UW-Madison: Center for Corporate Innovation opens

MADISON – Corporate executives have a new way to develop the skills and tools they need to thrive in today’s fast-paced business world at the newly opened Center for Corporate Innovation in the Wisconsin School of Business at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Corporations spend millions on product development and bringing new technology to existing products, developing and executing go-to-market strategies based on decades-old “best-practices,” and optimizing the efficiency of existing business processes. The center, located in the Fluno Center on the UW campus, will help executives drive innovation and allocate capital more effectively.

“Executives will learn design thinking and lean innovation methods through hands-on learning workshops, peer-to-peer executive circles, innovative partnerships, and an innovation master class in Silicon Valley,” says CCI director Sandra Bradley. “The center will help drive economic growth through deep engagement with C-suite leaders, and grow opportunities for students.”

Bradley was most recently research director of the Internet of Things Lab at UW-Madison. Realizing that needs in innovation and entrepreneurship go beyond what a single technology can do, she established – independent of the IoT Lab – the Hyper-Innovation Project to experiment with different approaches to innovation.Madison-based American Family Insurance is providing support for CCI’s programming, which will include holding functions at The Spark, the company’s newest building, to be located in the Capital East corridor of Madison. It is scheduled for completion in mid-2018.

“We believe customer-driven innovation not only requires focus and effort within our company, but also obtaining creative perspectives and ideas from others,” says Peter Gunder, chief business development officer at American Family. “The Center for Corporate Innovation will serve as a source of thought leadership, corporate innovation, skills development and real-world problem solving that will benefit both companies and their communities.”

FULL STORY AT http://news.wisc.edu/center-for-corporate-innovation-opens-at-uw-madison/