第1集 - 尼古拉·阿尔迪 / 大众汽车集团 - "创新无法被管控，它必须被连接。"

深度访谈科技领域最具影响力的创新高管。每期节目将为您带来全球主要及新兴生态系统的独家数据与洞察，最热门的全球技术与开放创新动态，以及更多精彩内容。欢迎收听《开放创新对话》。跨越桥梁，与行业领袖畅谈。

In-depth interviews with the most influential innovation executives of the tech arena. Exclusive data and insights on major and emerging ecosystems all around the world, the hottest news on technology and open innovation at a global level, this and much more in every new episode. Welcome to Open Innovation Talks. Mind the bridge, chat with industry leaders.

我是阿尔贝托·内蒂，企业家CEO、大学教授，同时也是Mindabridge的主席。这是《开放创新对话——Mindabridge行业领袖访谈》的首期节目。本播客聚焦开放创新，面向希望了解如何实现初创企业与大公司协作的企业高管、实践者以及初创公司CXO们。今天的嘉宾是尼古拉斯·阿尔迪。尼古拉斯是大众汽车集团创新部门的负责人。

I'm Alberto Neti, CEO entrepreneur, university professor, and chairman of Mindabridge. And this is the first episode of Open Innovation Talks, Mindabridge Chat with Industry Leaders. This podcast is about open innovation and is addressed to corporate executives, practitioners, and startup CXOs interested to understand how to make startup corporate collaboration work. My guest today is Nicolas Arde. Nicolas is the head of Volkswagen Group Innovation.

今天我们将与尼古拉斯探讨一项极具挑战性的工作——如何在一个拥有10个全球品牌的大型集团中组建中央创新部门并实现协同效应。这里是Mind the Bridge的阿尔贝托·内蒂，您正在收听的是《开放创新对话》。今天我们很荣幸邀请到大众汽车集团创新部执行董事兼负责人尼古拉斯·阿尔迪。

With Nicolas, today, we will discuss how to do a very, very difficult things that is organizing a central common innovation unit in a large group with 10 different global brands and how to generate synergies. From the end of Mind the Bridge, I'm Alberto Netti, and this is the Open Innovation Talks. Today we have the pleasure to have with us Nicolas Ardey, Executive Director and Head of Volkswagen Group Innovation.

你好，阿尔贝托。

Hello, Alberto.

非常荣幸。大众汽车过去几年的发展令人瞩目，特别是在创新方面，尤其是开放创新领域。几个月前在伦敦，大众汽车被评为2022年企业初创明星之一，这意味着你们在开放创新方面做出了非常有趣的尝试。我们迫切想深入了解你们近年来的工作及未来计划。尼古拉，第一个直接的问题是：能否请您描述像大众这样的大型集团对创新的整体策略？

It's really a pleasure. What Volkswagen has been doing in the past few years is really interesting, and particularly it's interesting what Volkswagen has been doing on innovation, specifically on the open innovation front. Volkswagen has been recognized among the corporate startup stars of 2022, a few months ago in London, and that means that you guys have been doing something quite interesting specifically on the open innovation front. We are pretty eager to deep dive into what you guys have been doing in the past months and years and what you're up to. So the first immediate question for you, Nikolay, is just if you can describe the overall approach to innovation of a large group like Volkswagen.

是的。大众汽车的创新首先是一个复杂的网络。集团旗下拥有众多品牌，每个品牌自然都有遍布全球的创新活动和实体机构。但我负责的是一个中央创新部门，我们致力于最大限度实现品牌间的协同效应。

Yeah. Innovation at Volkswagen is a sophisticated network at first. So there are many brands belonging to the Volkswagen Group, and each brand of course has its own innovation activities and also entities distributed all over the world somehow. But we have one central common innovation unit, which is the unit I am in charge of. And there we are trying to generate as much as possible of synergies between brands.

