Innovation and New Product Development

The Apple iPod, the Google Search Engine and Offset Mortgages have all changed the way we think about their sectors and been hugely successful.  However, much so-called innovation is either just a copy or brand extension that fails to add value.

At the Future Foundation we have placed a special emphasis on understanding and promoting innovation amongst our clients – in ideas, in analysis and where possible contributing to tangible new product development. 

We have developed a unique approach to ensuring that consumers are at the core of our decision-making, and genuinely informing a client’s innovation and product development process.  Our collaborative and interactive methodology helps align creative processes with future consumer needs, through a four-step proprietary process. 

The deliverables from this approach might typically include:

• A series of tailor-made workshops which allow clients to prioritise the trends that are the most important to their brands, categories, products and services.
• A visual trends toolkit that provides clients with the ability to communicate trends more effectively on an internal basis.
• A refreshed, revitalised and reintegrated view of future consumer needs upon which clients can confidently underpin strategic decision-making.  
• A confident and empowered consumer insight department enabled in terms of using, implementing and commercially communicating social trends effectively.

Our partnership with ‘Innovation RCA’ at the Royal College of Art enables us to also bring designers and other visionary thinkers into the process.  Our projects combine a rigorous process – rooted in strong social analysis but imaginative and open enough to engage key internal audiences and inspire action. 

We have worked with a range of clients in this area in recent years including Coors, Electrolux, Archant, B&Q, RHM, Birds Eye Walls and P&O.