Market players that have learnt to compete on volume despite low margins in a tough environment have also developed a lethal capability to explode premium market barriers in mature markets. Western incumbents will only be able to win this race as long as they can compete and excel not only at home, but more importantly, in the rough-and-tumble of emerging markets. Know more: http://www.infosys.com/building-tomorrows-enterprise/emerging-economies/Pages/index.aspx

1. Insights
Re-Innovating Innovation: The Case for Emerging Markets
- Dr. Martin Lockstrom
It’s often being said that innovation is the mother of competitiveness. That’s true, but only to a limited extent. The fact is
that innovation is only a means, and not an end. So what’s the end then? Adaptation. Only those companies, which adapt
to a changing environment will withstand the test of time. From a Western perspective, the notion of innovation as the
key source of competitive advantage held true for most of the 20th century, as companies in developed markets could
rely on global business models and reap benefits from cost differentials and arbitrage opportunities across geographic
regions. However, as globalization keeps its momentum, the traditional paradigm of inventing in developed markets and
producing in developing markets is becoming increasingly obsolete.
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2. A World in Flux
Globalization is the key driver behind the need for a new innovation
paradigm. The reasons are two-fold. First, globalization is a self-
nurturing process, which requires companies to globalize, which in
turn drives globalization further. Historically, companies started down
this path by sourcing from low-cost countries, followed by localizing
production, and so forth. This was a model of global production, in
which products were mainly developed by Westerners, in Western
countries, for Western consumers – if products were in demand in
other markets, it was a bonus. In today’s marketplace, however, things
look radically different.
Developing economies are generally growing very fast, often at twice
the rate of developed economies. As a result, they are increasing their
share of world economic output. For instance, over the last decade,
China has overtaken both Germany and Japan, to become the second
largest economy in the world, and is estimated to overtake the U.S in
less than a couple of decades if current forecasts hold true. India is also
catching up, albeit at a slower rate, and is today among the top ten
global economies. It’s the same story for other emerging economies
throughout South and South-East Asia, as well as Latin America and
parts of Africa and the Middle East. Meanwhile, in the wake of the
financial crisis, developed economies in Europe and North America are
struggling to stay competitive and revive slumping consumer demand.
So in order to adapt to this brave new world, it is imperative that
companies reap benefits not only on the supply side by securing
critical factor inputs such as raw materials, but more importantly,
adapt to the needs of local consumers in emerging markets, to offset
the declining demand in mature ones. Put simply, in order to remain
competitive in the future, companies are required to re-innovate
innovation. On an ongoing basis.
Learning from the Locals
It’s often been claimed by pundits that inventiveness and
innovativeness is virtually non-existent in emerging markets, and
particularly in China. However, this cannot be further from the truth.
The problem here is that we’re talking semantics – what is perceived
as innovativeness in emerging markets is not necessarily perceived
so in developed ones, and vice versa. This is a dangerous fallacy, as
it prevents companies from thinking about innovation in new and
necessary ways that are required to succeed in novel markets. Whereas
people in the West tend to think about innovation as a highly linear,
structured, long-term process with the aim of creating radical or
disruptive innovations, innovation in emerging markets is often the
opposite – unstructured, chaotic and opportunistic.
Why is this the case? For starters, besides cultural aspects, the
innovation approach in emerging markets is simply a result of
environmental factors. First, the economies are growing fast, and
rising middle-class consumers have not yet developed the same level
of brand loyalty that we see in mature markets. Therefore, agility is
essential in order to exploit opportunities, which could be perceived
as short-term opportunistic behavior by those from the Western world.
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3. Second, the purchasing power is often orders of magnitude lower in Impact on Western Companies
emerging markets whereas the savings rate is higher. This limits the
ability of local consumers to absorb the cost of breakthrough R&D. The traditional Western approach to innovation has been based
As a consequence, innovation in emerging markets is often more on increasing product sophistication with functions and features;
focused on reducing rather increasing product/service sophistication increasing product customization; and shortening product lifecycles,
– a concept usually referred to as frugal innovation. Whereas Western all with the objective of increasing margins, even at the cost of
companies often try to serve niche premium market segments with volumes. This has set off a vicious cycle of organizational complexity,
limited volumes and high profit margins, companies in emerging rising overheads and in turn the need to recover that with a higher
markets are doing the opposite. A good example here is Bharti Airtel, price premium.