当我们审视乘用车、卡车或公司其他业务板块时，会发现存在诸多跨品牌共通议题，比如脱碳技术、特定软件技术、自动驾驶、未来交互界面等众多领域。协调这些领域并共享研发资源非常必要，可以避免重复研究。另一方面，要实现创新效益最大化，必须进驻全球各创新热点地区。如果每个品牌单独行动将非常低效。因此从这一角度而言，设立中央创新部门在全球关键创新枢纽进行布局，并据此支持各品牌发展，同样具有重要价值。

So of course, when we look to passenger cars or to trucks or to other business parts of our company, then there are of course common topics which are relevant to each of the brands, like decarbonization, like certain software technologies, things like autonomous drive, future interface, and many more topics. And it's just worthwhile to coordinate on that and to share the resources between the brands, all this research only once, and do it in a coordinated manner. On the other hand, if you would like to leverage innovation to a maximum, you have to be present on each of the hottest innovation hotspots all over the world. And it would not be very efficient to do this by every brand separately. So also from this angle, is worthwhile to have one central innovation unit to be present all over the world and the most relevant hotspots for our business, and then to support brands in that regard.

这很重要，因为正如您所说，大众汽车的独特性在于拥有多个品牌。这些品牌历史悠久，在全球某些地区拥有创新方面的专长。另一方面，它们可能也希望保持自身的独立性，这正是品牌所代表的特质。而这通常会在协调和整合过程中带来挑战。正如您提到的，有些跨领域议题可能更适合由集团层面来高效管理。

So this is important because again, the specificity of Volkswagen is, as you mentioned, to having multiple brands. And again, there are brands with a pretty long heritage and certain parts of world, have a know how in terms of innovation. On the other hand, they have probably also desire of maintaining their own independence, flavor that is what the brands represent. And that probably that typically creates issues in trying to coordinate and leverage. As you mentioned, there are some topics that are transversal that might be efficiently managed at corporate level.

正如所述，您已经指出了其中几点。大众汽车等品牌正在其旗下各子品牌间推行类似的模式化运作。另一方面，应对不同创新举措的能力至关重要。首先您提到了在不同创新中心的布局——具体是哪些医院？哪些地区是您直接负责的？

As mentioned, you identify a few of them. And probably something similar that the modelization that brands like Volkswagen are doing across the different sub brands that they have. And on the other hand, the ability to cope with the different initiative is very important. First of all, you have mentioned the presence in the different innovation hospitals. In which hospitals, in which regions are you directly?

是的，首先是亚洲地区，包括北京、上海、东京和新加坡，这是我们在亚洲的布局。当然还有以色列的特拉维夫。在美国，硅谷是必争之地，我们设在贝尔蒙特。此外田纳西州也有非常有意思的进展。

Yeah, first in Asia, in Beijing, in Shanghai, in Tokyo, in Singapore. So this is our Asian footprint. Israel, of course, in Tel Aviv. And in The US, Silicon Valley is of course mandatory in Belmont. And then there's something very interesting going on in Tennessee.

我们与田纳西大学及位于诺克斯维尔的橡树岭国家实验室保持着紧密合作，这个顶尖机构主要研究绿色科技、绿色能源供应，以及电池技术的化学问题和核科学等领域。这对我们来说也是个非常有趣的热点。这些是我们的主要据点，此外还有其他品牌——比如奥迪在波士顿麻省理工学院设有机构，同时在柏林也建立了新的创新单元，我们正就此展开合作。

So we have close cooperation with the University of Tennessee and the Oak Ridge National Lab, Knoxville, which is a fantastic facility looking into also mainly green tech and green energy supply topics, also chemical topics for battery technology and nuclear science and so on. This is also a very interesting hotspot for us. These are the locations we are present, and then there are other brands. For instance, Audi is active at the MIT in Boston, and also Audi is active in Berlin with the new innovation unit. So we are collaborating in that regard.

确实。作为集团创新部门，我们的职责还包括构建、组织并连接整个集团的创新网络。虽然目前这个体系尚未完全建立，但我们正在筹备一个面向所有品牌和小型创新单元的开放创新平台。这个有趣的协作平台将邀请所有人参与，目的是连接所有创新议题——而非简单管控，因为创新本就不该被集中管制，而应该形成开放互联的网络。

Yes. So it's also our responsibility as a group innovation to form and organize and connect this innovation network all over the group. This was not so established so far up to now, but we are just about to establish now an open innovation platform platform for for all the brands and also tiny innovation units, which makes fun to work with, invites everybody, an open innovation platform in order to connect all these topics. Not to just govern them because innovation shouldn't be governed in a central manner. It should be connected, and it should be an open network.

这就是我们对开放创新的理解：首先要在集团内部实现创新互联与开放，当然也要面向外部创新生态系统开放。

So this is at first what we understand by open innovation to connect innovation to be open within our group, and then, of course, also towards the external innovation ecosystem.

