Meet Catarina Cruz, one of Open Ecosystem Network’s community leads at Nokia
Hi Catarina! If you had to explain what Open Ecosystem Network (OpEN) is to a 12-year-old, what would you say?
“I’d say it’s like a big, virtual playground or classroom where you can meet friends, both old and new. Some of the other kids might come from other schools, other neighbourhoods and even other countries.
In this classroom you can find friends with the same interests and share information with them, for school projects or just for fun.”
Matching Open Ecosystem Network challenges and potential solutions
You are one of Open Ecosystem Network’s community leads. What do you do, exactly?
“I’m a matchmaker: I bring together people with problems and people with potential solutions.
On one hand I help OpEN’s company partners to articulate their innovation and business needs and to work them into problem statements that can be published as challenges on OpEN. On the other hand, I search for interesting companies and individuals that might have fresh perspectives on how to fulfil those needs.”
Where do you find the potential companies?
“I do quite a bit of desktop research, but I also visit various events in Germany to build relationships with the startup scene and different incubators. This is partly to facilitate matchmaking, and partly to take learnings and fresh breaths of air from the outside world to inside Nokia.
While screening the market for challenge participants, I try to strike the right balance between companies of different sizes and maturity levels. I find that the more digital things get, the more value even the smallest companies can bring.”
“All new ideas don’t have to come from new kids on the block”
What is the most common misconception about OpEN that you often need to set straight?
“I like to remind people that OpEN is not just for startups.
Yes, it’s a platform for exploring and expanding the business ecosystem of an industry, and the goal is to find new ways of thinking and doing. But this doesn’t mean that all new ideas have to come from new kids on the block. Established companies and e.g. Nokia’s existing partners are more than welcome to join as well!
I think that for our existing partners, OpEN can be a great opportunity to show a new side of themselves. Sometimes the official procurement processes tend to pigeon-hole suppliers in a way that prevents the partnership from extending to new areas.”
The challenge of opening up – the more you share, the more you get?
Open innovation is the fundamental idea behind Open Ecosystem Network. Telecommunications is a patent-dependent industry, and that tends to come with strict attitudes towards trade secrets and intellectual property protection. How hard is it to plug the open innovation mantra in an environment like this?
“It’s true that people inside Nokia and the industry in general are typically afraid of sharing secrets with the competition.
Startups have an entirely different attitude towards openness. In that world, people believe that the more they share, the more value there will be for everyone in the end. I think that’s what the future will look like for bigger companies like Nokia as well.
I don’t think that Nokia is going to start handing out entire roadmaps or product breakdowns right away, but there’s certainly something in between the extremes of absolute secrecy and absolute openness that we can do. At least that’s the spirit we’re trying to evoke here at Nokia.
It’s not like every single thing we’ve ever created should be top secret. Most probably we have assets that are just hiding in the basement, so to say. They could be of much more value for the entire ecosystem if we could share those existing assets and let someone else build new applications on top of them.
Growing companies to keep an eye on
As an OpEN community manager, you’re constantly in touch with a lot of startups and growth companies. Could you name some interesting enterprises you’ve run into recently?
“Bernstein is definitely a game changer. Their blockchain solutions for securing intellectual property assets and innovation processes brings a trustful co-creation environment between companies and individuals that are working together!
Read the story of how Bernstein posted a project on Open Ecosystem Network and ended up collaborating with Nokia
Tealbook – Selected as a “cool vendor” by Gartner, Tealbook is providing a new journey to corporations in the field of supplier intelligence, combining machine learning, leading software development, procurement and operations expertise.
We have recently integrated Tealbook capabilities in OpEN and we are very excited with the value that can generate to the users.
Read more about this OpEN & Tealbook partnership
We’ve also had a very nice cooperation with a growing Ukrainian Software development company called VAKOMS. I matched them with an OpEN challenge related to virtual reality and 3D modelling a while ago and from a successful proof of concept with Nokia EDU, we were able to scale our collaboration for ongoing and upcoming projects.”
Anything else you’d like to share?
“I’ve been planning to extend my matchmaking efforts to my native Portugal. So if you know any interesting startup events (apart of the awesome Web Summit) or incubation communities in and around Lisbon, do drop me a note!”
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If you are passionate about innovation and technology, willing to share your ideas and interested in finding the right people to develop them with, you should join Open Ecosystem Network. It’s free.
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Catarina Cruz
Works for Nokia in Munich, Germany, and is one of Open Ecosystem Network’s community leads.
- Tell us something you’re known for:
“My resilience: never giving up andnever turning my back to a good challenge.“ - How about something you aren’t really known for:
“I am a reaaaaaaaaaaal foodie! “ - What’s your favourite life hack that has been made possible by technology?
“Google”! The starting point of many searches in endless domains.” - What´s your secret superpower?
“My passion for my work. I´m always confident that we can do something about things, and that confidence gets stuff done.”