Innovation and Commercialisation Strategies: NIX Communication Report

This report examines innovation and commercialisation strategies, focusing on their importance to employees and organizational success, particularly within the context of NIX Communication Group Ltd., a UK-based SME. The report delves into key concepts such as the innovation mix (paradigm, product, process, and position), frugal innovation, and the commercial funnel, illustrating their practical application through case studies of NIX Communication, Virgin Group, and Apple Inc. It explores how organizational vision, leadership, culture, and teamwork contribute to fostering innovation. The report also discusses the development and protection of intellectual property. The study highlights the significance of innovation in telecommunications and provides insights into how companies can adapt and thrive in a dynamic market environment.

INNOVATION AND
COMMERCIALISATION

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................1
P1. Innovation and its importance to employees of an organisation...........................................1
P2. Innovation and commercialisation through organisational vision, leadership, culture and
teamwork.....................................................................................................................................2
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................4
P3. Innovation Mix and how it is used to shape innovative ideas..............................................4
Paradigm:...........................................................................................................................4
Product:..............................................................................................................................4
Process:..............................................................................................................................5
Position:.............................................................................................................................5
P4. Frugal innovation..................................................................................................................5
TASK 3............................................................................................................................................6
P5. Importance of commercial funnel and New Produce developments....................................6
P6. Innovative Business case for NIX Communication Group Ltd............................................8
TASK 4............................................................................................................................................9
P7. Different tools to develop, retain and protect intellectual property......................................9
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................10
REERENCES.................................................................................................................................12

INTRODUCTION
Innovation refers to the Process or an action of innovating. It can be a new method,
product or idea. It can be viewed as the better solutions to meet existing market needs, new
requirements and unarticulated needs. It can also be defined as something new and more original.
While commercialisation is the process of bringing new product or new method of production to
the market. It can also be connoted as moving from a limited market to unlimited market (Ameka
and Dhewanto, 2013). For a better understanding of the study, it is being related to an SME that
is NIX Communication Group Ltd. and the case studies given in the brief have also been
referred. In the below study following things have been discussed like Importance of innovation
to the employees, how innovation and commercialisation can be achieved through organisational
vision, mission and objectives, frugal innovation, 4 P's of innovation and commercial funnel and
how these can benefit NIX Communication Group Ltd.
TASK 1
P1. Innovation and its importance to employees of an organisation
Innovation refers to the process and action of innovating new and existing products and
services. In other words, Innovation is viewed as application of improved and better solutions to
meet unarticulated needs, new requirements and existing market needs (Boehm and Hogan,
2013). The growing technology and need of customers has affected the demand of innovation.
Innovation is somewhat related to the invention, but it is not the same as invention. Exnovation is
the opposite of innovation.
For the better understanding of the study, NIX Communication Group Ltd., a SME of UK
has been taken for consideration.
Importance of innovation to the employees of the NIX Ltd.:
NIX Ltd. Is a telecommunication organisation. Before the internet and other data
networks of telecommunication, it had a clear meaning, that is, telegraph and telephone, the only
applications of communication between people at distance by voice (Crow and Bozeman, 2013).
The telecommunication industry is growing in the emerging globalisation and hence, the need of
innovation has increased. Following are the importance of innovation to its employees:

 Being a totally new process, innovation community will create a space in the organisation
that will allow the employees across the organisation to exchange their ideas.
 Innovation process will involve people from different functions and business units as it
focuses on creating the enthusiasm as well as new product. Thus, this will enable the
broad variety of view points in the NIX Ltd.
 Innovation allows creating a conversation between participants and senior manager. The
flow of ideas to senior manager is important in order to create a sustainable cross-
organisational innovation.
 Through the process of innovation, management will be able to utilise the unused talent
of the employees of NIX Ltd.
 Innovation process enables the learning on both side that is at organisational level and at
personal level (Davila, Epstein and Shelton, 2012). Thus, collateral benefit will be as
important as the innovation.
 Regular discussions and problem-solving meetings in the organisation will give rise to
social networks which will further lead to the future exchange of ideas.
 The innovation process provides a wide scope to employees to demonstrate their new
ideas and skills which, in turn, improves their efficiency of work, knowledge and also
increase the opportunities of growth in the organisation.
 For example, in NIX Ltd., in case of any innovation, firstly the innovations will be tested
and checked by the employees only that will provide the broader area of work to
employees and also the use of the latest technology.
P2. Innovation and commercialisation through organisational vision, leadership, culture and
teamwork
The vision and mission of NIX Communication Group Ltd. is to build a name in the area
of progressive, proactive and supportive organisation.
The vision of the company explains the culture of the organisation i.e. supportive. For a
supportive culture, organisation must have a positive teamwork and leadership environment.

All these constraints help in shaping the innovation and commercialisation in the
organisation.
For becoming a successful company, the CEO of the company will require to have a clear
mission and vision of the values and the goals of the company (Levie, 2014). These elements
help in guiding the team in accordance with the vision of the company for commercialisation.
NIX Communication Ltd. Is aiming at becoming the progressive organisation. For
achieving the aim, the company need to think and work in the way of inventions of new
products, technology or innovation in the existing ones. Innovation is the key factor for success
in the industry. The more the innovation the more the successful organisation.
Leaders of the organisation can shape the culture of the organisation through their
positive behaviour. Positive culture will lead to flow of the ideas in the organisation among the
employees of all level which will ultimately create the space of innovations. Diversity in the
company will be beneficial for innovation (Mowery, Nelson and Ziedonis, 2015). It can be done
through bringing together various ideas and viewpoints. However, diversity must be coupled
with open culture, where employees can express their ideas and viewpoints without any
hesitation. Further this, effective teamwork will turn the ideas into innovative products and
services.
As per the given case study of Virgin Group, the company has grown from a simple
publishing venture to a big investment venture. According to the company, the constant growth
of the company has been credited to the entrepreneurial aggressiveness of Branson and his
curiosity to explore new areas and horizons in the business (Patel, Fernhaber and van der Have,
2014). Virgin Group believes that the innovation is the only key factor of success. According to
the process of the company, all the senior personnel of different department comes together for
establishing new ventures of the company and its corporate priorities. The company has an open
culture that provides opportunity to each member of the group to present their business ideas and
concepts.
Example of the virgin Group company will help the NIX Ltd., in achieving its aims as
stated in its vision.

TASK 2
P3. Innovation Mix and how it is used to shape innovative ideas
Likewise, 4 P's of marketing, there are 4 P's of innovation as well. These are product,
process, position and paradigm.
Paradigm:
Paradigm arises a question, how do an organisation frame its business model? Innovation
is used to improve the way an organisation does its business. For innovation, changes are must
that can be radical, but not all the changes are positive for the organisation. Paradigm allows
imagining all the possible changes that can leverage the profit of the organisation (Qian and
Haynes, 2014). It is concerned with the way of change that is done in the organisation. For NIX
Ltd. It could be anything like development of new software for free communication in written
and verbal form (like Skype and WhatsApp). For example, NIX Ltd. Can change its published
product from print platforms to online platforms. Likewise, in the case study of Apple Inc., the
starting point for the development of I-pod was a question that what's the user experience?
Product:
Product relates to the question of, how a company can improve its product and services?
How the company can make it more appealing and better from available products of all other
companies.? This may include various suggestion to make a product better. This is known as
Incremental Change. The company can also use another form of innovation that is the company