您提出的'集团内部开放'愿景特别引人深思，因为实际上这与大型企业集团常见的复杂架构、层层障碍和部门壁垒形成了鲜明对比。'集团内部开放'的提议非常合理，我相信要实现这个目标需要付出巨大努力。

Think the vision you just use open within the group is particularly intriguing because it looks quite contradictory, actually knowing a large corporation and knowing the complexities in the hurdles and the multiple separate rooms division that large corporation do have, The proposition being open within our group makes a lot of sense, and I believe there is a lot of effort to really make it work.

是的，带着

Yeah, with a

顺便说一句，这得到了我们董事会的大力支持。他们授权我们建立这种开放网络，希望我们成为网络参与者，而不是封闭在实验室里独自研究那些微小分子。我们应该在集团内部以及外部创新系统之间更好地协作。

lot of support by our board, by the way. So they gave us the mandate to set up this kind of open network, they would want us to act as network player rather than to stay into our closed labs and perform research on all these tiny molecules down there, doing everything by ourselves. So we should better collaborate between each other within the group and also with the external innovation system.

如果要你根据在户外和团队内部与同事合作的经验提供建议，哪些是最重要的？过去几年你在串联这些点时学到了什么？

If you added to provide some advice, some tips based on your experience in the outdoors, work of connecting inside the group to some of your peers and colleagues, what would be the top ones? What you have learned in the past few years, trying to connect the dots?

这是个难题。我不太习惯给同事提供如何做得更好的建议，但成为这个国际创新网络的一部分非常有趣。我想建议每个人都享受与中国同事、以色列同事的合作，去实地访问。幸运的是，现在我们又可以进入中国了，我将尽快去拜访那里的同事。亲临现场、面对面交流、感受生态系统的氛围非常重要。

That's difficult question. It's not so much my style of work to provide tips to other colleagues, how they can do better, but it is a lot of fun to be part of this international innovation network. What I would suggest to everybody is enjoy to collaborate with Chinese colleagues, with Israel colleagues, visit those sites. And fortunately, now we can also enter China again, and it will be my next visit, of course, as soon as possible to visit my colleagues there. To be out there, it's so important to meet in person and to be there, to breath the spirit of this ecosystem.

仅仅坐在办公桌前或待在大本营是不够的。

It's not sufficient to do it from your desk and your home base.

想想看，我几个月前还在特拉维夫。实际上，我们Mind the Bridge正在特拉维夫开设创新中心，我有幸见到了你的同事Amanda。她向我介绍了位于特拉维夫的大众集团Connect创新项目。此外，特拉维夫还有保时捷APX加速器。你能解释一下这两个模式的目标和运作方式吗？

Just to think, I was in Tel Aviv a few months ago. Actually, we are opening our innovation center in Tel Aviv as Mind the Bridge, and I had the pleasure to meet with Amanda, that is your colleagues over there. And she presented me the Connect Volkswagen Group innovation that is based in Tel Aviv. And then in Tel Aviv, you have also the the Porsche APX accelerators. Can you explain what is the goal and how these two models are working?

因为我觉得它们相当经典。

Because I found them pretty classic.

好的，当然。至少关于Connect项目，我可以提供详细信息。虽然我对APX活动的了解不深，但我知道它们的目标和内容。不过从Connect说起，这个办公室我们已经设立多年，在当地已站稳脚跟。

Yeah. Sure. At least for Connect, I can provide the details. I'm not so deep into the APX activities, of course, I know what they are about and what their targets are. But if we start with Connect, this is an office which we have there already for several years and meanwhile are established there.

这是一个约10人的团队，他们真正融入了当地的创新生态系统。他们在那里发起挑战，举办黑客马拉松，并在以色列全境进行项目发掘。由于已建立良好关系，初创企业也会认真对待他们的邀请。这对我们来说是非常宝贵的资产，因为这让我们能够接触到这些公司。

It's a group of around 10 employees who are really entrained in the local innovation ecosystem. They provide challenges there. They perform hackathons and they do all the scouting in this ecosystem all over Israel. And having this established, they are also invited by and taken seriously by those startups. And this is a really valuable asset for us because this gives us the access to those companies.

