Tips & Tricks
12 principles of innovation for BoP markets (C.K. Prahalad)
Based on his research, Prahalad identified twelve principles that constitute the building blocks of a philosophy of innovation for BoP markets.- Focus on (quantum jumps in) price performance. Serving the BoP is not just about lower prices
- Hybrid solutions for innovation. BoP consumer problems cannot be solved with only the old technologies.
- Scalable and transportable solutions across countries, cultures and languages. Design for ease of adaptation in similar BoP markets is a key consideration for gaining scale.
- Reducing resource intensity must be a critical principle in product development. All innovations must focus on conserving resources.
- Product development must start from a deep understanding of functionality, not just form. The infrastructure BoP consumers have to live and work in demands a rethinking of the functionality.
- Build logistic and manufacturing infrastructure. Process innovations are critical in BoP markets.
- Deskilling work is critical. Take into account the skill levels, poor infrastructure and difficulty of access.
- Educate (semiliterate) customers in product usage. Innovations in educating a semiliterate group of the use of new products can pose interesting challenges.
- Products must work in hostile environments. Like noise, dust, unsanitary conditions, abuse, electric blackouts and water pollution.
- Function/ feature should result in adaptable user interfaces to the heterogeneity of the consumer base. Research on interfaces is critical.
- Distribution methods should be designed to reach both highly dispersed rural markets and highly dense urban markets. Innovations must reach the consumer.
- Focus on broad architecture. To enable quick and easy incorporation of new features and functions.
Bottlenecks / Fields of tension of the Designers4Billions
Communication with the BoP-consumer
Lepra-patients are our target group in the Base of the Pyramid, and they are extremely difficult to understand.
People are susceptible for leprosy, when their body resistance is extremely low. This people are -usually- very poor,
with a low education level. Therefore, consumer research in the first phases of the design process is quite difficult.
They don’t understand questionnaires or visual analogues’.
expert 8
It is very important to create consumer insights, but the BoP consumer is not a good sparring partner: they don’t
know the solutions. So, execute a consumer test as early as possible. Communication with the BoP-consumer is possible,
when you can offer them a prototype. Then, they can react on this. And in this way you are able to learn hands-on with
the target group.
expert 1
Make cross-cultural interpretations
One of the reasons that we are developing our product for India, is that there is less cultural resistance against glasses
in India. Gandhi, the biggest national hero, was wearing a pair of glasses. In other areas, for instance the rural areas of
China, the people have more objections against glasses. It is a taboo.
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It is very difficult to make cross-cultural interpretations. It could be wise to specialize in this skill in the continuation
of the project. To be able to excel in this skill.
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Ideology vs business
There is an area of tension between ideology and business: the project is founded in an ideology and on the other side,
there are the employees and the business. With stakeholders and shareholders. The project has to bring in money at the
end despite of this ideologic start.
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Intellectual property
The principle idea behind the product is very simple, the Egyptians already tried it out. There is many prior art.
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Only new combinations of materials or techniques can be patented. Meanwhile this intellectual property is very important,
because we are working in a highly competitive force field.
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Do we help with what we do?
The social effects of Design4Billions reach further than just the consumer. It has to do with the society, health, sustainability
and developing aid. Imagine that a water-pump can be the direct cause of a famine. With the water-pump one of the bottlenecks
in the food chain was taken away and the next bottleneck was a lack of solid food.
expert 4
There have been many discussions about the question: What is poverty?’ In my opinion, poverty can be reduced, when you give
people the ability to make a choice. It is more an issue of ‘having a choice’ than a money-issue or a happiness-issue. Designing
different products or multifunctional products gives poor people this ability to choose.
expert 8
Every western company, which produces for emerging markets, should consider whether their product contributes to an improved
prosperity or well-being of the BoP-consumer.
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Be aware of where the money is
There is fashion in tropical diseases. And right now, AIDS is very fancy, because we can get it as well. The western donor
organizations are interested to subsidize the marketing of preventive products for the fashionable diseases. But other diseases
are treated really, really bad. For example sleeping sickness: a quarter of a billion die of this disease each year, and nothing
has been done to this disease.
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Low experience with entrepreneurship in developing countries
We tried to find similar projects that stimulate entrepreneurial activities in developing countries, to learn from their
experiences. This seems to be something new for The Netherlands: with the BiD network and BiD Challenge, we are making the
first step. In England they have more experience with entrepreneurs in emerging markets in the organization Enterprise Works.
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Project ownership
In the design project, we paid much attention for the project ownership: the local people have to be involved in the project.
The participation of a Western designer in the project is not everlasting and therefore you can better involve local people
from scratch. Besides that, you simply can’t do everything on your own. Related to project ownership, you can better start
the project on a later moment together with somebody who will continue the project, than do the project-start on your own.
expert 8
The entrepreneur in the product chain has chosen to sell the product in restaurants. Maybe, he can also take a look at the
possibilities of selling points in shops. But we don’t push him. It is more important to give him the confidence to do it in
his way, because our personal aim is to reach a fluid chain for regional products. We have to give him the faith that he is
doing fine.
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Priorities differ with other interested parties
The interested parties in the project have sometimes different ideas. It happens, that this is not exactly in line with your
own ideas, or your preferences. Especially, when the other parties put money in the project, this can be quite complicated.
You need to have an intuition for politics to operate in this type of situation.
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Communication with experts
A study with experts in a leprosy hospital abroad was the immediate cause of a large progression in the project. Communication
with experts by email gives the opposite result. It is very hard to explain about details in email. And in the responds, you
sometimes discover that the interpretation wasn’t correct.
(Research Design4Billions, 2005, p.65-67)
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