Development of a Product Evaluation Process at ICIPE in Nairobi (Kenya)
Executive Summary
The International Centre of Insect Physiology and Ecology (ICIPE) is a unique international research organisation that was put to life in 1970. Eleven nations signed the founding treaty, among them Kenya, where ICIPE has been based ever since. ICIPE is a leading research-insitute in the field of tropical arthropode research and is – among other important topics – working fervently on the fight against malaria, sleeping-sickness and major plant diseases that are caused by arthropodes.
The annual budget of ICIPE was tallying USD 10 million in 2002, wheres USD 9,5 million were provided by grants. Scientists have to sacrifice a significant amount of their working time to get money. In addition it is getting ever harder to receive funding because many countries have been cutting their budgets. ICIPE has therefore been looking for alternative ways of income generation – and came up with the idea of bringing products from the lab to the market and use the money inflow to finance research.
The marketing of products is not the core competence of ICIPE. This is why a new company named “Bridgeworks” was defined to be the partner that will bring products to the market. A contract that gives Bridgeworks the first right of refusal on any product-ideas derived from ICIPE is the ground, on which Bridgeworks shall reach prosperity.
One of the most important business-processes of Bridgeworks is the evaluation and selection of products that shall be launched. It was the declared goal of the diploma thesis to define this crucial process and find ways how Bridgeworks will be able to scan product-ideas of ICIPE at a very early stage in their life-cycle, and therefore at a point where information is still scarce. The challenge is to handle the “fuzzy front end” of product innovation.
Result: The author of this thesis suggests that two well known methods should be combined to assess economic possibilites: the multi-attribute-utility-analysis and the portfolio-technique as it was introduced by General Electric and consultant-company McKinsey in the early 1970s.
To ensure sustainability Bridgeworks should run for labels when bringing products to the market. As the best label might be a different one for each product and each market, Bridgeworks should focus on a set of guidelines that are the very foundation on which many labels are built upon, for example the Generic Fairtrade Standards that have been published and are updated by Fairtrade Labelling Organizations International – an international NGO. At this very early stage of evaluation where information is still scarce and lack of money and time are major issues, Bridgeworks should verify compliance with a short checklist that is extracted out of those guidelines.
During the work on this diploma thesis, the suggested methodology was tested, refined and calibrated with seven product-ideas at ICIPE. The biggest problem was the fact that for many product-ideas no market research had been done so far. Apart from that it has to be clear that although the methodology that is used to assess the market and the company is delivering numbers and clear positions on a portfolio, the resultat comes with an inherent fuzziness caused by selection of the parameters and the incertainty of certain input-factors.
Albeit the fuzziness the chosen methodology matches the need of both Bridgeworks and ICIPE. The process was proven a useful tool that was accepted even in the short period of time that the work on the thesis lasted.

Contacts

ICIPE
Hans Herren
PO Box 30772
Duduville, Kasarani
Nairobi, Kenya
phone: +254-2-861686
mail: hherren@icipe.org

Bridgeworks
Andreas Schriber
Am Wasser 55
8039 Zurich
Switzerland
phone : +41 79 318 38 72
mail: a.schriber@biovision.ch

ETHags – Center for Sustainability at ETH Zurich
Dr. Rainer Züst
Bolleystrasse 9
8006 Zurich
Switzerland
phone: +41 79 420 39 27
mail: rainer.zuest@sl.ethz.ch