他们在以色列当地进行概念验证时，会与沃尔夫斯堡总部或其他集团部门协作。通过这些概念验证，他们帮助这些公司与品牌方共同开展贸易项目，助力业务发展。这种方式加速了创新进程，因为以色列的生态系统非常独特——其军事科技实力尤为突出，再加上特有的创业精神和创新氛围。可以说，以色列已成为仅次于硅谷的全球第二大创业社区。

While they are doing POCs locally in Israel in connection or in collaboration with the headquarter in Wolfsburg or any other of the group. Via these POCs, they try to help those companies to launch trading projects together with the brands in order to help them generate business. And this is a way to speed up this innovation because the ecosystem in Israel is a very special one, feeded by the military science, which is there in really an outstanding manner. And then the Israel spirit of startup and the general spirit of innovation in Israel, which is really very special. And let's say they established to be the second largest startup community all over the world behind just the Silicon Valley.

因此这已经是我们必须在那里的充分理由。当然，以色列还有Kodar Active、Koda数字实验室以及保时捷数字，这三个实验室合作非常紧密，我们甚至考虑过联合办公。那里确实形成了一个创新社区。

So this is already a good reason to be there or a must to be there. And of course, there's also Kodar Active, Koda Digital Lab in Israel, and and also Porsche Digital. And all three labs are collaborating really closely. We even are thinking to collocate also. So this is, of course, a community there.

保时捷APX是个非常开放且专注于早期种子阶段的孵化器。据我所知，他们主要投资早期初创企业，但更重要的是为这些被投企业提供资源支持，帮助它们与保时捷和Axle Springer公司共同开展概念验证和规模化项目。这正是早期初创企业所需的，因为它们通常缺乏独立实施概念验证的基础设施，往往还需要商业咨询等方面的支持。

And the Porsche APX is this is a very open and very early phase, early seed incubator somehow. So they are at first investing, as far as I know, in early seed companies, but mainly they provide those portfolio companies access to the resources or to perform their POCs and scale up projects together with Porsche and Axle Springer company. And this is exactly what an early seed company needs because they don't have the infrastructure normally to perform those POCs. They often also need help in terms of consulting or in business aspects. And this is what they provide to my knowledge.

这是个非常棒的模式，与巴塞罗那SEAT的做法很相似——他们也是基于挑战赛筛选企业，首批就有7家公司获得了包括指导、工作坊资源和项目资金在内的全方位支持。这种早期孵化活动完美融合了创业精神与企业资源。

And this is a very good idea. Yeah. It's very similar to the approach also of the SEAT activity in Barcelona, where they also, this is based on challenges they perform and then they select a certain number of companies. I think in the first cohort, it was seven companies who have been awarded to get them the support to be also coached, to get access to the workshops and to get also certain funding for their early seed projects. So this is an early seed activity which brings startup spirit and corporate spirit together.

一方面它能激发企业活力，另一方面也为初创企业提供了早期支持。

It's inspiring the corporate on the one hand, and it's also supporting, in a way, in a very early phase.

因此，当你将保时捷APX与ArcherSpring结合并启动不同销售时，我主要关注早期加速阶段，而Connect以及Scoda的数字实验室则主要聚焦于现今所称的风险客户，主要是纯粹的。谢谢。最佳技术然后将其推向。是的。进入领域。

So when you then Porsche APX together with ArcherSpring and start for different sales, I mostly focus on early stage acceleration while Connect as well as the digital lab of Scoda mostly focused on what today is called the venture client, mostly pure Yeah. Thank you. Best technologies and then bring it to the Yeah. Yeah. Into the sphere.

其他常见于不同开放式创新工具中的组成部分是投资。加速器会进行小型早期投资，但据我所知，大众集团已投资设立了一个3亿欧元的基金，专注于脱碳技术。你能为我们介绍一下吗？

The other component of typically among the different open innovation tools are investments. Again, the accelerators are doing small early stage investments, but as far as I know, there is a 300,000,000 fund that Volkswagen as a group has invested with a focus on decarbonization. Can you tell us something about that?

是的，目前正处于最终启动阶段，我们计划在本季度末准备好进行投资。这将是一个完全独立的CBC结构，独立性体现在我们不以集团名义控制或管理它。这个独立架构需要快速做出特定投资决策，但他们将获得集团的强力支持，包括我们提供的全球侦察网络、评估公司的专业能力与AI工具，以及技术相关性与可行性的评估。这些仅作为咨询建议供他们参考采纳。

Yeah, this is in the final stage of launch at the moment, so we plan to be ready for investment to the end of this quarter. So this will be a completely independent CBC structure, independent in that regard, that we don't control and don't govern it on behalf of our group. So this has to be an independent preconstruction to take quick decisions on certain investments, but they will get strong support from group in a way that we provide them our scouting network all over the world. We provide them our competency and AI tools to evaluate companies, to also evaluate the relevance of technologies, the feasibility of technologies. And this is just as a consulting input for them, which they can take or leave it.

