For my Module Coordinator job at Eurib’s design management program I invited Festo’s manager of corporate design, Markus Fischer as a guest lecturer. Markus does a nice job of managing the corporate identity of a this large (12.800 FTE) German multinational, but that’s not why I invited him. He also manages Festo’s Bionic Learning Network. And that is just the coolest thing in the world.
Festo develops, manufactures and markets solutions for production automation. Say what? They make high-tech, complex, B2B, highly functional, serious stuff. Actuators, fluidic muscles, electro-motors, pneumatic parts, the works.
The Bionic Learning Network is “part of the company’s commitment to vocational and further training. Cooperating with colleges and research companies, Festo promotes ideas and initiatives that go beyond the core business of automation and didactics, and may well give rise to promising areas of application in the future.”

Check out these two movies to see what they mean by that:

Now, I am just completely impressed by this program, from a design point of view (those jellyfish! that manta-ray with the logo on its wing! the sheer beauty of this kind of technology in motion) as well as from a brand driven innovation strategy point of view. This last view deserves some explanation:

1. the Bionic Learning Network positions and comunicates the Festo brand way more effectively than traditional brand communication would do.
2. the Bionic Learning Network demonstrates Festo’s capabilities in a very convincing way.
3. the Bionic Learning Network aligns engineers, designers, marketers and sales people: it gives them a shared understanding of what the Festo brand is about.
4. the Bionic Learning Network attracts talent to the comany: it is a recruiting magnet.
5. the Bionic Learning Network timulates young people to develop an interest in technology: it has a socio-economic function.
6. the Bionic Learning Network explores possible future directions for innovation and assesses their feasibility and potential.
7. the Bionic Learning Network helps explore new markets
8. the Bionic Learning Network helps to create and maintain value networks through cooperation with technology specialists and academics.
9. the Bionic Learning Network is a platform to introduce new products to the market in a very compelling way
10. the Bionic Learning Network helps to fill the innovation funnel with new ideas, as spin-offs from the work done within the program itself.

Jan Buijs and I have come to call this aproach to innovation ‘the concept-car strategy’, because in the car industry, this approach is common. We call the projects evolving from this strategy ‘projectas‘ because they are to ‘real’ projects what personas are to real persons. What fascinates me about the concept car approach is not only the impressive result, but also the process, the mental exercise. I belive this process is applicable to any industry. It is a very practical brand driven innovation strategy. You can turn your brand into a driver for innovation through asking yourself the questions: ‘how would we fulfil our brand’s promise if we were free to create what we we want, without restrictions? What products would really bring our vision to life? And how could we then learn from those products? How can we create spin-offs from these future concepts that will be meaningful and profitable tomorrow?’

These are questions I believe any entrepreneur should ask him/herself from time to time. It works for BMW, it works for Festo, and it might also work for you. Try it like I have for my clients. It’s extremely refreshing.

And if you’ve encountered this concept-car strategy at non-automotive companies yourself I would be very curious to hear about them.

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