It’s been a month since the OWIN23 Customer Conference what a thrilling ride it was! The impact of its contents, the shared insights, and the lessons learned are far from fleeting, but continue to resonate strongly. We hope you’ve kept the conversation on Sustainable Innovation alive because we certainly have.

In case you missed it, we would like to take this opportunity to provide you with a glimpse into the why and what of OWIN23 and take you on a journey into the world of sustainable innovation.

Sustainable Innovation for Growth and Scale, by Luigi Marciano, Founder and CEO

Innovation, the driving force behind adaptability and long-term sustainability, plays a pivotal role in this transformative journey. Throughout history, humanity has relied on innovation to navigate change and embrace progress and today, in an era of unprecedented speed, the need for sustainable innovation is more critical than ever before; innovation cycles are unprecedently faster, and this continuous evolution is challenging sustainability daily. Sustainable Innovation is therefore the remarkable fusion of these two forces and the very key to achieve long-term growth. It is part of the vision and mission of all of us in this industry to support our customers.

To grasp the multifaceted nature of innovation, let’s envision it as a radiant diamond, where each facet represents a unique aspect of the innovation process. In our business, these facets take on distinct forms: the first facet represents the unwavering commitment to enhancing the client experience, which leads to increased wealth and assets; the second facet speaks for the constant evolution of the offering, ensuring it remains highly personalised and tailored to clients’ needs; finally, the third facet portrays the dedication to reconfiguring the business model, extracting maximum value and delivering impactful outcomes. But for these facets to shine brilliantly and endure, they require a bedrock of sustainability and for innovation to happen they need to be combined into one process.

Indeed, Objectway Innovation Diamond Framework is meticulously crafted to encompass these three vital perspectives: Client Experience, Offering Evolution and Business Reconfiguration and a fourth, equally important perspective that underpins them all: Sustainability. This is what ties our vision to reality, paving the way for successful innovation.

But why Venice? “Well” said our CEO, “we tried to ensure that sustainable innovation permeates every aspect of our event, starting from the location.”

VENICE, THE OLDEST CITY OF THE FUTURE, by Carlo Bagnoli Full Professor of Strategy Innovation at Ca Foscari University and founder of Venisia

Venice stands as a compelling global symbol of the urgent need for sustainable innovation, being one of the cities suffering most from environmental unsustainability and increasingly facing vital sustainable development challenges: drowning, over-tourism and depopulation. Just recently, Venice witnessed huge, record-breaking floods and Acqua Granda in November 2019 is probably the most impressive example of the global emergency we are dealing with. Other extraordinary cities share similar environmental and social problems and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are now an urgent call to action for people, countries and companies.

Venice’s diverse urban and cultural fabric, its uniqueness and dynamism, naturally positions it as a pioneer in sustainable living, creating a fertile ground for a new dialogue between liberal arts and science, humanities and technology, biology and engineering, tradition and innovation. By combining these dilemmas, Venice has the potential to serve as a global exemplar of sustainability innovation, aspiring to become the world’s first 100% sustainable city.

Switching from a “think-global-act-local” vision to a “think-local-act-global” one, by exploring local solutions within Venice, we can unlock innovative approaches that have the potential to address global challenges on a broader scale. The scalability of these solutions holds immense promise, as it allows for financial returns on investments, which in turn becomes a crucial enabler for advancing the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), thus generating an ongoing virtuous circle of progress.

Since its origins, Venice has been coping with its fragile environment and thus became a universal example of resilience and adaptation. Today Venice is in danger, and the global duty is to guarantee its future.