当基金中有投资组合公司时，我们会尝试在集团内寻找合作伙伴，因为业务伙伴能支持初创企业获得规模化项目，将其与大众集团作为潜在技术客户对接，这将为它们提供强劲的增长支持。同时这种方式也有望推动价值倍数提升。这是我们目前的策略、主题及范围。内容上，这是我们首个专注于脱碳技术的基金。

When we have portfolio companies in the fund, then we try to find partners within the group, because having a business partner who supports the startup to get a scale up project to connect the startup with Volkswagen as a potential customer of this technology, there would be a strong growth support for them. And also in that way also would drive the multiple of the value, hopefully. This would be so far our recipe and the topics and the scope. Content wise, it's a bit of our first fund limited to decarbonization technologies, yes.

并且要

And to have a

明确聚焦范围，不设具体目标区域。

clear focus and do not have a clear target area for that.

所以该基金将保持独立。这是近期许多企业设立独立企业风投基金的普遍趋势。再次强调，作为唯一有限合伙人或也可能

So the fund will be independent. It is a pretty common recent trend for many corporates to have a separate independent corporate venture capital fund. Again, be the only LP or there will be also

不，我们也对其他有限合伙人开放。我们将先进行一次封闭，然后是第二次封闭。因此我们非常有信心，通过纳入更多有限合伙人，可以大幅扩大规模。

No, we are open also to other LPs. We will have a first closing and then a second closing. And so we are quite confident that we can also enlarge the volume quite a lot by including additional LPs here.

这是另一个重要区别，因为许多企业都有独立的载体，最终它们仍会留在

This is another strong differentiator because many corporates have a separate vehicle, at the end they remain into the

是的，我认为这很重要，因为它为整个故事带来了一些更基础的东西，可以说，让我们对所投资主题的评估更加完善。所以不仅仅是我们的意见在那里起作用。我们还需要站出来，可能也要让财务LP满意。这对我们也是挑战。

the Yeah. I think that's important because also it brings a little bit more, let's say, fundamental into the whole story, a better degree of valuation of the topics which we invest in there. So it's not only our opinion which counts there. We have also to stand up to maybe and also just in financial LP provide him or make him satisfied. And this is also challenging us.

我认为这增加了我们的机会，因为我们当然没有忘记我们是这个领域的新手。我们每天都在进步。所以认为我们一开始就能非常成功未免太过雄心勃勃。因此，如果集团内有其他有限合伙人（数量不过多），当然有助于整个故事最终取得成功。

And I think increasing the chances or the opportunities which we have, because of course we do not forget that we are newcomers in that field. And we are making daily steps in a way. So it would be too ambitious to think that we would be really successful from the first minute. So to have other LPs within our group, if there are not too many, would of course help the whole story to be successful at the end of the day.

确实，开放式创新讨论中有一个热点话题，就是企业风险投资的正确模式。最新趋势是将这种载体独立出来，因为它们希望保持独立性。显然，独立载体应该有自己的目标，这些目标通常更偏向财务而非战略。这最终引出一个问题：如果我是大公司并有投资部门，它应该是战略性的还是财务性的？因为无论基金规模如何，财务结果都是特定的，可以说对公司的损益表影响不大，无论表现多么出色。

Yeah, there is actually a very hot topic in the open innovation debates, again, is the right model for corporate venture capital. The most emerging trend is to having this vehicle separate because they want to be independent. Obviously, a separate vehicle, it's supposed to have their own goals, that typically are more financial rather than strategic. And that's at the end pose the question is, if I'm a big company and I have an investment harm, it should be strategic or financial, because at the end, whatever is the size of the fund, the financial results are particular, and let's say are not material for the P and L of the company, whatever they are. So if you are performing greatly.

所以真正的价值在于战略层面。

So the real value is the strategic one.

我认为原因在于，如果它是战略性的，那么从财务角度来看也会成功。因为如果符合我们的战略，我们就有能力支持他们。那么我们可能成为这项技术的潜在客户。当然，从财务角度来看也会成功。所以在我们看来，前者是后者的前提条件。

I think the reason that this or the if it is strategic, it will be also successful from a from a financial point of view. Because if it fits to our strategy, then we are in a position to support them. And then we could be potential customers of this technology. And of course, then it will be also successful from a financial point of view. So the one is the pre decision or the prerequisite for the other, from our point of view.

