Book language: English. You are ordering the English edition.

Why do some companies consistently manage to shake up the market with innovations, while others, despite their best intentions, seem to be treading water?

The answer is: it's not random. Based on more than 10,000 company analyses from the TOP 100 innovation competition, Nikolaus Franke and Rudolf Dömötör show that innovation does not arise from luck, genius, or ever-larger R&D budgets. It is the result of a system of four interlocking elements: top management & leadership, organization & processes, culture & climate, and external orientation & open innovation.

What innovation leaders do differently
The TOP 100 companies analyzed generate almost half of their sales and profits from innovations of the past three years. For market novelties and innovative improvements, their share of sales is almost six times that of the average mid-sized company, and their long-term performance is more than 300 percent above that of average companies.

What this book offers

• 40+ case studies of innovative companies showing how the principles work in practice
• Benchmarking data on what innovation leaders do differently
• Checklists to systematically develop your own organization's capacity for innovation
• Insights from more than two decades of research, without jargon and without any prior business knowledge required

What this book is not
It is not a theoretical textbook, not a collection of hero stories about brilliant founders, and not an opinion book. The authors are not interested in the myths of successful companies, but in the patterns they share.

Who this book is for
Entrepreneurs, managing directors, board members, and innovation and strategy leaders who don't want to leave innovation to chance but to shape it deliberately, with a solid empirical foundation instead of buzzwords.

About the authors
Prof. Dr. Nikolaus Franke founded the Institute for Entrepreneurship and Innovation at WU Vienna University of Economics and Business in 2001 and has headed it ever since. As academic director of the TOP 100 innovation competition, he oversaw the analysis of more than 10,000 mid-sized companies.
Dr. Rudolf Dömötör is director of the WU Entrepreneurship Center and managing director of WU Ignite Ventures. Together with Nikolaus Franke, he developed the analysis instrument of the TOP 100 competition.