Columbia Business School's Center on Global Brand Leadership with the support of Trimble, a technology company focused on helping the world work better, is pleased to release a new report which reveals innovation strategies in agriculture, construction, and transportation that could significantly contribute to the US and global economy. The report, titled Innovation Growth in the Lynchpin Industries: Challenges and Strategies for Agriculture, Construction & Transportation, aims to provide a roadmap for transforming these sectors, which collectively contribute approximately 10% to the US GDP.
It’s easy to imagine a science fiction film panning out on the vision of a towering city of the future, filled with majestic buildings, interspersed with lush and vibrant vertical farms, while fully automated land, rail, and flying vehicles bring people and supplies to and from across the landscape.
At the same time, the key underlying industries at the core of these specific images—agriculture, construction, and transportation —are rarely viewed as innovation leaders on the cusp of such transformations. They are “lynchpin industries” providing food, shelter, and mobility—all of which are at the core of supporting a stable society. However given the societal and business model changes of the digital age and global climate and resource transformations, it is more crucial than ever that these lynchpin industries are emboldened to become innovative leaders for the future.
“Despite several specific hurdles outlined in the report, these lynchpin industries have become eager to embrace emerging technologies and innovation practices,” said the report’s author Matthew Quint, Director of the Center on Global Brand Leadership, Columbia Business School. “This research outlines several techniques that can help them to break through the barriers they still face in making this transition.”
This report outlines factors that hamper innovation generally and specific barriers within these lynchpin industries, such as, an aging workforce, regulatory regimes, ecosystem complexity, project uniqueness, and siloed data and decisions. Alongside these challenges it offers strategies to move beyond them or leverage them into something that can be beneficial. For example, the challenge of an aging workforce can offer buy-in to more quickly adopt digital innovations that can improve productivity which simultaneously can change perceptions about these industries to make them appealing to younger, digitally native generations.
“The findings of this report align with Trimble’s vision and our focus on some of society’s most vital sectors,” said Pete Large, senior vice president of strategy for Trimble. “There is tremendous potential in these industries to improve operational performance through innovations that increase precision, drive efficiencies and expand access to real-time insights across connected workflows.”
For more information about the report please contact [email protected].
Below is an example of the summary charts outlining the challenges and strategies to drive innovation in the lynchpin industries that are included throughout the report.