can completely change its product or radical change (Nelson, 2015). For example, NIX Ltd. Can
make changes in its existing products or it can also make a totally different product like a new
software for smartphone. Like in the example of virgin Group, the company has expanded its
products to new ventures that are Virgin net, Virgin Mobile, Virgin entertainment group, etc.
Process:
Process is the question that how a company will create its offering to the public? This
does not only include the manufacturing or preparation process of the products and services. In
fact, it includes all the steps like the process of supplying, the process of workflow, process of
hiring people, and also the process of training (Moskowitz, 2016). Innovation includes how all
these processes can be enhanced to increase the profit of the organisation. For example, NIX Ltd.
Should not only focus on the innovation of its products and services but it can also implement
innovation by making changes in the processes of its operations. Like in the case study of Virgin
Group, the company has implemented many changes in its operations.
Position:
It can be also considered similar to the promotion, but it is not. It is one of the process in
the organisation that can affect the aspect of the innovation. It is re-positioning of a company’s
product and services or its process in a specific context (Kuehnle and Ritchie, 2013). Position-
Based innovations are the changes in a specific product or process and is perceived to achieve
the organisational goals. For example, in earlier times, phones were considered as a luxurious
item but now it has been classified as a necessity. In the given case study of Apple Inc., the I-pod
has replaced the small MP3 players.
P4. Frugal innovation
Frugal innovation “when doing less is new” refers to the process of eliminating the cost
and complexity of a good and its production. In general terms, it means the removing the features
that are non-essential for a durable good, in order to sell the product in developing countries (Les
Bas, 2016). Frugal innovation also helps in reducing the cost of products as it eliminates the
unnecessary features of the product. It can also be termed as doing better with less.

NIX communication Group Ltd. Can also use frugal innovation in different ways. Like,
in the earlier times the mobile phones used to have a small antenna on them but then it was found
that the antenna was not essential and then it was removed. This was a type of frugal innovation
in mobile phones. Change from wired communication services to wireless communication
services is another type of frugal innovation. There is a wider scope to use frugal innovation in
telecommunication industry like removing the key pad from phones, reducing the size of the
phone, building a large internal memory to remove the slot of external memory, etc.
In relation to the case study of Virgin Group, Virgin Group has over 200 companies,
from this it can be realised that there would have been a lot of innovation in the past 40 years
only (Datta, Reed and Jessup, 2012). The company does not believe in just sourcing the great
ideas but it believes in acting on them.
In relation to the case study of Apple Inc., the company's largest selling product I-pod can
be taken as an example of frugal innovation. In the I-pod, the company gave a large space to
store the music in comparison to all other MP3 players. I-pod weighing just 6.5 ounces of weight
can hold more than 1000 songs in it. This frugal innovation of enlarging the storage space helped
the company in reaching heights of success.
TASK 3
P5. Importance of commercial funnel and New Produce developments
Commercial Funnel includes sales funnel that refers to the buying process of a company
for its customers while purchasing a product. It is further divided into several steps depending
upon the sales model. The different phases of the process include:
 Awareness phase: awareness of the existence of the solution in various prospects
 Interest phase: demonstration of interest in a product with the help of product research
 Evaluation phase: examination of competitor’s solution while forwarding towards final
buying decision (Cervantes and Meissner, 2014).
 Decision phase: negotiation starts after final decision is reached

New Product development refers to the complete process of a product that opens an
entirely new market or a product that replaces or adopts an existing product. It also includes a
product that broadens the market of an existing product or an old product to a new market (Birch,
2016). There can be different types of new product including innovative products, new product
line, repositioning of product, revisions and improvement in existing product, etc. New product
development can be used to increase the market share by providing more choices or by updating
the older products. It can enable a company to diversify in the market. Importance of new
product development to employees:
 To create cash cows and stars for the future. (BCG matrix)
 To replace the product with declining market share.
 To use the advantage of new technology.
 To increase/maintain the market share.
 To cover the non- reached market.
Importance of new product development to the employees of NIX Communication Group Ltd.:
 New product development will help the employees of the company to gain more
knowledge.
 This will allow them to apply their new ideas and skills.
 This will help the employees in knowing their efficiency and understanding towards the
new technology.
 This will give the employees a future view of new product and technology.
 There will be a wider scope of learning for employees.
Development of new skills will increase the effectiveness and efficiency of employees.
The New Product Development will enable the employees to achieve their personal goals.
All the above factors will help in implementing a total market plan with full production
(Davila, Epstein and Shelton, 2012). This will allow the organisation in achieving its