确实，战略永远不应成为做出糟糕财务决策的借口。这通常是在十二月才会有的说法。但话说回来，这正是当前热议的话题，要精准把握形势以确定完美模式确实困难。不过我们注意到，许多企业正试图让CBC（企业创投）与传统合作模式保持更大距离。值得一提的是，做出这种选择的领军企业大多来自德国，这相当耐人寻味。

Yeah, strategy is never a good reason to make poor financial decisions. This is typically the way of saying, typically in December. But again, this is the big debate, and it's difficult to align the sand exactly to understand which is the perfect model. But again, we've seen that many, many corporates are trying to keep the CBC a bit more far than most of the traditional cooperative has kept. And by the way, it's pretty bizarre that most of the leading company that have done such a choice are German companies.

想想西门子的Next47，SAP的蓝宝石计划，现在还有大众汽车。这说明德国企业在保持CRM（客户关系管理）与企业核心决策圈距离方面，确实形成了独特的运作轨迹。不过我认为这种模式其实相当...

Think about Siemens with Next forty seven, think about SAP with Sapphire, now also Volkswagen. So that means that substantially it's quite a track record German company and try to keep the CRM a bit more far from the corporate epicentrum than most of the other corporates are doing. But I believe that is quite No,

这是保持决策敏捷快速的唯一途径。否则每个投资决策都要经过监事会审批，效率会大幅降低。所以必须保持非管控状态。在我看来，企业创投面临的最大障碍是如何将这些公司纳入我们的企业体系，也就是开展实质性业务合作。

the only way to keep it agile and quick in their decisions. Otherwise, you would have to consolidate each investment decision in the supervisory board, and this would slow down everything dramatically. So this has to be non controlled, of course. And the biggest hurdle for those CVCs, from my point of view and what the feedback we got, is to onboard those companies into our corporate. So to launch the business with those companies.

但无论如何，若能成功将外部公司纳入企业体系，从基金本质而言，就会产生内生动力去寻找那些成功概率最高的投资机会。

But in any case, if one is successful to onboard a company in the corporate, the value and from this point of view, there would be an intrinsic motivation of the fund itself to find those companies where the chances or the opportunities would be best to be successful in that regard.

归根结底，关键在于整合——既要整合内部创新，也要将外部创新引入组织。通常存在许多障碍和阻力，比如'非我发明'综合症，这恰恰让工作既充满挑战又引人入胜。因为要突破这些根植于文化的壁垒确实困难。你们遇到过哪些棘手挑战？如何应对？有什么经验可以分享？

Yeah, at the end, that matters is integration, integrating innovation inside the organization and integrating innovation from outside, inside the organization. Typically there is a lot of, let's say, barriers, resistance, not invented here syndrome, and that's again, it is the part that makes the work so hard and so fascinating, because again, to go through these barriers that are cemented in culture is so difficult. So what have been the most difficult challenges you have faced? How you try to get around them? What are your recipes here?

就创新领域而言？这个问题很难一概而论。让创新成果以合适的成熟度落地，并转移到预开发和正式部门始终是个挑战。由于这种'非我发明'心理的存在，本该接收创新的部门——比如从我们部门——往往会提出无数质疑：这个验证过了吗？

In general, in terms of innovation? Well, it's hard to say. Of course, it is always a challenge to land innovations with the right maturity and to transfer them into the pre development and serious departments. So it is especially due to this non invented syndrome, it is common, let's say a common phenomenon that those departments who should overtake innovations from, for instance, from my department, ask many, many questions. Is this already checked?

那个测试了吗？对预开发部门而言，在流程中短暂的阶段（通常仅一年）内达到合适成熟度是巨大挑战。他们必须在一年内确定合适供应商，完成最终规格制定，还要为目标研发项目争取资源承诺。

Is this checked? Is that checked? And it is a hard challenge for the predevelopment departments gain this the right maturity within the short phase of their part of the process. In many cases, it's just one year. And within one year, they have find the right supplier, they have to have a final spec for the whole thing, and they have to find a target commitment for a serious development project?