which redesigned its entire value chain in order to be able to serve This approach has worked very well in B2B businesses where quality
the mass market with rock-bottom prices. Another excellent example and performance requirements are high, and reasonably well with
is Aravind Eye Care Hospital, which so far has provided inexpensive luxury consumer goods and certain proximity-dependent services
or even free eye surgeries to more than 32 million patients during such as upscale hairdressing or fine dining. For most other industries
its 36 years of existence. Both cases are manifestations of jugaad however, premium prices are harder to command and makes them
(Hindi for “improvised arrangement” or “work-around”), where novel vulnerable to emerging market competitors. The reason for this, as
approaches have to be deployed in order to overcome institutional explained earlier, is that emerging market players are often adept
voids and a lack of resources. at reducing complexity, producing in large volumes, and keeping
Third, consumers in emerging markets often have special needs, overhead costs low enough to survive on razor-thin margins. Once
and hence any product/service features that are added are usually these competitors get access to crucial technology, they penetrate
idiosyncratic, often low-cost, and almost always highly impactful. An premium markets with lower prices to turn them into volume markets.
excellent instance of such innovation is the Chinese phenomenon of There are numerous examples of these - particularly from China -
Shanzhai (Chinese for “mountain stronghold”), which is a term used to such as battery manufacturer BYD (also a carmaker), and microwave
denote inexpensive, often inferior-quality imitations or knock-offs of oven manufacturer Galanz who now command impressive market
Western products with a local twist – nevertheless the innovativeness shares. These companies are among those who won big deals from
and speed-to-market is truly impressive. Examples include mini iPhone foreign customers; received training and technology transfer through
knock-offs with two SIM card slots or cell phones resembling cigarette supplier development activities; and by staying cheap and flexible
cases (sometimes even combining the two) among many others. by using inexpensive labor instead of automation, ultimately turned
into global juggernauts.
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4. New Strategic Imperative for Innovation Reaping Benefits from Innovation Hubs
So, two things are clear: First, companies can no longer rely on pure It is clear that these voids cannot be overcome from a remote overseas
global innovation, developed in one place and sold in another. location; in virtually all cases, this means having local teams with
Second, companies that rely heavily on generating revenues from sufficient on-the-ground resources who can make necessary changes
premium markets are inherently at risk. The following sections to products, services and processes, but more importantly, build solid
elaborate three key drivers of innovation advantage. relationships with local institutions in order to get access to timely
information and fair treatment. Companies like GE for instance, have
Building Growth Momentum set up global R&D centers in key locations across the globe (e.g.
Bangalore and Shanghai) in order to tap into the local talent base.
As mentioned earlier, the organization governing innovation in
emerging markets needs to be reshaped in order to be effective. This By doing so, companies are able to pursue what is commonly referred
is due to the fact that the environment in emerging markets, with to as reverse innovation, wherein products are developed and tested
its institutional voids, is often radically different compared to the in emerging markets, before being launched elsewhere in the world.
West. Overcoming these is pivotal for getting a market foothold and Because they have to counter institutional voids, they are forced to
generating growth; this is also where local players have competitive rethink everything from products to processes to even business
advantage. Hence merely replicating existing innovation processes models, which actually opens up new market opportunities.
in emerging markets is doomed to failure. This is opposite to the traditional innovation paradigm in which
Institutional voids exist in many shapes. An overview is given below: products are developed in mature markets and launched elsewhere
in downgraded versions.
• Political/Legal: Different/weak legal systems, frequently changing
regulations, frequent changes in the political landscape, opaque Another important aspect of reverse innovation is the identification
political processes, trade barriers, lack of Government support, of new consumer needs, or more properly, consumer needs that were
previously unknown. Companies have taken different measures to
• Social/Cultural: Different customs and religions, heterogeneity/ accomplish this. For instance, Unilever has set up a Concept Center in
homogeneity of ethnic/religious groups downtown Shanghai where consumers can try out new products. P&G
• Technological/Infrastructural: Poor availability/access to lets new hires spend time with peasants in the Chinese countryside
technologies, weak IP protection, lack of physical infrastructure to study their behaviors.
