It doesn’t take long for the word “innovation” to come up in any discussion about the cloud.
The cloud’s elasticity and support of rapid scalability are big drivers of innovation — helping companies affordably grow capacity with rising demands, improve on-demand availability, and ease and speed deployment.
This quote from Deloitte Consulting Principal and U.S. Technology Cloud Leader Ranjit Bawa describes the cloud-innovation connection in a nutshell: “The cloud democratizes the ability to test great ideas and bring them to life.”
But what is innovation? Google the word and you’ll find a bunch of different definitions. Here’s Merriam-Webster’s definition, for example:
1: the introduction of something new
2: a new idea, method, or device: novelty
Too narrow? Not applicable to the channel? I think so.
Here’s a better one from businessdictionary.com:
“The process of translating an idea or invention into a good or service that creates value or for which customers will pay.
To be called an innovation, an idea must be replicable at an economical cost and must satisfy a specific need.”
This second example from businessdictionary.com aligns with our view at Channel Marketing Journal that innovation goes beyond just hype and instead of just sparking disruption, creates transformative value.
Starting in September, Channel Marketing Journal will dive deeper into the topic of innovation — and create a forum for showcasing the channel marketers that truly drive it.
More on that to come. In the meantime, Channel Marketing Journal is interested in hearing how you define and/or enable innovation at your company and the impact of the cloud on your efforts. Contact us to tell us more.