这意味着像我们这样的创新部门需要学会提供更成熟的方案，以便将其转移至前期开发部门，使他们更容易接手。我认为这是我们在过去几年中学到的一点。在创新和产品上市速度至关重要的背景下，我们面临着激烈的竞争，特别是在当前的中国市场，因此我们必须加快步伐。这意味着我们需要稍微缩小关注范围，不要看得太远——虽然对创新者来说展望2050年很方便（因为无需证明所有事情），但更应聚焦于未来几年，比如2027至2030年这个阶段。这正是需要我们亲手耕耘的时期。

This means that an innovation unit like ours has to learn to provide more maturity to transfer it to those pre development departments to make it more easy for them to overtake it. I think this is something which we learned during the last years. And as speed is everything in the context of innovation and time to market, and we are exposed to a severe competition, especially in China at the moment, so we have to speed up. And that means that we have to shorten a little bit our focus, not looking too far, which is convenient for innovators to look towards 2050, which is very convenient because you don't have to prove everything, rather than to focus on the next few years, let's say the phase of 2027 towards 2030. So this is the phase where we have our labors in our hands.

我们需要衡量或追踪的是：2027年后出现的创新成果中，有多少是源于我们创新部门的贡献。这就是我们现在必须加速推进的工作，也意味着要提升成熟度。另一方面，我们当然不能错过那些突破性创新——这是硬币的另一面。因此我们需要保持约25%预算的自由度，但不应询问品牌方或客户资金用途。这属于我们的自主决策权，比如可以押注量子计算或核聚变等可能带来重大突破的领域。

And what we are, or should be, measured or tracked about is which part of the innovations which we will see from 2027 onwards will be there because our innovation unit put their contribution to it. So this is what we have to do to speed up now, and this means to gain more maturity. And on other hand, of course, we shouldn't have missed all these breakthrough innovations, which is the other end of the story. So we have to keep a certain degree of freedom, which should be about 25% of our budget, but we should not ask the brands or customers what we should do with the money. So this is to our own competency to say, okay, there's quantum computing, for instance, which is the next breakthrough thing or fusion energy or whatever, which will be the next big step.

当然，我们还需要为此保留自由的资源空间。这一点也获得了我们...

And this is of course something which we have also to have the free resources and to keep the free resources for that. And this is also appreciated by our

是的，我认为你刚才提到了两个非常关键的点。首先是外部集成创新的主要障碍之一就是成熟度问题。根据我们的具体经验，针对未来几年业务线需求的解决方案必须是可部署级别的成熟方案。因此他们更关注成长型企业而非初创公司，这使得整合工作虽不轻松但更可控——正如你多数同事所言，初创公司往往过度承诺，当把他们引荐给工程师时，后者立刻能识别出那些不切实际的说辞。

Yeah, I think you touched two very relevant points in what you just said. First of all, that one of the big barriers in integrated innovation from outside is the level of maturity. And based on our experiences specifically, for solutions that are supposed to solve needs coming from the business line, the business unit in the next few years, they have to be mature solutions that are deployment grade. And so they're talking about mostly scale ups rather than startups, mature companies. And that makes the integration effort not easy, but definitely more manageable, because one of the things that most of your colleagues tell me is yes, sometimes startups tend to oversell too much, and when I put the startups in front of my engineers, they perceive immediately the BS word, a mile of distance.

正如EMEA所说，那行不通。你需要提供的是可直接部署的可靠方案。这是业务的一方面。另一方面，显然还需要考虑大众集团2027年乃至2040、2035、2050年的规划，这要求具备前瞻视野来测试创新——前者（近期需求）最适合采用风险客户模式，因其能交付真实的概念验证并规模化部署成熟方案；而风险构建、企业风投等工具，以及我们在前哨基地的布局和对多元趋势的把握，都是帮助塑造长期视野、协助高层制定未来战略的关键要素。

EMEA said, that's not work. So you need to give them something that is deployment ready and solid. And this is one side of the business. On the other hand, obviously you need to just to think about Volkswagen 2027, also 2040, 2035, 2050, and that requires also some ability to be forward looking to test innovation and probably requires different tools for the first one, the venture client is the ideal tool, because it's able to deliver true POCs, test innovation, and then deploy most with scales, mostly mature solution, while other tools like Venture Builder, Corporate Venture Capital, we just mentioned. The presence in the Outposts and stability to all the different trends are the ingredients that help you to educate your long term site and from you helping your top management to educate the children about the future strategy.

因此保持这种平衡至关重要。完全同意。

So this is the right balance that needs to be kept. Absolutely.

