At the peak of the first wave of the Covid pandemic, countries around the world scrabbled to try and produce and procure sufficient quantities of medical equipment, such as ventilators, to allow health systems to cope with the deluge of patients. In the UK, the British government created the VentilatorChallenge (VCUK) to try and ensure an adequate supply of ventilators to hospitals.
A recent paper from Cambridge Judge Business School argues that it’s an approach that could herald lessons for other societal challenges, such as climate change and global poverty.
A shared mission
Key to the success of the initiative was the ability to communicate a shared mission that was able to transcend any boundaries and barriers that exist and unite people behind the cause.
The researchers also highlight the importance of “exaptation”, which they describe as the process by which products acquire features and functions that may not have been anticipated. They use the example of the microwave, which emerged out of the accidental discovery that radar components typically generate heat.
In the case of ventilators, this exaptation revolved around repurposing everything from design to production technologies from industries such as aerospace and motorsports.
“The success of the VCUK consortium reflects how innovation can be accelerated through multiple non-traditional strategies,” the researchers explain.
“The consortium had an open-innovation mindset that welcomed contributions from scores of partners; exaptation was much faster than mere adaptation in developing a new ventilator design; and there was a sound ecosystem strategy through leadership that welcomed knowledge sharing and coordination among partners rather than command and control.”
Diverse inputs
The project received support from over 100 firms who were able to get a new ventilator design signed off within 21 days, with large-scale production beginning a few weeks later. The initiative also aimed to boost production from existing ventilator manufacturer Smiths Medical by providing them with support from consortium partners, such as Rolls-Royce.
While the number of ventilators required was ultimately lower than feared, the authors nonetheless believe that the VCUK project provides some valuable lessons on how valuable open innovation can be.
“The VCUK case provides potentially valuable lessons, not only about how innovation and delivery can be dramatically accelerated, but also insights into how complex social and business challenges can be tackled,” they say. “An increasing number of challenges can only be tackled with access to sets of capabilities and knowledge that exceed those available within any one organization, existing supply chain, or single technology.”
New uses
A lot of innovation is what is known as recombinative, which is when existing knowledge is deployed in new ways, and this is at the heart of the success of VCUK, as existing products found new uses via their latent functionality. The researchers use the example of feathers, which originally evolved to help creatures to stay warm but later became crucial to flight.
“Compared with traditional innovation processes, exaptation offers significant advantages in terms of greater speed, lower cost, and lower risk (due to proven performance in the original application),” the authors say.
This can be especially powerful if the diverse participants can unite behind a common challenge, with the authors highlighting how the framing of a problem can be crucial to secure this united front.
“Framing a problem in a way that makes it equally relevant to all involved makes the potential value that can be created by an ecosystem clear, which in turn encourages open innovation,” they conclude. “What makes these challenges effective is that they are clear and focused, as well as complex and pressing.”
