Using Open Innovation to Be Competitively Unpredictable

Psion Teklogix, a company that makes rugged mobile computers for inventory tracking, courier services, field service and other demanding jobs, is #3 in its industry. To stay on top of emerging market changes and create technology that best fits a company’s individual requirements, Psion uses open innovation. The company developed an ecosystem of third party vendors who make components that plug in with Psion’s products. Psion launched Ingenuity Working in 2010, a site built to expand its open innovation activities. The IW community is focused on partner vendors, and there is a two-way exchange of product ideas and use cases via discussion forums, blogs and a secure zone for each partner. Psion is looking to stay on top of emerging market changes and leverage collective intelligence to develop applications and hardware for its configurable platform, which would be hard to forecast out over the next 6, 12 or 24 months. By engaging with external parties, Psion becomes competitively unpredictable.