General Mills Generates Innovation

We are tremendously encouraged by the success and industry interest weve seen from our G-WIN open innovation program," says Peter Erickson, senior vice president of Innovation, Technology and Quality at General Mills. Not only have we seen a 300 percent increase in the number of innovation concepts submitted to us since we initiated G-WIN, but we are also seeing a higher percentage of high-quality, potentially game-changing technologies with broad application across our businesses.

General Mills believes that the concept of applied open innovation has generated a wide spectrum of collaboration opportunities, everything from applying technologies more effectively to partnering more closely with key suppliers to finding potential new partners in entirely different industries. The company has developed joint ventures, engaged in technology and equity licensing, sourced finished products, and worked to solve technical problems with experts applying concepts to further accelerate the companys own internal innovation efforts.

In its first year, the G-WIN team at General Mills received more than 200 concept submissions. Because of its efforts to drive open innovation, the G-WIN team was able to generate new product introductions, as well as important technology advancements and key industry partnerships. Some highlights include: Fiber One Chewy Bars, Progresso Reduced Sodium soups and Yoplait Go-Gurt Fizzix, to name a few.