Week 9: New Products and Entrepreneurship

Workshop discoveries and experience:

         

During the class, Professor Marcela showed us how to melt plastic. She showed us how to use the oven in the room next to the room 823 lab. The oven is to be used with caution and the molds are to be used with gloves so as to avoid burning. The oven takes around 10 minutes to heat up and we learned that we must stay on the 8th floor while we are melting our plastic into the molds so as to avoid burning the plastic. Interestingly enough, burnt plastic turns a gruesome brown or dark yellowish color. 

 

      

In addition, we got to see how to use the sawing machine for creating little stumps of wood with which we would hard press the molds into each other. This is the part of the process that flattens the shape in place and creates the final shape of the plate we are creating. The scary part of this was the sawing operation and the blades on the machine. 

 

       

In order to create the melted plastic bowls and plates, we are supposed to cut plastic type 2,4, or 5 and create at least 100 grams of plastic cutouts for the medium size bowl. We can also use juice caps and bottles to melt, which would take around 15 more minutes to melt. Before putting the plastic pieces in the mold, we must put wax all over the molds and make sure that there is a thick layer of it on the entire surface.

Readings discoveries:

Circular Business Models Developing a Sustainable Future reading, chapter Multiple-Helix Collaboration for the Development of a Circular Economy: (key points and takeaways)

• The transformation of transport systems constitutes one of the areas that need to be transformed in the development of a circular economy
• This concept of industrial strength based on the joint efforts of companies, public organizations, and organizations providing research, education, and training was further developed by Professor Henry Etkowitz M. Larsson  and given the name of Triple Helix collaboration
•  Each of the sectors of the private, public, and research and educational sectors representing a helix, a concept similar to the double helix structure of DNA.
• A fifth helix is made up by civil society that also has an important role in the spreading of information and as customers that demand innovative products and services.
• All of these together make up the multiple-helix system that will become necessary in order for circular systems to develop
• Compared to the concept of clusters, the term implies a certain amount of goal orientation and management.
•  In many parts of the world, governments have taken on the role of developing, managing, and financing the activities of NGOs that support development and systems are increasingly treated by governments and authorities as important drivers of innovation.
• long-term and large-scale government investments have significantly contributed to speeding up development
• Ruttan described the important role of governments as providers of financing for research and in their capacity as customers in the early stages of development.
• The reason behind the need for government investments is the very large amount of financing necessary to drive the development of new technologies and systems from the first prototypes to the stage where technologies become inexpensive general purpose technologies
• In order to play the role of pilot customer and provider of funding for key steps in the chain of activities that are necessary for companies and industries to move forward, government organizations need to build an understanding of development needs and the steps that are necessary to take in a sequence of development and application projects.
• As technologies mature, they become less expensive and can be utilized in a wide range of applications.
• Different forms of government financing, EU-project funding, and procurement schemes by public buyers are some of the tools that have been used in order to promote development.
• Politicians and public officials on EU, national, and local levels spend increasing amounts of time communicating with business leaders and users of products. They pick up new needs for support activities, matchmaking, and financing and spend time lobbying for funds and trying to attract more attention to their favourite industries and causes.
• Governments also supply the basic financing for research, education, and training.
• Another role carried by universities, schools, and companies specializing in training is to supply companies and organizations with competent personnel and providing training services for professionals
• NGOs take on important roles in the innovation system: organizing clusters of companies and partner organizations, running projects for research and training, and identifying opportunities for development.
• Despite their role as organizers of projects, seminars, and receivers of development financing, the contributions of NGOs are often not recognized to their full extent.
• the activities of all NGOs combined constitute an important driver of innovation and one that becomes increasingly important as the complexity of society increases and it becomes more and more resource consuming for companies themselves to identify prospective collaboration partners and areas where they may want to become involved.
• Consumers contribute to making or breaking companies and business models. By selecting a product or service they, very simply, communicate their approval and signal that they want more of the goods or services of a particular supplier.
• One of the challenges related to the development of a circular economy is to persuade the powerful community of consumers to increasingly demand products from companies that apply circular models and buy less from companies that do not.
• Influencing consumers is likely to require substantial resources and take time.
• Region Skåne is the regional health care provider for a population in excess of one million in the southernmost region in Sweden.
• The organization has implemented a number of innovative practices, using the method of innovation procurement. This has provided an opportunity for the small company Gaia Biomaterials to become the supplier of disposable aprons made from a biologically based plastics material.
• the challenge is particularly difficult due to the unprecedented level of specialization in present-day society and the intricate network of companies, public organizations, service firms, and organizations that form part of the innovation systems of countries, which is at present primarily geared towards innovations within the linear economy

Optional video opinions:

The video titled. “My Perspective on Profit” talks about how a company makes profit after incurring costs on rent and production. He defines profit as “bonus money”, and talks about how a company can improve people’s lives and reduce their energy usage, producing more locally and reducing carbon footprint. However, these things cost companies more money and their lack of improvement in these areas saves them money. These are companies with lots of profit, which is often not fairly distributed