Ideas
Explore the world's #1 largest database of ideas and innovations, with 460,503 inspiring examples.
Trend Reports
Discover why 1,240 brands rely on our AI-powered Trend Reports to get better, faster insights.
Newsletter
Join 321,097 subscribers who rely on our weekly newsletter to keep up with need-to-know trends and insights.
How to Hunt
Learn more about how to hunt megatrends, ideas, patterns and opportunity.
Consumer Insights
Uncover major shifts and emerging opportunities with our exclusive PRO research.
Trend Reports
Discover why 1,240 brands rely on our AI-powered Trend Reports to get better, faster insights.
Newsletter
Join 321,097 subscribers who rely on our weekly newsletter to keep up with need-to-know trends and insights.
How to Hunt
Learn more about how to hunt megatrends, ideas, patterns and opportunity.
Advisory & Services
Accelerate innovation and ignite disruptive thinking with our award-winning programs and research.
Trend Reports
Get fast, customized trend reports, presentations and deep dives 20x faster than traditional research.
Plans
Get started today with a free consultation, our self-serve tools, or a dedicated program.
Articles & Magazine
Get inspired with our 4,210 innovation strategy articles, keynote, videos and innovation tools.
Innovation Awards
Trend Hunter’s Innovation Strategy Awards recognize the best innovation tactics gathered from our interviews with some of the world's most notable business leaders, authors and change makers.
Advisory & Services
Accelerate innovation and ignite disruptive thinking with our award-winning programs and research.
Innovation Assessment
Enhance your innovation potential with a deeper understanding of your unique innovation archetype and how your organization benchmarks.
FuturistU
Prepare for the years ahead with 100+ lessons, tactics, tools and frameworks with our full learning database.
Innovation Books
Join 20,000,000 people getting better and faster with our New York Times Bestselling books and keynote videos.
Jeremy Gutsche
Ignite your event or virtual event with our CEO, a NY Times Bestselling Author and one of the top innovation keynote speakers.
Our Team of Speakers & Virtual Presenters
Inspire your group with our most popular speakers on innovation, trends, change and futurism.
Custom Training & Events
Bring the Future Festival experience directly to your team or co-hosted custom event.
Custom Masterclasses
Join the world's leading brands who leverage our custom programs to accelerate innovation.
FuturistU 5-Day Program
Become a Futurist with our immersive 5-Day program at Future Festival World Summit.
Online eLearning
Learn the fundamentals of futurism and trends with 100+ online courses about innovation.
How to Hunt
Learn more about how to hunt megatrends, ideas, patterns and opportunity.
Contact
Get in touch to learn more, ask a question or submit a tip.
About Us
Learn more about Trend Hunter and how we accelerate innovation.
Follow-Us
Join our 3,500,000 social media followers, on the cutting edge.
How to Hunt
Learn more about how to hunt megatrends, ideas, patterns and opportunity.
FAQ
Get answers to common questions about Trend Hunter.
Community
Stay on the cutting-edge with the help of the Trend Hunter community.
Team
Meet the team trusted by hundreds of leading businesses worldwide.
Jobs
Find opportunities to accelerate your career with the #1 Trend Firm.
News
Catch up on noteworthy Trend Hunter news and media mentions.
Join
Build a portfolio and put your trend-spotting abilities to the test.
Advertising
Supercharge your marketing by partnering with Trend Hunter.
Portfolio
Visit your public portfolio and browse your past articles.
Add a Trend
Write up an article and showcase your trend-spotting skills.
My Trends
Edit your articles and see how they stack up on the leaderboards.
Settings
Edit your profile, connect your social media accounts, and more.
Add a trend, customize your dashboard, or track topics.
Future Festival
Innovation Events
Join the world's top innovators at our in person events.
Free Webinars
Learn to innovate through chaos, navigate the new normal and maintain work culture from home.
Custom Training & Events
Bring the Future Festival experience directly to your team or co-hosted custom event.
Search our database of 460,503 cutting edge ideas.

Staying On Top of Innovation

Gerrit Smit, SVP R&D, Valio
Dylan Morton
July 8th, 2015

Related Trend Reports

Branding, Drinking, Food, Marketing
Not only is Valio the largest Dairy supplier in Finland, but it also one of the largest companies. Established in 1905, the company is renowned for producing milk and dairy products, including butter and yogurt. Valio employs over 4,600 people, and raked in over $2 billion in revenue in 2014. Valio isn’t just successful in Finland – it is also successful in the international markets, which accounts for over one-third of Valio’s net revenue. However, current closure of the borders with Russia creates big challenges for Valio at the moment. Gerrit Smit has been with Valio for over four years now. He is responsible for leading the development teams and research for long term products. He closely interacts with the business groups involved with Valio, the next generation of new products, and how they should be developed. He also challenges new projects and products, and how to position them in the market.

4 questions with Gerrit:

1. What makes an innovative culture? How do you create a culture of innovation?

An innovative culture requires bringing in new innovations to the market and to be able to do it way ahead of the crowd. We can create these new findings while we also reach out to the different areas around the world. At Valio, we have a better innovative culture than many dairy companies. We are actively looking into areas that others are not. We are seeing that we are leading the development of many things coming out of the dairy industry. This culture is cultivated…we love to innovate, and compared to most other dairy companies, we spend more on research and development.

2. What is the biggest challenge you face when innovating?

One of the biggest challenges we seem to face is trying to find the white areas where we see new potential, but because of our innovative nature, we are unsure. What areas will give us this new potential and what new things are popping up around the world? Another question we often face is if we can even act on these developments – can we create them to be sold? This is always a challenge, finding the new hot-spots and what can give us a new line of revenue.

3. How do you find inspiration or ideas from adjacent industries? Or do you focus only on your category?

We most definitely look at other companies…we look for new innovations all together with different industries as well. We are looking to see if elements from other industries can be applied to our own business. I firmly believe that you must look outside your own industry to get inspired. Also, looking at different countries and the products flourishing in those areas. Can we learn from those for our own market?

4. Looking to the future, how is Valio going to be a leader in innovation?

In order to stay on top, I think we need to stay focused on a couple of key areas and technologies that we want to develop further. You must build up starting from your core strengths and connect to outside the organization for complementary strengths. We are always asking ourselves where we want to be in a couple of years – in what area do we feel we can make a difference. Sometimes we have to trust this gut feeling that we have that you just cannot explain. We have the culture to do this as well… we invest in tech even in its earliest stages. If it fits our core, we will definitely look into it.
References: valio, linkedin