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Trilogy Associates is a management consulting and business development firm that facilitates business growth and renewal through commercialization of new products.
Here you will find links to many of our email newsletters on wide-ranging topics of business, societal and personal interest. Most topics relate in some way to our consulting practice focused on medical products and the life sciences.
I hope you find these musings helpful, interesting, even controversial. And, if you conclude that any of these views was either "right on" or way off the mark, please let me know.
Caution: Links often break over time; it cannot be helped.
Sincerely,
Joe Kalinowski
Principal
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- Optimize Tech Transfer
- The effectiveness of technology transfer from academia to industry is ripe for improvement. I tell you how to improve it.
- Nobody Wants to Use Your Product
- Product designers can make a great contribution to society, to their customers, and to their employers' bottom lines if they would simply do a better job. Here's how.
- Consider the Innovation Triad
- Let's agree to reduce the number of disappointing new-product launches. Try my "Innovation Triad."
- Don't Overspend on Your New-Product Strategy
- New-product commercialization activities are always exciting. But don't get carried away. Take a stepwise approach to focus on what is most important.
- Another Promised "Innovation" Bites the Dust
- Medtech innovation fascinates me. Medtech is, dare I say, cool! So I find it important to examine its failures and successes.
- The Power of Pre-Prototype
- I'm obsessed with the importance of assessing the commercial potential of a new-product idea at the point of conception -- well before serious time and money are consumed by its development.
- Look before you leap: Examine the Landscape
- Landscaping is an important -- often essential -- business tool. Read about landscaping and other interesting stuff.
- Big Data or Genuine Insight?
- I'm all for having access to lots of data. Show me the benefits, and let's roll. But ... don't confuse Big Data with genuine insight.
- How do you know what to build?
- Advice on the important issue of deciding what new product(s) to build to support your business.
- Medical Market Research at Home and Abroad
- The ways you attack medical market research depend upon your goals and available tools. Here are some guidelines for two important examples.
- Hearing the Voices of Lead Users
- Whether you call them KOLs or lead users, you need to have occasional conversations with those folks.
- Know a promising new product when you see one?
- It turns out that we humans are incredibly ill-equipped to make business decisions on a purely rational basis. You can improve your decision-making processes. But it ain't easy.
- The Future of Medtech
- Most musings on market trends and predictions tend to focus on specific new products. I think what matters even more are changes in your customers' preferences and behaviors, and the nature of your relationships with those customers.
- New Medtech: Boondoggle or Breakthrough?
- Assessing new technologies is tricky business. I try my hand at two recently announced developments, one boondoggle and one potential breakthrough.
- Collaborative Consulting Works for Both Buyers and Sellers
- If you don't know about collaborative consulting, you should. Whether you're a buyer or seller of consulting services, this business model can pay handsome dividends.
- Healthcare and the Apple Mystique
- Silicon Valley is coming up short on innovation, especially in healthcare.
- Is your new-product idea worthy?
- New ideas are a dime a dozen; the trick is converting one to a cash-producing business.
- Medtech Consolidation
- Perhaps you've read that Medtronic intends to acquire Covidien. This would be a big deal that would ultimately affect most players in the medtech space.
- Opportunities and Disruption
- Must you creatively disrupt a market in order to exploit an opportunity? Maybe so. But maybe not. In either case it makes sense to first examine that opportunity beyond the view of your customer.
- Doing Technology Deals
- Roadblocks can be overcome if both seller and buyer remember a few behavioral fundamentals along the way. Here are my suggestions for navigating this process successfully.
- Advice for Startups
- The quality of grant proposals from startups that I occasionally review are highly variable, some great and many terrible. Read a few of my words of wisdom addressed to those grant-writers.
- Effectively Communicate Your Product Concept, or Else
- No matter where you are in this process, you need a plan, an overarching framework, a Product Concept communication tool. I may have just what you need.
- Our 25th Anniversary Celebration
- It's been 25 years since I founded Trilogy Associates in March of 1989. Let me point you to some potentially useful takeaways that might help you on the path to your own "25".
- Rethink Your Markets and Your Business Models
- Do you have a clear understanding of your market(s) and how you address them? That's what this installment is about. Just some advice that's not exactly rocket science, but reminders of techniques that often work based upon lots of personal experience; plus, an important emerging trend in the medtech space.
