Stick at it
Time in the market can solve problems for innovators. Australian company Resmed spent decades educating the population about the dangers of sleep apnoea in order to build a market for its CPAP machine, which controls it.
Harrison points out that Apple’s first version of the iPad, the Newton, was a flop.
“Perseverance is a winner,” he says. “The best entrepreneurs believe so strongly in their vision that they ignore the naysayers around them. One of the critical things is time in the marketplace; if you can survive more than a year, you improve your chances and if you stay in the market for three years, you have done really well.”
Better Place started in 2007, and has raised $25 million in venture capital in Australia, and $860 million in the United States. Its largest shareholder is Israel Corporation, the holding company of Israel’s richest man, Idan Ofer, worth an estimated US$6.2 billion. Crikey reports that Ofer issued an ultimatum late last year to Better Place to come up with a viable business strategy or have his support pulled.
Charismatic leadership
Big vision demands a commanding leader to communicate the dream to the community and convince them of its potential, and to keep staff motivated by a long-term goal, says Kosmas Smyrnios, professor of family business entrepreneurship, at the School of Management, RMIT.
“Any form of innovation is not something that happens overnight. It is really a process and not so much an event. One ingredient is of leadership, a charismatic, transformational type leader, who can bring the community within the organisation and the community at large to follow them.
“There needs to be a culture within the organisation that encourages and sustains individuals who are eccentric, different, lateral thinkers rather than the yes person, who goes along with everything.
“And there needs to be a culture externally, with the government and with communities, or it just won’t work.”
Better Place was initially led by its founder, Israeli entrepreneur Shai Agassi, who was named as one of the top 20 global influencers by Time magazine in 2003, and listed among the top 100 most influential people in 2009 by the same magazine. Agassi was replaced by Thornley last October as job cuts began at the company.
Wait for the market to catch up
Price says the move by Better Place to consolidate in key markets sounds like it makes sense: “They are taking a good hard look at how big market [will be] in next five years, and it is not going to be that big. It seems like a sound decision.”
Harrison says companies need to reassess innovations. “Do you drive the market need or wait for the market need to drive your product? You get yourself some sophisticate data research and modelling,” he says.
RMIT’s Smyrnios says it may be time to look at alternate strategies.
“It is one thing to do something on a grand scale, but what might have worked best for them is to prototype it. This is where rapid prototyping is important; to have a Better Place 101 model in a developing nation, in a community in Africa, and then from there introduce it into a Western community. It is being able to do it on a small scale that is indicative of its feasibility and then you take it from there.”
This article first appeared on LeadingCompany.
