MILWAUKEE’S IDEAWAKE HELPS BIG COMPANIES INNOVATE
4 Fortune 500 firms use its software, resources
In Coby Skonord’s world, a startup company is like a speedboat. A Fortune 500 company is a cruise ship.
Each has its advantages: Speedboats are fast and nimble. Cruise ships are packed with amenities, well-trained workforces and lots of customers. Each ought to be able to learn from the other.
That’s where Skonord’s company, Ideawake, comes in.
Ideawake, a 4-year-old Milwaukee company, provides software and online resources that allow big companies to tap the knowledge and creativity of their employees so they can innovate and grow like a startup.
In the language of today’s startup world, it’s a way for established companies to take advantage of “crowd sourcing” among their employees.
“The ones closest to the process will have the best ideas,” Skonord said. “They have untapped knowledge that upper management wouldn’t have.”
The Ideawake platform already has been adopted by four Fortune 500 companies, and Skonord says it’s “growing really rapidly.” He hopes the company can quintuple in size in 2018.
Ideawake itself is participating in the fall program of gener8tor, the Milwaukee-based, nationally ranked accelerator that provides young companies with advice, training and other resources to help them succeed.
The growth of Ideawake comes as mainstay corporations in Milwaukee are increasingly taking part in the area’s startup scene.
An example: Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Co. and Aurora Health Care recently announced they are starting venture funds to invest in Milwaukee startups. Each company is committing $5 million and will focus on technology-based startups.
Also, the Green Bay Packers and Microsoft are teaming up on TitletownTech, a partnership to advance technology and innovation. The partnership has initiatives to start an accelerator, a venture fund and other projects. And that’s just in the past month. “Companies are so much more open and willing to work with startups than even a few years ago,” Skonord said. “And (those partnerships) will be the engine to more startup activity in the upcoming months and years.”
Change agent
Skonord may be an unlikely person to help large companies modify their approaches to growth and change, because he’s never really worked for one. After graduating from the University of WisconsinWhitewater with degrees in accounting and finance, he went to work at Ernst & Young’s Milwaukee office — but then turned in his two weeks notice on the day he started.
Ideawake’s platform was originally designed to be useful for inventors and the general public. After Skonord got inquiries from several corporate leaders, however, he realized enterprises could use it — and such applications could be far more lucrative.
Nearly two years ago, Skonord met Mike Rodgers from Aurora Health Care at a technology summit. Rodgers was the Milwaukee-based company’s new director of strategic innovation, and that meeting led to Aurora and Ideawake working together to customize the platform for the health care provider.
Rodgers said Aurora was looking for a way to empower caregivers to define and solve problems to deliver the best patient care possible.
“We know that caregivers see, feel and experience problems on the front lines that no one off of the team would ever be able to recognize,” Rodgers said.
Aurora’s network has more than 33,000 caregivers.
The company started sharing “challenges” on the platform nine months ago and is early in the development stages for a few ideas conceived through Ideawake.
Skonord said the product’s value is really seen in companies with more than 250 employees. For companies with large or dispersed workforces, Ideawake enables the employees to voice ideas that may otherwise go unheard.
Ideawake’s clients are looking to answer questions such as, “How can we disrupt ourselves with technology?” The idea: Capture the innovative thinking so often found in startups for the corporate environment.
The Ideawake platform has had a hand in the development of more than 400 products in two years.
The platform is now used in 118 cities in 22 countries. About half of the challenges companies post, seeking ideas from their workers, ask about continuous improvement.
From Skonord’s perspective, his startup, with just five employees, brings speed and nimbleness to the table. The company has raised $1.2 million to support its growth.
“It’s a symbiotic relationship when you find the right partner,” he said.
Agility is key
For Aurora and many companies, engaging with startups helps them meet enterprise goals.
“We need to be more agile as a company,” Rodgers said, noting that an organization as large as Aurora — Wisconsin’s largest health care system — needs input not only from its own employees but also from outsiders. In addition to Ideawake, Aurora also is working with a Brookfield startup, EmOpti, that came to the company with an idea on a piece of paper that now is helping cut wait times in Aurora’s emergency departments.
“We don’t think everything will be solved here,” he said. “There is no reason why we should think that we have to invent it here. That ‘we don’t have to invent it here’ mentality is manifesting itself in all industries. We need to look internally and externally at the same time.”
The startup mind-set will be on full display starting Monday as Milwaukee Startup Week gets underway.
Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Co., for instance, will be pitching its business problems to entrepreneurs who will, the company hopes, deliver solutions. The Milwaukee insurer, a lead sponsor for the event, acquired an online financial planning startup, LearnVest, in 2015.
In addition to a $5 million fund it recently started for local startups, the company has a $50 million fund, the Northwestern Mutual Future Ventures Fund.
“There’s no way one company can do it all themselves,” said Craig Schedler, venture partner with Northwestern Mutual Future Ventures. “Forward-thinking companies are looking at startups as a way to increase reach.”
In its first year, Northwestern Mutual Future Ventures has made investments in six early-stage companies.
The idea is for the 100-year-old company to be more than a source of capital. Ultimately, Northwestern Mutual wants to leverage the technology from the startups to offer new, digital ways for its clients to interact with their finances.
Schedler has noticed how innovations that start out as seemingly removed from his own business can quickly start to evolve and be applied to financial services.
“The pace of change is so great that no one company can stay on top of all the aspects that are changing in their business,” Schedler said.