MI Summit 2013 - London: Disruptors, Innovators and Entrepreneurs

Disruptors Panel: Key Insights on Innovation, Data, and Market Transformation

• Jeff McGrath (McLaren Applied Technologies)

  • Applies Formula One engineering "win-at-all-costs" mindsets and perfectionism to data, health, and industrial sectors.
  • Defines innovation as the creation of adopted value rather than just technical ideas, requiring a marriage of creative visionaries and technical execution.
  • Operates from a "surgical" environment in Woking where extreme pressure and peer accountability drive continuous performance improvement.
  • Expands globally by partnering with pioneers and visionaries in the U.K., Asia, and the U.S. to co-create solutions.

• Ryan Kavanaugh (Relativity Media)

  • Transformed the film industry from a 100-year-old "venture capital" model (high risk, low success rate) into a "real estate" model (predictable leasing and asset management).
  • Executed 117 international partnerships over three years, offering local distributors full film slates to eliminate production risk before a single dollar is spent.
  • Reduced the distribution workforce from hundreds to 22 employees by utilizing high-quality relationships to book theaters and collect revenue more efficiently than legacy studios.
  • Shifted development spending from $110–$120 million annually to $4 million, achieving a 96% development-to-production ratio by acquiring rights only when a project is greenlit.
  • Utilizes rigorous Monte Carlo simulations and AI-driven regression models to predict movie success, yet retains a "rejection model" where projects with positive financials must still meet creative standards.
  • Acknowledges that data models can fail, citing Movie 43 (which missed targets despite high celebrity counts) and 300 (which passed models initially but became a massive hit via "gut" instinct).

• Saad Mohseni (Mobi Group)

  • Built a regional media empire reaching 100 million+ daily users across volatile markets (Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan, Iraq) despite terrorism, corruption, and government opposition.
  • Treats high-risk markets like "junk bonds," diversifying portfolio to ensure profitability even if specific regions fail.
  • Successfully adapts Western formats (e.g., The Voice, Deal or No Deal) and global hits (24, Homeland) for local audiences, creating role models in conflict zones.
  • Uses media to hold corrupt institutions accountable, noting that television has replaced the mosque as the primary source of information and social change in the region.
  • Reports that Afghanistan's media market is growing at 50–60% annually, while Pakistan's advertising market grows 15% year-over-year.

• Joe Sorrell (Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation)

  • Sets 2018 as the target year for global polio eradication, focusing on the three remaining difficult countries: Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Northern Nigeria.
  • Highlights that vaccine delivery failures are often due to security and trust issues, specifically citing the CIA's use of fake vaccination programs to locate Osama bin Laden as a catalyst for distrust.
  • Emphasizes the need for local intelligence capabilities to ensure vaccine workers are not targeted by the Taliban.
  • Advocates for a "post-CSR" era where companies integrate community engagement into their bottom-line strategy, particularly in emerging markets.
  • Predicts mobile technology will act as a "vaccine for corruption" by enabling citizens in developing nations to hold governments accountable for health and education spending.

• Nancy Liu (NPLUG Inc. / Nanaly Bioscience)

  • Co-developed a polymer heat-stabilizer for liquid vaccines that eliminates the need for refrigeration (2–8°C), enabling distribution in rural areas without electricity.
  • Originated the project through chance networking during a hackathon, combining her tech background with a biochemistry/MD from MIT.
  • Funded Nanaly Bioscience entirely through grants and awards, avoiding private equity to maintain focus on research and development.
  • Founded NPLUG to deploy advanced digital billboard networks that collect over 200 metrics per second, currently utilizing cell phone pinging to respect privacy while measuring foot traffic.
  • Plans to introduce camera-based audience demographics (gender, age) in the future as consumer comfort with data collection evolves.

Cross-Cutting Themes: Failure, Data, and Barriers

• Failure as a Catalyst

  • Ryan Kavanaugh asserts that entrepreneurs must embrace failure as a primary learning tool, noting that success offers little actionable insight compared to post-mortems on failures.
  • Jeff McGrath contrasts the U.S. culture, where failure is a "badge of honor," with the U.K. tendency to punish first failures, limiting entrepreneurial risk-taking.
  • Saad Mohseni balances clinical data with instinct, recounting how he kept a loss-making entity for 26 months against corporate advice, which finally turned a profit.

• Data Privacy vs. Efficiency

  • Nancy Liu notes a tension between collecting granular consumer data (e.g., identifying if a billboard viewer is male/female) and maintaining consumer trust, opting for non-intrusive methods like cell phone pinging.
  • Joe Sorrell warns that advanced surveillance for disease tracking raises privacy concerns similar to drone technology, though the data is critical for preventing missed vaccinations.
  • Jeff McGrath predicts "meta products" with embedded sensors will revolutionize healthcare by providing predictive intelligence and allowing for real-time product tuning.

• Systemic Barriers and Regional Innovation

  • Panelists identified a growing sense of entitlement and reliance on government support in parts of Europe, contrasting it with the U.S. model of private investment in young entrepreneurs.
  • Nancy Liu suggests that Europe's innovation lag can be solved by channeling private equity into young founders rather than relying on state funding or established blue-chip safety.
  • Saad Mohseni argues that media must educate populations to take ownership of economic and environmental issues to overcome societal complacency.