
Innovation transformation

Process improvement
Developing breakthrough products and services requires a close alignment between an organisation’s processes, structure, systems, tools and – most importantly – its culture.
Our engineers, designers and scientists have a deep understanding of the challenges our clients face in delivering innovation. We incorporate our learnings with insight into our clients’ ‘as is’ ways of working to deliver a pragmatic approach that their teams believe in.

Organising for success
We not only design new processes and systems, we also have the facilitation, training and mentoring expertise to carefully manage and implement cultural as well as organisational change, such as establishing a programme management office (PMO).
We consider the level of technology control, ownership and risk our clients desire and design an approach that empowers them to deliver innovation.
Front-end creativity

Concept generation
Innovation can manifest itself in many different ways. We combine robust generative research and technical excellence with an invigorating and pragmatic approach, to ensure only viable propositions are taken forward.
It’s a fast-paced, streamlined, highly cooperative process designed to orient innovation in the early stages, delivering a considered set of market-driven, technology-robust options for development.

Technology scouting
We balance blue-sky creativity with market pragmatism, customer insight and scientific understanding, searching for and assessing approaches to identify not only the most exciting routes but those with the greatest probability of success.
We’re realistic about technology maturity, cutting through the hype to provide an options appraisal grounded in technical and user insight.

Market relevance
The value of an opportunity is not just a question of technical feasibility, but also commercial viability and desirability to the user.
Our approach is flexible. We identify opportunities for a known technology where our client already understands the segment well or wishes to consider new market applications.
Equally, if a client wants to better understand the market and its stakeholders, or translate insight into technical creativity, we can help bridge the gap, ensuring market relevance and quick realisation.

Architecture & service design
Innovation exists in services as well as products and, in an increasingly connected world, these concepts are often inseparable. Services rely on efficient interoperation between platforms, data and applications in a secure, reliable and scaleable manner.
We ensure that the end-to-end service, and the networks to deliver that service, meet industry best practice and are adaptable to changing demands and expectations.
Experience

We deliver
We have unrivalled experience managing the innovation process and a deep understanding of our clients’ technical and operational concerns and challenges.
Our multi-disciplinary teams address both challenging consumer requirements and critical business needs, assuring continued alignment with the original ambition for the project, whilst maximising speed, innovation and likelihood of success.

Relevance by design
We understand that system performance is only ever as valuable as the experience it delivers and have therefore developed thorough generative research and ethnography tools.
These help us define the key market differentiators that will underpin an overall user experience and design intent, allowing us to match it with the most relevant enabling technologies, be they readily available or in need of breakthrough development.

Beyond incremental
Our processes recognise the value of ‘starting right’. Stakeholder engagement ensures this pivotal support is in place and the innovation objective is clear.
We use a structured decision making process and our proprietary tools to move our clients beyond incremental to capture and nurture step-change ideas.
Interested in joining us?
Tech, tools & facilities

Innovation lab
Dedicated to client workshops and collaborative working, it’s an inspiring and flexible space that adapts to facilitate ideation sessions, problem-solving workshops and design strategy meetings. This is where our project teams and our clients generate concepts, identify new markets for existing technology and develop new business models.
Case studies


Hitachi radical innovation transformation
Hitachi came to us to help transform its innovation capability and shift its R&D activities towards market-driven, breakthrough innovation, drawing on our long and successful track record.

Technology road mapping
Developing a realistic and achievable technology roadmap to deliver real end user value, for a market-leading supplier of photovoltaic panel mounting solutions.
News & insights

Faster-to-market innovation with multi-modal R&D
The world’s most innovative companies do not have the largest R&D teams, they combine their in-house capabilities with a wide range of external resources.
- Innovation management
- Service design
- Strategic advice

The COVID questions – shaping our response for an innovative post-pandemic world
The world is in crisis. Simple, short-term survival is everyone’s top priority, whether that’s as a nation, a government, a business, a family or a lonely and forgotten self-isolating individual. But the overwhelming necessity to endure has always been the mother of invention. Where will the crisis lead us?
- AI & Analytics
- Digital services
- Human factors
- Innovation management
- Strategic advice

Uncovering the next generation of design talent
Congratulations to Loughborough University student Rumyana Dancheva winner of the Cambridge Consultants Prize for Excellence in Consumer Health at the New Designers event in London. Her winning design is a smart autoinjector for people with diabetes, named ‘Level’.

Cambridge Consultants and Iridium continue world-changing partnership as $3 billion space upgrade is completed
Cambridge Consultants has been Iridium’s partner developing core technology for ground-based devices and infrastructure, part of the largest technology upgrade ever to take place in space.
Events

GIANT Health Event
Europe's greatest festival of health tech innovation. The Global Innovation and New Technology Health Event showcases leading health tech from around the world and is accelerating innovation in an inspiring and creative environment.

PDA Universe of Pre-filled Syringes and Injection Devices
During the last decade, PDA’s Universe of Pre-filled Syringes and Injection Devices event has become the must-attend meeting for everyone working in the field, and is now the world’s largest conference on this subject.
We can help you achieve the impossible