Open innovation: The Marriage of Big Brands and Technology

In today’s episode Alex Dunsdon talks about the importance of big brands and companies creating effective partnerships with technology companies.

[audio http://traffic.libsyn.com/breakingbiz/InnovationBreakingBiz.mp3 ]

The big players like to ‘own’ stuff. And they like to own it 100%. Especially technology and innovation. They like to develop it themselves, which means they own every aspect of it. But it’s slow, difficult in a risk-averse culture, and the chances of success are low. Is there a smarter way, with less risk? Unilver seem to think so.

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Co-founder of The Bakery London & Citymapper investor Alex Dunsdon on investing, pitching & the PowerPoint problem

Investor Alex Dunsdon is co-founder of The Bakery London and Investment Director of SAATCHiNVEST. He’s also been lucky (or smart) enough to invest in the ever popular ‘Citymapper’ app, and he speaks to Breaking Biz about how startups should pitch to investors, what he looks for when making an investment and much more.

[audio http://traffic.libsyn.com/breakingbiz/AlexDunsdonBreakingBiz.mp3 ]

This interview offers valuable insight for startups thinking about investment and covers similar ground to my earlier interview with NY Times besteller and angel investor Tucker Max.

Some takeaways from the conversation were:

Pitching problems. Lots of startups mention irrelevant figures when investors just want to know who the target audience is, what problem you’re solving and how you’re talking to them

We’re about to see a car crash with companies that have accepted early stage investment with the wrong type of investors

Pick the right investment partner above the valuation

Don’t waste time with powerpoint slides. Start the conversation. Investors tend to have short attention spans (i.e they’re quick thinking..)