Bajaj launched a new first-of-its-kind open innovation platform ‘Innovate and Rise’ to engage with the external ecosystem in driving innovation across Consumer Products and Lighting businesses. Bajaj Electricals aims to partner with individual inventors, academics, designers, research institutions, universities, start-ups and other small, medium, and large companies, and existing and potential new suppliers to ideate and deliver on the company’s most challenging opportunities.
‘Innovate and Rise’ will play an instrumental role for the company in discovering and harnessing business and product ideas across its Consumer Products and Lighting business verticals. The company calls out to external innovators to come up with new product ideas that help solve some of the complex problems faced today and deliver stronger consumer proposition. These challenges have been uploaded on the platform to invite applications with a focused selection criteria depending upon the inventiveness, business relevance, commercial viability, etc. of the innovation. The submissions will be reviewed by an internal committee and the decision will be communicated to the innovators within 3 weeks’ time.
Speaking on the initiative, Anuj Poddar, MD & CEO, Bajaj Electricals Limited said, “The new normal has proven the adage innovate or perish, emphasising how crucial innovation will be as we move forward. Solutions that solve real problems and provide superior proposition to today’s consumers in a manner that is disruptive, economically viable and has scalability potential are the need of the hour. As one of the building blocks of our open culture at Bajaj Electricals Limited, we are keen to partner with the industry and the broader ecosystem to take the power of innovation to every Indian household. This will provide a unique opportunity for the wider community and driven minds to work on real-world opportunities and potentially see their ideas go on to take real shape and presence in the market. Based on the viability of the idea, we will partner the innovator through a mutually agreed contract and commercial terms to further help scale the solution.” Bajaj Electricals is currently actively seeking solutions from external innovators under various categories like kitchen appliances, domestic appliances and fans; and will soon further extend the invite to consumer lighting and luminaire categories as well. Designing mixer grinders for silent operations or inviting innovators for solutions around air coolers that can work effectively in humid conditions or designing silent air coolers, energy conservation in household appliances, easy cleaning of domestic & kitchen appliances are some of the challenges already posted on the platform
