margarita cruz
Driving Innovation: How Frugal Can Hotels Be?
Margarita Cruz | April 4, 2019
By Margarita Cruz and Isabella Blengini When speaking of innovation in the hospitality industry, we often hear about new technologies and processes capable of breaking the standards on how the industry works. Typically, these innovations require large amounts of investments; as well as the design and implementation of new processes. According to the EU Industrial R&D Investment Scorecard, in 2017 alone, investments in innovation made across different industries around the world surpassed €700bn. However, only a small percentage of players are effectively able to implement innovations of this kind. In fact, 90% of the world's R&...
Is an Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Beneficial for Startups?
Dr. Margarita Cruz | June 6, 2018
By Dr. Margarita Cruz Innovation and entrepreneurship are clearly flourishing in Switzerland if the Global Innovation Index is anything to go by, as the report ranks Switzerland as the most innovative country in the world. Another study, the Swiss entrepreneurial ecosystem report, puts the number of new firms created each year at some 12,000, with the cantons of Zurich and Vaud leading the field when it comes to high-growth startups. But what exactly is an entrepreneurial ecosystem and how can entrepreneurs benefit from it? We recently staged a panel discussion at Ecole hôteliere de Lausanne on the topic of 'Nurturing your entre...
Business Model Innovation: Beyond the Traditional Way of Innovating in Hospitality
the Authors | August 24, 2017
By Margarita Cruz and Nicole Rosenkranz Innovations form a significant backbone to an organization's ability to secure a competitive advantage. While historically we attribute much of that innovation potential to product, process or service innovations, a study conducted by KPMG in 2015 revealed that three out of four executives believe their company's future competitive advantage would be challenged by a competitor's business model innovations (BMIs). When we talk about BMIs, we are referring to the basic logic in the way a firm does business: how the company is able to create value for customers, either by defining a new value proposi...
