San Francisco Seminar 2008
Day 2

Innovation @ Google

Illustration of a light bulb used as a symbol of idea development, innovation, and insight. The image represents how data, services, and customer insight became increasingly important drivers of the digital economy—where technology was no longer just about systems, but about understanding people, needs, and value creation.

Introduction and Context

The day at Google was a highlight, but it also differed from the other visits: rather than providing insight into its culture, organizational structure, or research processes, Google presented its product portfolio and innovation model.

Thomas Korte opened with Google’s vision—to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful—and demonstrated how the company built innovation on structured experimentation rather than random ideas.

Although the visit was more of a demonstration than a dialogue, it made clear that by 2008 Google had already become a global ecosystem. This was the year the Android platform was launched, as search, email, maps, images, and video began to converge into a seamless user experience.

Program Overview

Date: April 1, 2008
Location: Google Inc., Mountain View

Welcome and introduction by Thomas Korte
Presentation: Innovation @ Google
Overview of products and services (Google Search, AdWords, AdSense, Blogger, Picasa, Maps, and more)
Discussion of Google’s innovation model and the “70–20–10 rule”
Tour of the Google Campus

Watercolor illustration of Google’s campus in Silicon Valley, where people gather outdoors under colorful umbrellas for professional presentations and conversations. The scene captures the open culture of innovation that characterized many of the visits during the San Francisco seminars—an environment where technology, collaboration, creativity, and knowledge sharing were at the center.

Key Academic Themes

Vision as a driving force: A clear purpose from day one—“organize the world’s information.”
The 70–20–10 rule: 70% focused on the core business, 20% on new initiatives, and 10% on experimental projects.
20% projects: Employees were given the freedom to develop their own ideas (Gmail, News, and Maps were mentioned as examples).
Recruitment and culture: High expectations for creativity and analytical skills were seen as a core value.
Platform thinking: Connecting search, advertising, and content services created network effects that reinforced one another.

Case Studies

Google did not present any external case studies that day, but shared internal examples of how ideas from 20% projects had become commercial successes. One notable example was Gmail, which began as an internal project and later set a new standard for web-based email and storage.

Watercolor illustration of a sign at Google’s campus in Silicon Valley, surrounded by greenery and soft morning light. The scene symbolizes the entrance to one of the world’s most influential technology environments—a place where innovation, experimentation, and digital platforms have shaped how people search, communicate, and work today.

Reflections and Discussion:

The day provided a basis for reflecting on what characterizes innovative organizations:

How can freedom and structure be balanced?

How can organizations prevent experiments from failing to deliver business value?
Can the 70–20–10 model be applied to other industries or the public sector?

Many participants came away with the idea that innovation must be rooted in culture and leadership—not just in processes and budgets.

International Perspectives

At the time, Google’s model represented an American approach to innovation: a high tolerance for failure, strong access to capital, and a focus on growth before profits and dividends. For Norwegian and European companies, the contrast was clear—greater emphasis was placed on stability and predictability than on experimentation.

Watercolor illustration from Google’s campus in Silicon Valley featuring a laptop, notebook, and coffee cup beneath a large umbrella in a green setting. The scene symbolizes the open and creative work culture that characterized many of the visits during the San Francisco seminars—where technology, collaboration, and idea development came together in an environment designed for innovation and learning.

What Do We Take Home?

A clear picture of how structured innovation can be organized in a technology-driven environment.
An understanding that vision, culture, and recruitment are just as important as technology.
Inspiration to consider how “20% time” can be adapted to other organizational structures.

Relevance Today

The model presented by Google’s product evangelists in 2008 has stood the test of time.

Many of today’s companies—from Spotify to Finn.no—have adopted similar approaches, with small experimental teams that test, learn, and scale.

Today, we also see parallels in the public sector through the use of agile development and innovation labs.

Peder Inge Furseth

Peder Inge Furseth was a key academic driving force behind the San Francisco seminars and played an important role in making the encounter with Silicon Valley relevant to Norwegian and European organizations. Through his role as a professor at BI Norwegian Business School and as academic director of the program, he helped participants place the presentations within a broader context—one in which technology, innovation, business development, and people had to be understood together.

In San Francisco, participants met entrepreneurs, researchers, technology leaders, and investors from some of the world’s most innovative environments. Furseth’s strength was his ability to connect these experiences with practical challenges and opportunities facing Norwegian organizations. He helped translate Silicon Valley’s ideas and ways of working into a

Nordic context where collaboration, trust, and long-term value creation play a central role.

Throughout the seminar series, he served as an important bridge between research, business, and technology. For many participants, he therefore became more than an academic leader—he was also a mentor who inspired them to think differently about innovation, digitalization, and commercialization.

Learn more about Peder Inge Furseth here

From Studies and Seminars to Today’s Knowledge Hub

The studies, seminars, and academic trips documented on this page form part of the knowledge base behind The Invisible Capital. Topics such as customers, technology, innovation, digitalization, and value creation have been part of this journey for several decades — while these fields have continued to evolve.

At The Invisible Capital, we continue exploring these questions through dedicated knowledge series. Here, earlier theory, research, and experience are connected with newer knowledge, emerging technologies, and today’s challenges facing people and organizations.

Innovation

Innovation is not just about new ideas. Value is created when knowledge, technology, and ideas are developed into products, services, processes, organizational forms, and business models that are actually put into use. The series on innovation traces the field from Schumpeter to modern innovation research and explores incremental, radical, disruptive, open, and user-driven innovation.

→ Explore the Innovation series

The Customer

The customer is not simply the recipient of what an organization produces. In a competitive market, the customer is a decisive factor in whether an organization actually succeeds in creating value. The series on the customer explores customer orientation, customer insight, customer experience, satisfaction, loyalty, trust, and the human interactions that shape the customer relationship.

→ Explore the Customer series

Value Creation

What does it really mean to create value — and who creates it? The Value Creation series moves from economic theory and influential thinkers to a broader understanding of how people, knowledge and skills, institutions, organizations, and the public sector contribute to value creation.

→ Explore the Value Creation series

Digitalization

Digitalization has evolved from individual technologies into a fundamental part of how organizations operate and create value. The Digitalization from A to Z series traces this evolution through the internet, the web, e-commerce, search, UX, social media, mobile, omnichannel, cloud, data, platforms, and digital transformation — leading up to today’s AI-first era.

→ Explore the Digitalization from A to Z series

Artificial Intelligence

Artificial intelligence represents the next chapter in the digital evolution. In our dedicated AI knowledge hub, we explore how artificial intelligence works, how AI finds and uses information, how it evaluates sources and websites, and what this development could mean for people, organizations, and value creation.

→ Explore the articles on Artificial Intelligences

In the Plex: How Google Thinks, Works, and Shapes Our Lives

Steven Levy provides a unique look at how Google evolved from a search engine into a global innovation platform. The book explores how experimentation, data-driven development, and a strong technology culture helped make Google one of the world’s most influential companies in search, Android, maps, video, and digital services.