Mind the Chat with Michael Nichols and Uwe Kirschner (Bosch)

Too Many Corporate Innovations Fail

The probability of failure in corporate innovation outside the core business is staggeringly high. One of the principles of the Bosch Accelerator Program is not to deny this reality, but to embrace the math - the most likely result is failure. Once you have accepted this fundamental principle, you need to build a capital-efficient funnel to clear out all the walking-dead innovation horses in your organization so that winners have a chance to emerge.

Out of 800 projects submitted to Bosch Accelerator Program from RB associates from 21 countries in the last 4 years, only 19 have exited the program with a GO decision and are ready to scale up (and not all of them are expected to be finally successful).
The early termination of zombie projects produced an estimated total of €200M in opportunity cost savings from freed up personnel capacity.

Then: “Failure is not only okay. It is crucial for success.”