of entrepreneur you are in your view?
Analyze data and information
Conversation with Matt Robinson reveals various things about different theories of
entrepreneur and their mindset. Below are few points that can be understood from the research
work:
Change in mindset – There was a time when a person starts a business by considering
that thought that one day my children will manage it. His/her family members also join him/her
and it basically develops a family run business. But this concept has vanished and nowadays
entrepreneurs focus on hiring those people that can increase net worth of the enterprise. Matt
Robinson is interested in building a business for long run but he never thinks of old working
styles. Earlier entrepreneurs use to earn money by simply making and selling things. This system
does not work anymore as businessmen have to do lot of research in finding million dollar
opportunity. Innovation is key to success in this century, development of product and marketing
has their limitations.
Growth, not profit – Matt Robinson is founder of two companies, both firms focused on
their valuation increase of profits (Overview of UK’s Top Serial Entrepreneurs, 2020). This is story
of every other start up across the globe. GoCardless is getting close to valuation of $1b and they
are still thinking of expanding their business instead of using resources for improving profit
margin. New ecosystem concentrates on earning huge amount of money in short period of time.
It cannot be done by earning profits as they remain less in initial stage. So, entrepreneurs focus
on increasing valuation of their business and then sell stakes in order to earning millions in single
day (Tidd and Bessant, 2018). Matt Robinson has done same with his first business. Serial
entrepreneurs invest their money in new business so they can again build an organization with
high valuation so its stake can be sold in future.
Find gap - Innovation happen when someone find gap in current system. New age start-
ups has to work hard for finding an opportunity which can explored in order to earn money. They
innovate new products and services because their survival depends of how they fill gaps and earn

profits through it (Drucker, 2014). Matt Robinson also focused on small details about the
problems which organization and customers face on daily basis. Present trend shows that most of
the new billion dollar companies are using technology for running their business. Companies like
Nested are operating on a simple idea i.e. help customers in selling and buying their houses. But
they understand that they cannot do it in old fashioned way. If they will open office and start
working as an agent then it will not increase valuation of company. Also, they cannot make a
simple application for registration of properties so it can be easily sold or bought. They
innovated a new process where both technology and advice of agents work together so clients
can get value for money.
Follow your interest - As discussed above, the idea of family run business is outdated as
entrepreneurs themselves do not remain in their promoted firm. They sell stakes to others for
millions and then start something new because after a while their own idea does not excite them.
More than 60% start-ups do not remain operational after first year because of funding. The
reason can be anything but one thing is clear that many so called entrepreneurs do not have
courage passion to follow their interest when things go south. Matt Robinson also accepts that
there was a time when GoCardless was on the verge of shutting down but their passion when key
to keep it floating.
Relate to theory
Disruptive innovation
Innovation has always remained key topic of research as its importance is continuously increasing
from last 3-4 decades. Disruptive innovation is very popular lately because of start-up culture. It
basically means creation of new values by launching products, service or system in existing market or by
creating a new market. Disruption means shaking complete eco-system; it may be for a limited period of
time because of lower performance but if company can maintain new value network for longer period
then, with time, disruptive innovation can convert into sustainable innovation (Goffin and Mitchell,
2016). GoCardless and Nested both created their own market by introducing new ideas and services in
the market. Selling and buying property through online mode is not a new idea but helping seller in
selling their house is not popular in marketplace. Nested disrupted whole market; it introduced positive
change in the industry as people’s faith from online selling and buying was going down. They were
seeking guidance regarding how to sell their property which Nested provided them for free.