organisational goals and objectives. This will ultimately help in the process of managing an
organisation to achieve financial gain and commercialisation.
P6. Innovative Business case for NIX Communication Group Ltd.
NIX Ltd. is a telecommunication company, in the field of telecommunication there has
already been many innovations in 21st century (Mowery, Nelson and Ziedonis, 2015). With the
help of its research and development department the company can find various areas for
innovation. The latest innovations in the field of telecommunication are:
 Big Data based services
 Mobile Money Transactions
 Smart cards
 Skype
 Smartphones
 WhatsApp, etc.
For any innovation in the existing product or for introducing a new product in the market,
a company need to analyse the factors of existing market and the new market. For this company
need to evaluate the need and demand of the customers, market gap, the latest technology in the
market, etc., (Innovation management, 2016). All this will require a company a huge amount
fund of to be invested in its research and development department. Therefore, bringing
innovation to the market is not an easy job even for large enterprises like Apple Inc. or Virgin
Group.
Here is an innovative business plan for NIX Communication Group Ltd.:
 NIX Ltd. can bring a new application in the market according to the requirement of the
customers. For example, a new application for tourists and travellers. The application
may include the following features:
 All available modes of transportation to reach a destination. (Railway, road transport, air
transport, etc.)

 Prices for all the available modes of transports. There are many existing applications with
this feature, the prices should be more exact for competing in the market.
 All the available accommodations with their correct reviews and ratings, along with their
prices on different websites (Crow and Bozeman, 2013).
 Available amenities in different accommodations.
 All the attractions of the destination including their ticket rates, online booking, and ways
to reach there.
 The application must be free to download for the users and should also be available on all
the platforms like IOS store, google play store, etc.
For this Innovative business plan NIX Communication Group can raise funds from
following ways:
 Venture capital
 Issuing equity shares
 Offering debentures
 Bank loans
 Other fund-raising options.
TASK 4
P7. Different tools to develop, retain and protect intellectual property
Intellectual property is a result of a creativity and an intangible property of the
organisation. Intellectual property refers to value- added creations of human intellect that are the
results from their creativity, ingenuity and inventiveness. Intellectual Property plays an important
role in the process of taking innovations to the market and at the same time it also enhances the
competitiveness of enterprises based on technology (Gummesson, 2014). For facilitating the
market success of an innovation, many players are involved, effective use of Intellectual
Property reduces the risk of players involved. In context of NIX Communication group, its

intellectual property may be its idea, design, software's, applications produced, its data
processing system, etc.
Formation of WTO (World Trade Organisation) has changed the rules of doing business
in the modern era. It should be noted that different Intellectual Property Right Tools protect
specific Intellectual creation (Birch, 2016). The below table shows the tools to retain and protect
intellectual property of NIX Communication Group Ltd.:
Intellectual Property Category Intellectual Property Protection style
Cultural, artistic, computer software, literary
work and compilation data
Copyright and related rights
Innovative processes and products Patent, Utility model and trade secret
Distinctive sign Collective marks, Trademarks, Certificate
mark and geographical indicators
Design, Including Textile Design Industrial design rights
Microchips Layout design on topographic of integrated
circuits
Confidential business and technical
information of commerce
Trade secret
Denomination of goods of given quality Geographical indicators
These different Intellectual Property tools can be used by NIX Ltd. To protect and retain
its intellectual property.
CONCLUSION
From the above study it is been concluded that, Innovation flows in the
telecommunication. Innovation and commercialization are related to invention but not are the
same as invention. For the facilitation of success in the market and for growing the market share,
innovation and commercialisation are necessary for any industry. Intellectual property is