Product Laboratories

“LEAPFROG TEAMS” AND AUGMENTED REALITY: 10 COMPANIES PIONEERING NEW WAYS TO DEVELOP THEIR PRODUCTS

3M MAPLEWOOD, MN

The manufacturing conglomerate famous for Post-it Notes and Scotch tape earns about 3,000 patents every year and encourages its 91,000 employees to devote 15% of working time to projects outside the normal scope of their jobs.

AMD SANTA CLARA, CA

AMD, a semiconductor company, uses “leapfrog teams”—discrete groups of engineers who simultaneously work on successive generations of core chip designs—to ensure the consistent communication, preservation of knowledge, and enforcement of best practices that can help spur innovation.

Cloudflare SAN FRANCISCO

To create products that improve website security and performance, Cloudflare’s R&D lab incubates new ideas through rapid iteration. Cloudflare also conducts two-week experiments called “spikes”: Employees test new ideas to determine whether they warrant further investment. In

2018, the company launched eight new products and services, including 1.1.1.1, which provides consumers with faster and more secure internet connections.

Kronos Incorporated LOWELL, MA

Six years ago, executives at the workforce

management software company sequestered a team of 25 to reinvent Kronos’s core product. That group, dubbed “Project Falcon,” eventually swelled to 600 and created a new cloudbased workforcemanagement platform called Workforce Dimensions, which has helped drive up company revenue by 38%.

Lifeomic INDIANAPOLIS

The 70-person cloud and mobile software company acts “as a virtual VC,” helping engineers learn how the software business works beyond technological development. In its first year, the program has spawned three subsidiary corporations focused on software, security, and marketplaces for healthcare and other industries.

Merck KENILWORTH, NJ

In 2018, the drugmaker spent nearly $10 billion on R&D. This year, the company announced an additional five-year, $16 billion investment in projects to improve development, capabilities, and innovations. Its ventures fund has committed more than $85 million toward treatments for a variety of conditions, including neurodegenerative disorders, cancer, and resistant bacterial infections.

Morgan Stanley NEW YORK

The banking company’s Technology Innovation Office funds promising employee projects in key areas, including artificial intelligence, data analytics, and fintech, and offers an accelerator program to expedite the patent-filing process. Its Innovation

Lab provides a digital “sandbox” environment where any employee can experiment with code, software, and other technologies.

OSF Global Services QUEBEC

At OSF Global Services, a Canadian company that implements custom commerce platforms, any employee can submit a proposal to the Product Lab and, if approved, receive funding and resources to develop it. Incentives are shared by the idea’s originator and the team that’s assigned to help them build it. In the program’s three years, OSF has launched 28 new products, including 9 in 2018 alone.