PORTFOLIO MANAGEMENT
Is there a golden ratio of different types of innovation?
Transformational initiatives are the engines of above-average returns and blockbuster growth
Find out the best level
of innovation
Manage your explore
and exploit portfolios
Reduce innovation risk
and uncertainty
Companies should manage innovation portfolios deliberately and closely
Most companies do not manage innovation according to the principles of the venture capital industry.
Study shows that companies attempting to enter new businesses fail as often as 99% of the time. The only way to truly identify the winners is by investing small amounts of money in a large number of projects, retiring ideas that can’t produce evidence and investing in those showing traction.
Evidence shows that companies that allocated about 70% of their innovation activity to core initiatives, 20% to adjacent ones, and 10% to transformational ones outperformed their peers. As it happens, returns from innovation investments tend to follow an inverse ratio, with 70% coming from the transformational realm.
What if you had a step-by-step guide on using the portfolio map and managing your portfolio?
At Venture Factory, we help ambitious founders and organisations to do something different, to transform and that’s exactly what they usually need.
With experienced coaches, a clear and well-structured process, and visual outreach tools, we can help you:
- Define the right overall ambition for the company’s innovation portfolio.
- Make decisions to kill ideas that don't bring evidence to the table.
- Manage an exploration portfolio and transition the best innovation projects to an exploitation portfolio.
- Reduce risk and uncertainty and invest in evidence, not ideas you like.
- Design and implement the innovation framework that’s best adapted to your portfolio objectives.
- Visualize, analyse and manage your portfolio of existing and new businesses.
- Tackle headwinds from legacy businesses where a very strong will is needed to successfully introduce radical innovations, which go beyond marginal improvements to existing products or services.
We’ll help you to track how much closer are you getting from idea to real business
Let's start working together.
Schedule a FREE 30-minute strategy session
Discuss your goals, challenges and solutions
Start transformative innovation - playing a volume game.
Portfolio management support is built on our 20+ years of business design & ecosystem building experience
We have successfully supported a number of corporate innovation teams, as well as several 100 startup teams in implementing entrepreneurial thinking and innovation methods. We have developed the PODIM conference into a leading startup and tech platform in the CEE region and built a global network of startups, experts and partners across various industries. Learn more about us here.
Elastic (USA)
We offer you end-to-end innovation services
Workshops &
trainings
“Managing a Portfolio of Existing and New Businesses”
6 hours (includes multiple breaks) – can be held in one day or split evenly over two days
“How to Systematically Govern Innovation at the Portfolio Level to Achieve Greater Financial Impact?”
4 hours (includes breaks)
Workshops and trainings are based on a proven design & innovation methodology. They can be 100% remote and organized digitally or physically at Venture Factory, a brand-new creative space designed to co-innovate and accelerate.
- Sync call before the workshop to start from a clear and solid understanding of your business, context and objectives.
- We challenge you and your team to be bold and clear about innovation ambition and long-term value creation.
- We will co-develop a framework for surveying all the initiatives your business has under way. How many are being pursued in each realm, and how much investment is going to each type of innovation? What results to expect out of it?
- We facilitate relevant strategic discussions on the most appropriate target structure for your company’s portfolio of innovation projects and the action plan to realize it.
- You get practical tools for innovation portfolio management according to the principles of the venture capital industry.
- We use visual work to structure, create alignment and shared understanding, and accelerate decision making.
- You will learn how to manage various business models that are at different stages of their life to get to a balanced portfolio.
- We follow up to get feedback and define potential next steps.
Innovation as a
service
We offer a Consulting package to help you co-design and co-develop a pipeline of innovative projects in different stages, with specific customers, enforcing different strategic pillars towards the future.
Ideal for companies’ chief strategy and chief innovation officers who need more hands-on support in portfolio management of existing and new businesses. It includes the mapping of existing portfolios and determining how the composition of businesses in their portfolio needs to evolve in the future, and setting their investment strategy accordingly. The service includes support in intensive preparation, content design & research, facilitation of strategic conversations and co-creation of all outputs.
32 hours – Consisting of intensive preparation (4 hours), Content design & research (8 hours), Facilitating strategic conversations (8 hours), Finalising outputs (8 hours), Joint presentation of the results and next steps moderated discussion (2 hours).
Innovation services are based on a proven design & innovation methodology. You can choose between an online version or take advantage of a work retreat at Venture Factory in Maribor, Slovenia, a brand new creative space designed to co-innovate and accelerate.
- A great opportunity for a work retreat to spend time brainstorming and working on your portfolio of existing and new businesses according to the principles of the venture capital industry.
- We are masters of facilitation, delivering the right, frictionless design process, an engaging experience and high-quality output.
- We challenge you to be more disciplined, execute extensive governance of innovation across the company’s business portfolio to achieve higher revenue growth.
- We challenge you to invest more time and effort into innovation to re-injected the innovation spirit into your company or just boost it to higher levels.
- We visualize the portfolio of existing and new businesses and help you with pipeline management to ensure that innovation projects are progressing according to plan.
- We help you to make decisions to kill ideas that don’t bring evidence to the table on time.
- We provide complete project management down to the smallest detail to get the job done.
Partnership for collaborative innovation & special projects
We build partnerships with ambitious companies challenging the status quo and building invincible businesses.
Ideal for companies that are looking for a long-term partner in innovation with a proven innovation track record, global reach and strong roots in the CEE startup ecosystem. For companies looking for a specific innovation project or program we can co-design and co-execute.
We have prepared three packages for you, namely Startupper, Outlier and Unicorn. Each includes a specific amount of consulting hours per month, scouting talents and promoting innovation projects and activities via Podim & Startup Slovenia platforms.
We can provide services online or in person at Venture Factory in Maribor. You can use our creative office space 2 days/month for free.
Startupper package: 12 consulting hours/month.
Outlier package: 24 consulting hours/month.
Unicorn package: 32 consulting hours/month. Benefits
- We offer end-to-end support for your company’s constant reinvention and innovation.
- We help you create the right environment with talent, processes and methods.
- We help you reach out and find external partners to drive innovation through cross-industry collaborations.
- You can use our Podim conference and Start:up Slovenia ecosystem platforms. We can deliver tailor-made solutions to ensure you reach your goals.
- We can help you reach an international audience through our events, media channels and community partnerships.
- We help you stand out and accelerate your innovation by being disruptive.
- We can co-develop special innovation projects or programs (execution/implementation is not included in the base price).
Get on the path to becoming a resilient business
Work and innovate with us to create new value for customers and make a difference in the market. Together with your team, we will discover;
- Your winning ambition
- Where do you play?
- How do you win?
- Your core competencies.
- Your core systems.
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