(e.g. railroads, highways, sea ports, airports etc.) This type of ethnographic market research can reveal interesting
• Economic: Size and growth of economy, economic inequality insights; for instance, repairmen of the Chinese home appliances
among different regions and social strata manufacturer Haier discovered that rural people used washing
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5. machines for cleaning vegetables. This information was fed back to is P&G, which launched its Connect and Develop concept in 2000,
the R&D department, which subsequently designed larger outlets to which let external innovators sign up and submit ideas that were
avoid clogging. Another example is Mexican cement maker Cemex, screened and further refined in a co-creation effort.
which discovered that local consumers preferred buying cement in
This not only called for technology, but also required significant
bags rather than pre-mixed cement from trucks, and consequently
changes to processes, and more importantly to corporate culture,
packaged and sold their retail products like powdered soap.
by changing the existing paradigm from “not invented here” to
“proudly invented elsewhere”. By doing so, the company could tap
Smart Sourcing of Key Resources into a potential pool of 1.5mn external researchers. The results were
Proactive companies today are not relying solely on their in-house remarkable: After five years, the share of innovations with external
R&D departments for innovative ideas. More and more are opening origins increased from 15 to 35 percent, while reducing the share of
up their boundaries through open innovation networks (OINs) over R&D expenses from 4.8 to 3.5 percent of total cost.
which ideas can flow both in and out. One of the pioneers in this area
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6. Conclusion
Many multinational companies have for long relied on a Western-
centric innovation model where products have been designed in
the West, for the Western market, and at a very late stage launched
in emerging markets in a downscaled version. As a result of the shift
in center of gravity in global markets towards emerging markets,
companies have to pursue innovation the other way around by
innovating in emerging markets and subsequently adapting
products and services for developed markets. This may sound easy
in theory, but changing the mindset of senior managers and the
overall corporate culture is indeed a daunting challenge. A clearly
articulated innovation vision and a rigorous corporate innovation
strategy is definitely a good start.
What is more, Western companies have traditionally had
profitability, not profit, as the key financial metric. This in turn
has incentivized companies to primarily target high-margin
market segments around which they have erected entry barriers
to competition by increasing product/service sophistication.
However, as technology diffusion has increased tremendously
through a combination of outsourcing and the advent of the IT over
the last decades, many proprietary technologies have been easily
absorbed by aspiring competitors, with rapid commoditization
as a result.
To sum up: Market players that have learnt to compete on volume
despite low margins in a tough environment have also developed
a lethal capability to explode premium market barriers in mature
markets. Western incumbents will only be able to win this race as
long as they can compete and excel not only at home, but more
importantly, in the rough-and-tumble of emerging markets.
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7. About the Author
Dr. Martin Lockstrom
Principal Consultant, Building Tomorrow’s Enterprise, Infosys Labs
Martin is a specialist in Supply Chain and Operations Strategy,
Outsourcing/Offshoring and International Management. During a
six-year stint in China, he established the research and education
activities at the SCM, Sustainability and Automotive academic
centers at China Europe International Business School, Shanghai.
He established the first endowed chair for Purchasing and SCM in China at Tongji
University, Shanghai, and was also responsible for setting up Supply Chain Management
Institute China, an international network of SCM research and education hubs.
Martin co-founded Procuris Solutions, an IT company specializing in SCM-related solutions,
offering consulting services to companies like Accenture, Ariba, BMW, Clariant, Dell, Dow,
Ernst & Young and Intel, among others.
He has a Ph.D. in Supply Chain Management from European Business School, Germany, a
bachelor’s and master’s degree in Industrial Engineering and Management, from Chalmers
University of Technology, Sweden. He speaks Swedish, English, German and Chinese,
has published over 50 articles and papers and presented at more than 60 conferences.
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8. About Infosys
Infosys partners with global enterprises to drive their innovation-led growth.
That's why Forbes ranked Infosys #19 among the top 100 most innovative
companies. As a leading provider of next-generation consulting, technology
and outsourcing solutions, Infosys helps clients in more than 30 countries
realize their goals. Visit www.infosys.com and see how Infosys (NYSE: INFY),
with its 150,000+ people, is Building Tomorrow's Enterprise® today.
For more information, contact askus@infosys.com www.infosys.com
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