Entrepreneurship innovation theory
It can be considered as the most relevant theory of present time. It states that innovation can
be done through below mentioned four points: Launching on new service/product or by upgrading previous one. Introduce a completely new market Apply new process of production or sales Acquire new sources of raw material Bring new structure in industry like end monopoly through disruption
An individual does not require being smartest person on earth or acquiring all the
knowledge for using innovation in business. Above mentioned points depict that instead of
focusing on technical knowledge; entrepreneurs should concentrate on finding some new ideas
so they can use them for setting up their business. Continuous hard work and desire to “explore”
will remain key factor for entrepreneurship in forthcoming time (Decoding Theories that Make
an Entrepreneur, 2020). Matt Robinson says that he became serial entrepreneur because of his
habit of exploring stuff. If he find a gap in market which is still unexplored and people are not
queries about it then he consider that “gap” a potential source of investment (in present) and
earning in (future).
From the interview of Matt Robinson, it can be analyzed that he, with other founder, were
trying to work on a basic idea i.e. how to ease business of companies. They developed a new
product which allowed their clients to collect recurring payments easily. Undoubtedly it was an
innovation which allowed them to touch new heights in short period of time. Beside start-ups,
old companies are also investing heavy amount in research and development as they understand
that introduction of new products/service is essential for sustaining in market. Nested, another
venture of Matt Robinson, is also a new market which was also unexplored. He analyzed a
pattern that almost 60% of the people who were willing to sell their house through different
online application delisted their property because they failed to sell them at desired price. With
extensive research and personal experience, he realized that the problem is not in the properties.
People did not have knowledge regarding how to market their house.

Matt Robinson consider himself as a serial entrepreneur who firmly believes that
managing innovation is only way to develop a sustainable business. He agrees that knowledge is
not the only factor that can lead organization to success, without imagination and exploring
enterprises cannot survive for long. He also believes that employees are the most important
resource in companies as they have power to image things. Machines can assist human in
exploring and developing new ideas, but technology has its own limitation and it cannot feed us
with new thoughts (Trapp, Voigt and Brem, 2018).
Type of innovation
Innovations are of mainly four types; product, process, position and paradigm. Product
innovation simply means development and launching of new product/service in the market for
conducting business activity. This type of innovation was used by Matt Robinson in both of his
ventures. Another type is process innovation where company develops a new process or modify
current one. It is popular in service industry because revenue of organization depends on
efficiency of their current process. Position innovation is normally use in field of marketing
where same products or service is positioned in a different way so it can earn money for the
enterprise.
Paradigm is an unpopular and different kind of innovation. Here, innovation is done by
changing the perspective of looking towards an opportunity. Matt Robinson reveals that one of
the main reasons behind constant success is that he tries to explore things in an uncommon way.
For example, before starting Nested he realized that he cannot earn money by introducing
another platform for online sale of property. His thought were different i.e. sell those houses
which failed to get a buyer and earn money through this idea.
Innovation is important for all forms of businesses i.e. small or MNCs. The reason behind
this is continuously increasing desire of market to keep getting better products/service. There
was a time when innovation was not considered as a significant factor in success of business but
now sustainability of companies is dependent on it (Singh and Gaur, 2018). Although there are
various myths about innovation and people believe that only extraordinary minds can innovate
but Entrepreneurship innovation theory has proved it wrong. Desire to explore is most important
to become a businessman.

Conclusion
At the end, it can be concluded that in, forthcoming time, importance of innovation in
business enterprises will enhance as they understand that it can help them in getting a lead on
others. Managing innovation is a big challenge for organizations as they are unaware of how to
use their resources for getting best results. Companies have to make a procedure so they can
bring and implement new ideas in their operations. Firms will have to give more power to
ground workers as they have essential experience and significant information. Most of the
opportunities in upcoming time will be explored and exploited by using innovation.

References
Books and Journals
Drucker, P., 2014. Innovation and entrepreneurship. Routledge.
Gagliardi, D., 2013. Next generation entrepreneur: innovation strategy through Web 2.0
technologies in SMEs. Technology Analysis & Strategic Management. 25(8). pp.891-904.
Goffin, K. and Mitchell, R., 2016. Innovation management: effective strategy and
implementation. Macmillan International Higher Education.
Singh, S.K. and Gaur, S.S., 2018. Entrepreneurship and innovation management in emerging
economies. Management Decision.
Tidd, J. and Bessant, J., 2018. Innovation management challenges: From fads to fundamentals.
International Journal of Innovation Management. 22(05). p.1840007.
Trapp, M., Voigt, K.I. and Brem, A., 2018. Business models for corporate innovation
management: Introduction of a business model innovation tool for established firms.
International Journal of Innovation Management. 22(01). p.1850007.
Online
Decoding Theories that Make an Entrepreneur. 2020. [Online]. Available through<
https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/302800>.
Overview of UK’s Top Serial Entrepreneurs. 2020. [Online]. Available through<
https://about.beauhurst.com/blog/successful-serial-entrepreneurs/ >.