- A Diagnostics Mystery
- Does this new IVD supplier represent a radical departure, or is it more of the same wrapped in hype?
- Do you really know your market?
- Knowing you must understand your market and actually understanding it are two very different realities. The latter takes hard work.
- Thinking Inside the Box
- Don't start with a known problem. Rather, start with solutions that are already familar, then modify them incrementally to innovate!
- Clinical Insight from Physician Panels
- Hosting physician panels is a bit like herding smart cats, but it's great for gathering new-product intelligence.
- Tapping Medical Minds Is At Risk
- The newly legislated Sunshine Act is an attempt to expose and moderate physicians' conflicts of interest. But there's a problem ...
- Disruption and Medical Ethics
- Are you undisruptable? Can a market newcomer attack you from the bottom up? Market leaders, beware!
- Healthcare Watchwords: "Cost" and "Design"
- Aside from clinical value, your medical product must demonstrate cost-effectiveness and user-friendliness.
- Screen Your New-Product Ideas (or Else)
- Look before you leap! See our "Screener to Guide New-Product Assessment".
- Understand Market Needs: Ask Artfully
- Knowing what and how to ask are critical, rare skills. Step up to the challenge and really make a difference.
- 10 Guidelines for New-Product Definition
- You need to somehow discover what folks want, i.e. what will sell. I give you 10 tips based upon my experience.
- Forget Brands, Think User Types
- Everyone is into branding. It's been the norm in consumer products marketing for decades, and now it's everywhere. Maybe that's wrong. Read why that might be so.
- Who Do You Call ... to Assess Business Opportunities?
- Tap the right influential sources to understand your working environment; 7 groups to consider.
- A POC Ecosystem and Virtual Reality
- What's a point-of-care (POC) ecosystem, and what does it mean for your POC commercialization efforts?
- Introverts, Partnerships and FDA
- Introverts are more likely to be successful business leaders than extroverts. Who knew?
- Healthcare Costs and Combination Products
- There's a new kid on the cost-data block: The Health Care Cost Institute (HCCI)
- Back to the Future
- Are healthcare revolutionaries often outrageous? Yes. Are they sometimes ultimately right? Yes!
- Let Clinical Needs be Your Guide
- Try needs-driven innovation -- really. Consider observational research.
- A Little Bit of Everything
- "Supreme" healthcare. Brainstorming myth. Pivot for success? Focus on customer jobs, not products.
- Our 2011 Consulting Engagements
- Our eclectic practice continues. For proof by example, see a summary of our 2011 activities.
- Communicating Your Vision
- Consider our ConceptVision model for selling your concept internally and externally.
- Killing Your New-Product Launch
- Some great lessons can be learned from launch failures and disappointments.
- China, Nukes and Business Development
- Opportunities in China are real, but there are considerable risks to those who do not fully understand its markets, business practices, and government policies.
- R&D Spending or Innovation Culture?
- Culture & strategy matter, R&D spending not so much. Strive to align innovation strategy and corporate culture.
- Find and Engage Domain Experts for a Better Outcome
- Seek out people who know the right people who can help. Don't just tap your usual sources.
- Stock Market Wisdom
- That's an oxymoron. Relax. Focus on the fundamental drivers of success in healthcare.
- A Radical Proposal for Drug Approvals
- Something needs to change! Here's an idea similar to one I suggested several months ago.
- Medtech Highlights and Cautions
- Medtech has experienced a healthy decade, thanks partly to M&A. But beware due diligence shortcomings.
- How do you innovate?
- There are two recognized means. Use both methods, and do them both right.
- So what's the real problem?
- Where are the blind spots in your organization that are retarding growth?
- Physician Insight and R&D Investment
- Three topics, all dealing with innovation in the life sciences and healthcare.
- Hear the Drumbeats on Cost Effectiveness
- Evidence mounts that cost effectiveness will separate winners from losers, regardless of which end of the political spectrum "wins".
- Innovation Killers
- Want to cripple your ability to innovate? Here are some sure fire ways to do it.
- The Year Past and Years to Come
- A quick look at some highlights in medicine in 2010, then a few perspectives on our society going forward.
- Innovating Can Become Very Expensive
- Strive to avoid company-killing costs on the path to innovation.
- The Hard Part is Getting Started
- Involve helpful people early in the process for a better, and often quicker, outcome.
