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When Samsung announced in mid-2010 that to grow its business in Africa, it would design products specifically for Africa, it confirmed two facts about global competition today:

  1. As growth in developed markets gets more difficult, firms must seek and exploit opportunities in developing markets.
  2. To succeed there, they need to “act local.”

Explaining Samsung’s plan, George Ferreira, COO of Samsung Electronics SA, said:

“In line with our key value of co-prosperity, coupled with our business and development sector partnerships, we have a vision of developing technology that is built in Africa, for Africa, by Africa”…We will over the next few years be allocating more local R&D investment for further local product planning, design and development.”

A press release from the company added:

“Samsung have undertaken extensive research and development (R&D) to develop technology innovations, specific to the African consumers’ needs. These include, TVs with built in power surge protectors, triple protector technology for air conditioners to ensure durability, power surge protection and safeguarding against high temperatures and humidity, deep foam washing machines that are 70% energy efficient – saving up to 30% water use, dura-cool refrigerators with cool pack – allowing the refrigerators to stay cool without power, as well as dual-sim technology and long battery life phones with battery standby times of up to 25 days.”

According to a report on Moneyweb, “The electronics group hopes to attract the African market with a range of television and refrigeration products that are designed to withstand power surges, dust particles and humidity and camera and camcorders that are designed to take “better” pictures of dark toned people.”

In one example of how it will pursue its strategy, Samsung has teamed up with the University of Cape Town (UCT) in South Africa and Strathmore University in Kenya to develop unique mobile phone applications for Africa. Such collaboration is sure to yield ideas that the company wouldn’t develop on its own, and to speed up the time-to-market process.

However, what the electronics giant did not say was that innovations in developing markets may prove valuable in developed markets (a process known as “reverse innovation” or “frugal innovation”). This has been the experience of companies producing products as diverse as soap, tractors, and medical scanners. And innovations may include not just new products, but also processes and business models.

Innovations from developing markets give firms new opportunities in developed markets by providing simpler, cheaper products

Reverse innovation will be one of the most important trends of coming years. It opens many new opportunities for developing markets and for the companies and innovators in them. And it provides new reasons to go to places you weren’t really sold on, to invest there, and to make a deliberate effort to learn whatever you can from being there.

Champion of the movement is V.J. Govindarajan, professor of international business at Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College, and the first professor in residence and chief innovation consultant at General Electric. His October 2009 Harvard Business Review article, “How GE is disrupting itself,” co-authored with GE chairman and CEO Jeff Immelt and Chris Trimble, another Tuck faculty member, won the McKinsey Award. His new book, Reverse Innovation (co-authored again with Trimble), will probably draw similar praise—and stoke interest in the concept. They provide many examples of how firms have gone about it, plus advice for those who want to.

In an interview with Knowledge@Wharton (April 2, 2012), Govindarajan explained some of the rationale behind the concept:

The fundamental driver of reverse innovation is the income gap that exists between emerging markets and the developed countries. The per capita income of India, for instance, is about US$3,000, whereas it is about $50,000 in the U.S. There is no way to design a product for the American mass market and then simply adapt it and hope to capture middle India. You need to innovate for India, not simply export to India. Buyers in poor countries demand solutions on an entirely different price-performance curve. They demand new, high-tech solutions that deliver ultra-low costs and “good enough” quality.”

“Poor countries will become R&D labs for breakthrough innovations in diverse fields as housing, transportation, energy, health care, entertainment, telecommunications, financial services, clean water and many more.

Reverse innovation has the potential to transform wealth in the world. Growth in developed countries has slowed down. Much of the growth is now in developing countries. The 2008 financial crisis and the more recent debt crisis [in Europe] have only exacerbated this situation. As such, we are likely to see the center of gravity for innovation shifting from rich to poor countries.”

Questions to ask now:

  • What will developing countries do to promote not just their market opportunities, but also their innovation opportunities?
  • What will local firms in those countries do to take advantage of this trend?
  • How will local universities and other potential partners respond?
  • How can you exploit this idea?

The entire world is a learning laboratory. No place has a monopoly on ideas. Today, it’s foolish—and potentially costly and risky as well—to be myopic.

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