Conceptual Thinking and Creative Note Taking

Anyone who has seen my office and the piles of hand-written notes on legal pads, in the backs of books, on scraps of paper and napkins, and on various Post-it notes stuck to the wall would probably label me a bit kooky. So, I’m glad to hear that a recent study...

Disruptive Innovation Creates Opportunity

Disruptive innovation is innovation that disrupts an existing market and creates a new one. All industries are subject to change. And people will hang on to the status quo as long as possible. Society in general often feels threatened by the disruption of the status...

Mothers of Invention Grants

They say that necessity is the mother of invention, even though fewer than 15% of all patent holders in the world to this day are women. But Toyota is doing its part to help draw attention to women innovators and women inventors at the fourth annual Women in the World...

Woman Inventor – Josephine Cochran

If you’re like most people, washing dishes is a chore. Okay, maybe it’s just me. But back in 1886 a woman inventor named Josephine Cochran thought the same thing. Technically Joel Houghton patented a dish washing machine, but it was a wooden machine that...

Women Inventors – Tabitha Babbitt

I’ve heard too many times that women inventors tend to invent “girlie” things. Sometimes that might be true, but not always. Take the case of the shy and quiet inventor Tabitha Babbitt, who invented the circular saw, which is certainly far from being...