Our writing has been informed by our combined 75-plus years in industry. This includes:
Paul Mugge
Paul Mugge has 35 years in product development, global business strategy, and business innovation services at IBM and 15 years of researching and teaching innovation as the Executive Director of the Center for Innovation Management at NC State University. It was through this experience that Mugge learned that more important than technology or product innovation is business model innovation. It, by far, is the hardest to copy—and the most important to establishing long-term growth. He captured these ideas—and the actual methods to perform business model innovation—in a book he co-authored with Dr. Stephen Markham, titled, Traversing the Valley of Death: A practical guide for corporate innovation leaders. Most importantly, Mugge spent his entire career – both at IBM and NC State University – listening and sharing what he has learned with scores of organizations that intend to separate themselves through innovation.
Haroon Abbu
Haroon Abbu is Vice President of Digital, Data, and Analytics at Bell & Howell headquartered in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina. He is an accomplished leader with more than 20 years’ industry experience in leading technology-enabled business transformation. Additionally, Haroon conducts research in the field of digital transformation in collaboration with the Center for Innovation Management Studies (CIMS) at NC State University and RWTH Aachen University, Germany. He presents regularly at leading industry conferences and has published his work in industry publications and academic journals such as the Journal of Business Research and Research-Technology Management.
Gerhard Gudergan
Gerhard Gudergan is the deputy managing director at FIR Institute for Industrial Management at RWTH Aachen University in Germany. He is a renowned researcher with over 20 years of experience in the fields of service management, business transformation and digital leadership. Besides his research, Gudergan translates his entrepreneurial mindset into numerous spinoffs. Currently his focus is on the Metropolitan Cities Initiative, as the acting head of this latest project. The vision is to use urban innovation to transform the fifth largest metropolitan region in Europe, Rhine-Ruhr, into the most livable metropolitan area possible.