Grassroots Innovations can be a good starting point for inclusive business models, argues Aline at a symposium during the Indian week in Hamburg
Aline spoke at a symposium held during India week on how to leverage grassroots innovations for inclusive business development. The symposium aimed to explore and demonstrate the potential of German firms, especially small and medium-sized ones, to assist grassroot inventors with technical and marketing know-how. Amongst the speakers were Prof. Anil Gupta from the Indian Institute of Management (IIM) and founder of the HoneyBee network; Prof. Dr. Luc Soete from UNU-Merit and Dr. Klaus Gronwald, Vice President and Country Manager Germany at Mahindra Satyam. The speakers agreed that grassroots innovations are a good starting point for developing products and services for low-income market, as they are often better adapted to local needs, and fit local conditions as well as resource constraints. Also, they have the potential to trickle back up to more developed markets. The panel discussion circled around how to find ways to connect the inventor with interested companies, how to protect the intellectual porperty of the inventor and how to bring such cooperation to scale.
The symposium was organized by the Institute of Technology and Innovation Management at Hamburg University of Technology together with the Hamburg chapter of German-Indian Round Table (GIRT). Partners of the event include the Hamburg Chamber of Commerce, National Innovation Foundation of India, the Hamburg chapter of German-Indian Society, and Mahindra Satyam.