Sustainable Business: Are We Ready to Navigate the Deep Tech Landscape?

The right strategy for sustainability can yield innovation processes and performance – but first we need to take the next leap forward in deep tech investments and embrace collaborative transformations. In other words, the matching and commitment of investments to specific activities such as green transition can yield new growth and opportunities.

Cultivating Sustainability through Collaborative Deep Tech Investments

To rethink how we make and use things, we’ll need to redesign business models, supply chains and materials, ensuring we eliminate waste, circulate products and materials, and biodiversity can thrive.

An emerging trend in the business world is the increasing recognition among companies of the value of deep tech investments for addressing complex problems. These companies are allocating resources to leverage cutting-edge technologies and research to develop innovative solutions that can tackle issues as climate change, floods, security of energy supply, and cybersecurity threats. This shift towards deep tech investments reflects a growing commitment to strategic innovation and the understanding that solving complex problems requires interdisciplinary collaboration and long-term solutions to sustainability.

Deal with the Real Problem – Not its Symptoms

The key to achieving sustainability lies in selecting real, pressing problems to solve, as addressing tangible challenges fosters lasting environmental and social impact.

Once we have identified the problems and solutions we want to sort out, we can determine which approach to innovation makes the most sense. As we think about the future of our business, what problems need solving? Where do new opportunities lie?

The emerging technologies, business models, and strategies for spinning up early-stage, deep tech startups have advanced by orders of magnitude in less than a decade. These startups are reimagining materials, powering green tech innovations, and reinventing industries. Collaborative R&D and innovation can accelerate the transformation of energy, economic and industrial structures, and can enhance real-world problem solving by offering breakthrough solutions.

So how do we engage in the deep tech and innovation ecosystems we need to find a solution to our problem?

A Deep Tech Wave of Innovation: Are We Ready to Get Involved?

It’s easy to see why deep tech startups, corporate giants, and universities in collaboration make sense: it leverages the innovative prowess of deep tech and science entrepreneurs, the market reach of corporate giants, and the cutting-edge talent pool of universities to create a powerful ecosystem that drives technological advancements. By now, we understand that we must create an innovation ecosystem. The next question is how we create it?

Deep tech and Innovation strategies, like all strategies, must start with a “game plan” for a program that can be broken down into small steps and concrete actions. Here's just 7 things, big and small, we could do to support strategic collaboration within R&D and innovation:

1)???? Establish program management for deep tech and innovation: Create dedicated programs or teams that facilitate collaboration between industries, academia, and research institutions to foster a culture of knowledge sharing and joint research.

2)???? Create access to university-industry funding and grants: Offer financial support, grants, and incentives for collaborative R&D and innovation projects, encouraging organizations from different industries to invest in joint innovation efforts.

3)???? Build shared research and test facilities: Develop shared laboratories and testing facilities that can be accessed by deep tech startups, giant corporations, and universities, reducing infrastructure costs, and promoting sustainable innovation.

4)???? Manage IP rights and patents: Establish clear guidelines and agreements for managing intellectual property (IP) rights and patents to encourage open innovation while protecting the interests of all parties involved.

5)???? Create statements for idea challenges: Embrace the innovative nature of hackathons and competitions that bring together different entities to solve specific industry or societal problems collaboratively.

6)???? Employee training and skill development: Offer training programs, workshops, and new educational opportunities that promote interdisciplinary skills and encourage employees to work effectively within cross-sector R&D and innovation teams, bridging the gap between academia, deep tech startups, and corporations.

7)???? Engage in digital platforms and networks: Create digital platforms and networks that facilitate communication and collaboration among stakeholders, making it easier for them to find partners and share research findings.

Deep tech capabilities have spurred a new wave of sustainable solutions to solve the biggest challenges facing our society and planet. There is an absolute limit to our ability as individuals to solve these complex problems. Therefore, new ecosystems, investments, and collaborations are absolutely needed in companies at all sizes. To win, we must a engender a new mindset – one that aims to innovate responsibly and unleash sustainability.