- Heed the Voice of Your Customer
- Read the intriguing story of The Folding Chair and the importance of your VOC efforts.
- Emerging Changes to FDA's 510(k) Pathway
- My critique of FDA's preliminary recommendations of August 2010
- Price-Setting and Diagnostics Patents
- Setting prices based on customer input, and what Bilsky might mean for diagnostics patents.
- The Seeds and Processes of Innovation
- Two key parts of the innovation puzzle, both critically important to companies and societies.
- Due Diligence and Innovation
- A new way to look at due diligence, and the innovation scores of life science firms.
- So you think you have a platform technology?
- A stepwise plan for sequential licensing and commercialization.
- Healthcare Blather -- What Else?
- Healthcare economics, the Medical Device Tax, and 510(k) overhaul.
- Doing Technology Deals
- Suggestions for greater success, for sellers and for buyers.
- Trends Affecting Your Business in 2010
- Here are some important trends that are likely to affect many, if not all, medtech businesses over the next few years.
- Your Future in Medical Device Markets
- Try some scenario planning to position your business for 2015.
- Seeing the Forest for the Trees
- Step back to see the big picture: On your career, on healthcare, and on energy policy.
- Get Serious about Costs and Tech Assessment
- You must leverage your cost-effectiveness now. And, put technology assessment to work in your favor.
- Get Better at Due Diligence
- Keep it simple. Focus on the decisive issues.
- Try a New Perspective
- The benefits of taking a step back, plus Google's personal health records.
- Exploiting the Downturn for Advantage
- Exercise internal due diligence and get the timing right.
- A Little Bit of Everything
- Your economic story, CER priorities, combo products, and devices shine.
- Comparative Effectiveness: Why should you care?
- Addressing the new realities of tomorrow's healthcare environment.
- Heed the Game-Changers & IVD Economic Benefits
- Medtech interest in game-changing opportunities and threats triggers a new Trilogy initiative: Game-Changer Reports.
- Soon It Will Be All About Cost
- My prescription for dealing with the reformation of U.S. healthcare.
- A Business Development Roadmap
- Get unstuck while taking your first steps in solving a business problem.
- Quit Lamenting ... Start Growing!
- Bad news aside, here's a wealth of free business advice you can use.
- Healthcare Politics & New Tech for the New Year
- Addressing the U.S. healthcare crisis and checking out some new medtech.
- Gaining Clinical Insight from Docs
- Planning, conducting and interpreting physician interviews.
- Medical Devices & America: Not to Worry
- An industry exec predicts a future absent medical devices as we know them!
- The Demise of Medical Devices
- How does medtech measure up against biotech?
- Doing the Right Thing
- An argument in favor of collaborating consultants and tapping manifold information sources.
- Escaping Your Comfort Zone
- There really is danger in your comfort zone!
- One Account, Multiple Customers
- Leverage your existing accounts by reaching out to new users.
- Uncomfortable Realities and A New Office
- Trilogy relocates to the Research Triangle of North Carolina; worth a look.
- Spring Landscaping
- Who needs to understand a business "landscape"? Why and how?
- Liability, Doing It Wrong and Recessions
- It's time to hunker down, right? No!
- Innovation vs Invention
- Think they're the same? Think again.
- Assessing New Technologies
- Why do it? How to do it right.
- Hearing the Voices of Lead Users
- These early adopters can put you on the path to success. Here's how to talk with them.
- Positioning
- Yes, it's Marketing 101. Try it yourself; I did.
- Framing Your Messages
- Is it just spin or is it vital? You decide.
- Validation, Diagnostics and Disruptive Technologies
- What's really "disruptive"? And why does it matter?
- Dimensions of Opportunity Assessment
- Questions to guide you, and our checklist too.
- Managing Change and Innovation
- Think this is essential to business success? Me too.
- Innovation and Design Excellence
- Some clever new products in the medtech space.
- An Embarrassment of Riches
- Ask for too much and you ask for trouble -- or you don't get nuthin'.
- (Inaugural) News from Trilogy Associates
- Internal due diligence: key to new-product success.
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You can also view our library of white papers, published articles and presentations at our Web site. See the Reading Room. Trilogy Associates
4068 Fearrington Post
Pittsboro, North Carolina 27312
919-533-6285 |
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