这正是你们工作中最有趣也最具挑战性的部分。确实如此——既能处理短期议题产生实际产品影响，又能统筹战略展望与未来趋势研究，将所有这些要素融合贯通，实在令人振奋。

And that is the fun and the hardest of the job that you're doing. Absolutely. So it's big fun to have this width of activities and to have this short term topics and to generate really product impact. On the other hand, to have all these strategic outlooks and future research and trend research topics and to bring all these things together. This is really, really exciting.

既刺激又有趣。最后说点积极的，我要告诉Grape Wines（葡萄美酒）公司，你是个了不起的歌手。

Exciting and interesting. Just to close with a positive note, I order to the Grape Wines that you are a great singer.

太好了，我

Great, I

那这份热情呢？

What about this passion?

是的，这确实是我的热情所在。我接受过相当专业的声乐艺术教育，在舞台上担任独唱演员，参与歌剧演出、歌剧节，还有清唱剧音乐会和合唱等等。所以这确实是我业余时间的热情所在。

Yeah, this thing is really my passion. I've got quite an education in the vocal arts, and I'm acting as a soloist on stage, on opera, at opera festivals, and also oratoria concerts and charts and so So this is my passion during my free time, yes.

恭喜你。顺便说下，我正在做一个关于开放式创新角色的系列访谈，采访那些从事这种新型工作模式的人。这种工作没有特定的准备路径。访谈的一个发现是，这些从业者背景五花八门，包括人文背景、艺术背景等等。现在我又要加入一位歌手——显然具有音乐背景的受访者。这说明这可能是种新兴职业，需要融合多种技能才能找到解决方案。

So congratulations. By the way, I'm running a specific series of interviews, interviewing people doing the role of open innovation. That is a new work kind of work, so it's not a specific preparation. And one of the outcomes of these interviews is that most of these people are coming from all the possible different backgrounds, including humanistic background, including art background, and so on. Now I have also a singer with definitely a musician background to add to my collection of That means that probably it's an emerging profession that requires a lot of different skills that need to be passed together in order to find solutions.

顺便说，这和你日常工作的性质很接近——平衡不同需求、不同技能。你需要懂技术、懂商业、懂战略、懂政治，然后把它们融合起来。

And by the way, it's pretty close to the work that you've been doing every day, to balance different needs, different skills. You need to understand technology, you need to understand business, you need to understand strategy, you need to understand politics, mix them together.

没错，你需要对一切保持好奇心，不能在某一个领域钻得太深，否则就会失去对新领域的好奇心。

Yeah, you need to stay curious about everything, and you should not be a specialist very deeply in a certain subject, because then you lose your curiosity to the new subject.

太棒了。那么，尼古拉，非常感谢你抽出时间。祝你新的事业顺利，继续保持热情。也感谢这次对话，我们一定会保持联系，获取你们的最新动态。

That's perfect. So, Nikolay, thank you so much for your time. All the best for your new endeavors and for your continued passion. And thank you for this conversation. We definitely stay in touch for getting updates about you guys.

谢谢。

Thank you.

非常感谢你，阿尔贝托。与你交谈真是非常愉快。

Thank you so much, Alberto. It was really a pleasure talking to you.

感谢大家的收听。在下一期的《开放式创新对话》中，Mind the Bridge的首席执行官马尔科·马里乌奇将与弗朗西斯科·斯托拉奇对话。弗朗西斯科曾担任Enel集团首席执行官长达九年。我认为这将是一个绝佳的机会，深入了解他在大型能源公司长期推动创新的经验。如果你喜欢这个播客，请访问Mind the Bridge的LinkedIn页面，告诉我们你的想法。

Thank everybody for listening. In the next episode of the Open Innovation Talks, Mind the Bridge CEO, Marco Mariucci, will talk with Francesco Storace. Francesco has been the CEO of Enel Group for nine years. So I think it will be an amazing opportunity to deep dive the experience of Osceo driving innovation in a large energy company for a large period of time. If you like this podcast, please go to Mind the Bridge LinkedIn page and tell us what you make of it.

期待听到你们的反馈。下周见。

Love to hear from you. See you next week.

感谢大家今天的参与，我们下期《开放式创新对话》再见，Mind the Bridge将与行业领袖继续对话。

Thank you for being with us today and see you in the next episode of Open Innovation Talks Mind the Bridge chat with industry leaders.