Re: A review of idea and innovation software

msbendts — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 14:29:26 -0000

A good collection as a starting point..and from the comments dialog the categorization is interesting. Many of them classify themselves as Innovation Managment, but most really fall into just helping you to manage how to collect and sort ideas (what I'd call Idea Management or the "Digg" part of your entry).

I've found very few that can actaully manage the innovation process (from discovery, to ideation, to elaboration, to experimentation, to production). I'd place the MindMatters Innovator product and the BrightIdea's innovation "platform" into that category. (Sorry, haven't looked at the QMarkets stuff yet...)

As you mentioned in your entry, the websites don't give you the best picture of what can happen...getting into the demos (or trial software) opens up what the potential is. The BrightIdea website talks about their WebStorm product, and then some loose concept of an innovation platform...until you get a demo do you realize that the WebStorm is a colletion and ranking tool, and the "platform" is actually a product that they sell (not just a concept) that can help monitor that idea through several stage gate and workflow business rules.

MindMatters Innovator is an even more robust solution for managing that idea through your business, including a very easy transistion into having that idea move into the patent process. Most workflow and business managment solutions focus on business models that are up and operational...the MindMatters tool is a great way to keep track of that fuzzy concept as you are still flushing out the business case.

Kluster (http://www.kluster.com/) is another intriguing offering that is a 'voting' or 'wisdom of the crowds' tool, but offers some very interesting means of how to rank ideas that could be something to learn from.

Others to research and categorize accordingly...
CogniStramer Innovation Portal -- http://www.innovationportal.eu
Creax Innovation Suite -- http://www.creaxinnovations...
Employee Suggestion Box -- https://www.employeesuggest...
IBM Innovation Factory -- http://www-935.ibm.com/serv...
id Force -- http://www.id-force.de
Imagineware -- http://www.imagineware.com/...
Jenni Idea Managment -- http://www.jpb.com/jenni/in...

But, again, thanks for your list and there are some here that I'll poke my nose more into.

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Re: A review of idea and innovation software