This year’s theme is Innovating in Tough Times: Practical Ways for Innovating when Budgets are Tight and Resources are Limited.

Carolinas based companies already scheduled to share their lessons learned, experiences and tools include:

• Elster Solutions (provider of innovative solutions to the utilities around the world)
• NetApp (leading vendor of innovative storage and data management solutions)
• Novant (integrated group of hospitals and physician practices)
• Red Hat (global leader in open source technology solutions)

 There will be plenty of time for networking as well.

Last year over 200 innovators, new product development and product management professionals and executives participated to Innovate Carolina.  This is an opportunity you don’t want to miss! Keep checking back for more details on speakers and detailed agenda. 

For speaking opportunities, please review and submit your proposal per this 2012 Innovate Carolina Conference Call for Speakers.

For sponsorship opportunities please review the 2012 PDMA Carolina Sponsorship Levels and contact Steve Josey, sponsorship chairperson, at carolinaschapter@pdma.org.

Note: speaking and sponsorship opportunities are handled on a first come first serve basis

We’ll have a panel of “cross-breed” experts who have practiced product development and innovation on both sides of the “products vs. services” fence.

Networking and food starts at 5:30 and the program begins at 6:45pm.

• Keynote speaker Louis Foreman of Enventys opens a $25 million innovation fund through his firm’s idea submission platform, Edison Nation
• Toyota’s technology transfer contest, Ideas for Good, will open voting on public submissions on April 10 (set up by one of our sponsors, Innocentive)
• UNC Charlotte announced the finalists of its Five Ventures business plan competition to be held on April 14
• Henry Chesbrough, who first coined the phrase Open Innovation, launched a new blog on Forbes about last week

• Are you a business leader looking for ways to get new ideas and technologies into your business pipeline? 
• Are you an entrepreneur trying to partner with large companies to bring your idea to market? 
• Are you a consumer or end user with a smart way to improve an existing product or service or category?

Innovate Carolina 2011 is where we explore the intersection of these interests and talk about how Open Innovation gets done in the real world.

Who else is interested in this?  Representatives from companies across the Carolinas including Electrolux, Bank of America, Sealed Air, Ingersoll Rand, Wells Fargo, Best Buy, Lowes, Duke Energy, Rubbermaid, Lord Corporation, GlaxoSmithKline, Celgard, and SPX have already registered.  Learn from other professionals in the field practicing innovation and register today!

1. Early-bird registration expires soon! Rates go up after March 15
2. Third “Services” track added with speakers from Best Buy and NewKind!
3. NPDP certification discount Taking the NPDP exam?  NP Learning is hosting a 2 day prep workshop on April 13-14 in the University area nearby
4. The Five Ventures contest Catch the Charlotte Research Institute’s Five Ventures business plan competition on April 14 also on campus.  Attendees from FiveVentures can get a special discount!
5. Great networking! Representatives from companies across the Carolinas are already registered from the financial services, manufacturing, medical, energy, and technology sectors.  Meet them and share best practices.

Check out these links:

• Our latest agenda (details on our third Services Innovation track will be finalized very soon!)
• Our registration rates
• Our sponsors
• Our speakers
• Our student innovation contest

More questions?  Send an email to carolinaschapter@pdma.org

We’re also planning a partner discount for those interested in NPDP certification training before the conference.  Stay tuned for more details.

The PDMA Carolinas Chapter invites you to join us on the UNCC campus in Charlotte, NC for a full-day of networking and engaging discussions. Unlike other conferences that tackle this topic, we’ll hear from Product Development leaders speaking about real-world case studies, including stories from the field about:

• How ideas from outside of a firm are generated and collected through contests, trend spotting, and tech scouting
• How Open Innovation concepts should be evaluated and managed differently from internally-generated concepts, and what happens when they aren’t
• How an Open Innovation process fits in a traditional product development culture

The speaker agenda is just about complete and registration will open soon.  Drop us a line to be notified with registration details.

Until then, take a peek at this video clip from Marshall Brain, the keynote speaker from our 2010 conference in Chapel Hill.  (Duration: 12:50)

And here’s a few links highlighting last year’s agenda and content:

• Event description
• Full PDMA archive of recordings (available for purchase)

Here’s some feedback from our 2010 attendees:

• “Conference provided important information about innovation efforts interpreted in a business culture.”
• “Excellent speakers who provided practical insight”
• “Provided a new perspective”
• “Inspirational, thought-provoking, practical”
• “Gained a lot of insight into the innovation process.  Made good contacts.”