B203A - 3M: Analyzing Business Functions, Innovation & Growth

This case study examines 3M's success as an innovative organization, highlighting its customer-focused approach and continuous invention. It emphasizes the importance of commercialization in introducing new products like the Post-it Note and multi-layer films, and also discusses how commercialization benefits companies through societal impact, economic growth, and industry partnerships. The analysis extends to an innovative product from MERGE, the 6DoF Blaster, which merges real and virtual worlds for gaming, showcasing the importance of innovation in different industries. The paper concludes that 3M's transition to buying minerals and its focus on customer needs have been crucial to its success, with commercialization playing a vital role in brand identity and product positioning.

Running head: BUSINESS FUNCTIONS
Business Functions
Name of the Company
Name of the University
Author note:

1BUSINESS FUNCTIONS
Innovation is very important for the continuous growth and development of any
company (Stark 2015). It means the introduction of new things into the business such as
improving the business processes or introducing any new innovative product or service.
However, this paper shall elaborate on analysing a case study on a company named 3M
enterprise. It would discuss the main factors that is making this company an innovative
organisation and the importance of commercialisation process for the innovative organisation
like 3M. Furthermore, it would also provide an example of innovative product from other
company other than this and would provide the reasons behind that product to be innovate.
The main factors that is making 3M an innovative organisation are the fact that it 3M
has continuously maintained to make significant inventions. It identifies the need of its
customers and then develop the products that are suitable to meet those needs. Some of the
examples of such products are the Post-it® Note. With the same, it is also to note that the
company focuses its ingenuity on finding out practical solutions for helping its customers to
succeed. It creates a large variety of multi-layer films that draws the inspiration from the
nature and especially, from the glittering blue wings of the Morpho butterfly. These are
produced without using colour pigments. By doing this, 3M has created a multi-layer film
that reflect in the same manner, whatever the light angle. Also, by combining 3 types of
multi-layer film, the company has developed a new display solution with the benefits of the
new ‘edge lit’ sign technology at a price that is more constant with the former lower-cost and
back-lit alternatives. However, it is to mention that the primary business function that have
contributed to these factors include that of buying in the minerals that are required for the
manufacturing of the sandpaper.
Moreover, the process of commercialisation in any innovative organisation refers to
the process by means of which any new product or service is introduced by the company in
the business market (Gureva et al. 2016). Commercialisation required any firm to develop a

2BUSINESS FUNCTIONS
marketing plan for its new product and determine how the product would be supplied to the
target market and then anticipate or remove the barriers to the success of the product
introduction. For any innovative organisation like 3M, commercialisation provides a list of
beneficial elements that no other process can. The very first is that, it provide the company
with societal benefit. It is the key driver behind commercialising the new inventions of the
company in the market. Secondly, it improves the economic growth of the company. Whether
it be through licensing the technology of the company to other firms or by developing new
start-up company, commercialisation helps by providing new job creation and revenue
creation in the local and regional market. However, the most significant benefit of this
process is that it provides a great opportunity for such companies to get engaged with the
industry partners, the investors and the other businesses in order to develop the business and
creating the most effective channel for marketing the product (Datta, Mukherjee and Jessup
2015). Such partnership led to getting sources of additional funding for the company. Also, it
helps in creative brand identity for the companies in their place of business operation.
One of the innovative products is the ‘6DoF Blaster‘of the company callled MERGE.
The 6DoF stands for the six-degrees of Freedom (Chen et al. 2018). This product deals with
keeping a track of the position and the orientation of humna beings such as their turning,
moving, up, down, forward moving etc. When a person moves, 6DoF moves. When a person
jumps, 6DoF jumps. It has merged the digital space with the real world and it puts the person
wholly in the game. A person can play anywhere sitting in his bedroom to his backyard and
challenge his friends in the multiplayes matches. It is someting that proves the skill of
a person to the whole world. This product, allong with the hand set (smart phone) that
a person owns, tracks his body movements in the real world by making use of sophisticated
positionall tracking technology. It is regarded to be a new breakthrough AR/VR technology
that merges the real world space of a person with the digital world. A person can walk around

3BUSINESS FUNCTIONS
in his own video game and block the shots and dodge his enemies by making use of real
world movemets in the environment. A person can compete against the players sitting any
corner of the world and attack any one sitting any part of the globe. With the same, it is also
to note that there is not set-up required for his product. It just need to drop in the smartphone
and then, one can simply start to play using it. In other words, it can be said that this products
brings the battlefield for the game lovers in their living room. It is a mere plastic gun but it
uses a smartphone for offering all teh smarts of AR/VR games, instead of playing through the
goggles, which is really difficult for most of the players.
Hence, from the above analysis it can be concluded that 3M is an innovative
organisation which is shaped by its commitment to provide its customers what they need and
introduce innovative inventions. The key driver of it to become a successful business
enterprise is its decision to turn from mining the mineral deposit to buying the necessary
mineral that are required for its product manufacturing. Furthermore, commercialisation is
helping the company to create its brand identity and positioning its products into the market.
Also, the last section of the paper has described about an innovative product named 6DoF
Blaster, an innovative product that is invented by Merge enterprise. This product is
innovative as of the fact that it links the real world with the virtual one. It is a great product
for any game lover as it brings the entire battlefield into their living room.

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References:
Chen, Z., Aksit, D.C., Huang, J. and Jin, H., Adobe Systems Inc, 2018. Six-degree of
freedom video playback of a single monoscopic 360-degree video. U.S. Patent Application
15/433,333.
Datta, A., Mukherjee, D. and Jessup, L., 2015. Understanding commercialization of
technological innovation: taking stock and moving forward. R&D Management, 45(3),
pp.215-249.
Gureva, M.A., Kirillov, A.V., Vinichenko, M.V., Melnichuk, A.V. and Melnychuk, Y.A.,
2016. Management of innovations and innovative process: concept, essence, classification
and diffusion. International review of management and marketing, 6(6S), pp.147-153.
Stark, J., 2015. Product lifecycle management. In Product Lifecycle Management (Volume
1) (pp. 1-29). Springer, Cham.