Philips 2006 Annual Report Download - page 80

Philips Annual Report 200680 Philips Annual Report 200680
New business development
To achieve its growth ambitions, Philips needs to create
new businesses that combine new technologies with
new business models to open up new market spaces.
To speed up this process, Philips has established three
Incubators – dedicated to healthcare, lifestyle and
technology respectively – to help identify new business
opportunities and to help business teams transform
ideas into new business.
Delivering on commitments
In the Annual Report 2005, Corporate Technologies
defi ned a number of key focal areas for 2006 and beyond.
The progress made in these is outlined below.
Developing advanced technologies to create
meaningful innovations
Corporate Technologies contributed to a host of
meaningful innovations in 2006. In healthcare, for
example, these included time-of-fl ight PET, which
is based on advanced solid-state technology and can
enable earlier detection of disease (especially cancer).
Magnetic biosensors are also beginning to deliver on
the promise of fast, sensitive and robust diagnostic
testing, enabling tests in uncontrolled environments,
e.g. in ambulances or emergency situations. And in
lighting, a proprietary discriminating technology for
higher luminance and color control is being developed.
Generating patents
Approximately 1,900 patent applications were fi led
in 2006 to protect Philips’ innovations.
Incubating new businesses
In 2006, the Incubator program, which started in 2002
with the set-up of the Technology Incubator, was expanded
with the Healthcare and Lifestyle Incubators. The Philips
Incubators are separate business units within Corporate
Technologies. To ensure more effective management
of the venture creation pipeline, Bell-Mason staging was
also introduced in 2006, with preceding phases added
in Philips Research. The Bell-Mason Framework is an
early-stage venture development methodology.
“As novel disruptive technologies
and immersive media enable an almost
unlimited spectrum of new product
concepts and services, the problem of
fi nding out which of these innovations
really serve the needs of their users –
the essence of ‘sense and simplicity’ –
imposes a true challenge.”
Prof. Dr Emile Aarts,
Vice President and Scientifi c Program Director, Philips Research
Simplicity is the key to translating advanced technology into human
benefi ts. Some fi ve years ago, Philips Research opened HomeLab,
an experience and application research center supporting multi-
disciplinary teams of researchers and designers studying human-
technology interaction and testing new ambient intelligence concepts.
In October 2006, this approach was extended to the domains
of well-being and retail with the addition of CareLab and ShopLab,
respectively. Together, these three labs constitute the ExperienceLab,
where researchers can work on the creation of compelling, simplicity-
led experiences.
6 Financial highlights 8 Message from the President 14 Our leadership 20 The Philips Group