What is the difference between innovation and invention?

The words innovation and invention overlap semantically but are really quite distinct.

Invention can refer to a type of musical composition, a falsehood, a discovery, or any product of the imagination. The sense of invention most likely to be confused with innovation is “a device, contrivance, or process originated after study and experiment,” usually something which has not previously been in existence.

Innovation, for its part, can refer to something new or to a change made to an existing product, idea, or field. One might say that the first telephone was an invention, the first cellular telephone either an invention or an innovation, and the first smartphone an innovation.

                                         Business brief

Traditionally,a company's new ideas and products come from itsresearch and            development (R&D) department. The initial idea for acar will be turned into a series of prototypesand tested. In software development, the final 'prototype' is the

, which is beta-tested. Pharmaceuticals gothrough a series of trials.

Different industries have different lead-times, thetime between conception and product launch; a new drug might take 10 or 15years to develop. In consumer goods, marketresearch will be a key part of

thedevelopment process, with focus groups:small groups representing cross-sections ofconsumers talking about their reactions to proposed designs, and wider consumer surveys. Consumer products are test-marketed or trialled,and feedback gathered.

Innovativeproducts that are entirely new are bought by a small group of pioneers, often technicallysavvy enthusiasts. The other groups successivelyto take up a successful innovation are the earlyadopters, the early majority,the late majority and, bringing up therear, the laggards.) (For example, mobilephone uptake is now so great in advancedeconomies that the people buying one now for the first time are the laggards.)

Howto develop innovation and creativity inlarge, bureaucratic companies? Company leaders talk about corporate venturing and intrapreneurship, where employees are encouraged todevelop entrepreneurial activities withinthe organisation. Companies may set up skunk works,often a small group of people outside the usual structures, to work on innovations: development ofthe PC at IBM is the most famous example. Another problem that organisationshave to overcome is the not-invented-here syndrome,where managers not initially involved in an innovation may resist its development.

Entirelynew innovations are perhaps more easily developed by entrepreneurs in start-upcompanies, but here the problem is finance: how to get the venture capital to develop the product, manufacture it on an industrial scale and market it.  

beta version 测试版 

prototype 原型，雏形

lead-time 研发周期

 intrapreneurship 内部企业家精神

Intrapreneur 内企业家; 内部创业家

entrepreneur 企业家

skunk works 特殊团队

venture capital 风险资本，风险投资