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Apala is a world-renowned expert on Contextual Innovation—the discipline of creating breakthrough product concepts and adapting existing products, services, and technologies to new markets. HP Labs, adidas, Nokia, Sony Ericsson, NCR, and Intel are just a few of the companies that have benefited from Apala’s innovative, pioneering techniques in this exciting and growing field.
Apala and her CI team have helped designers, marketers, product managers and ethnographers apply her innovative techniques to develop exciting new concepts and products. She systematically guides the ideation process to uncover subtle patterns in ethnographic and market data to reveal the exciting breakthrough ideas that can drive your business and generate more revenue and profit.
Apala has developed a vast array of data-gathering techniques, including the Bollywood Method, Bizarre Bazaar, and the Funky Facilitator, which help understand the user experience in a variety of cultural and economic environments. She and her team pioneered the “Ecosystem Chart” which organizes vast amounts of ethnographic data into a coherent model. She is a creative and dynamic speaker who has received acclaim in USA, Canada, Europe, India, and China for her keynote talks on contextual innovation, internationalization, and designing for emerging markets.
Some of Apala’s Contextual Innovation projects include:
• Cell phones for the Indian market.
• Microcredit system, managing small loans to farmers and small
businesses, with operators who could only read numbers, not text.
• Researching media applications in rural markets.
• Applying handwriting recognition in small businesses in India.
• Unusual applications for ATM machines.
• Identifying latent needs in emerging markets for U.S.-based home
medical equipment used in the therapy process.
Apala has been with HFI since 1999 and is currently Vice President of Asia, managing offices in India, China, and Singapore, and a Contextual Innovation lab in Bangalore. An award-winning designer (International Audi Design Award), Apala has led teams spanning design, development, testing, and deployment of software products. In addition, she is ACM SIGCHI’s Vice Chair for local chapters.
On a more personal note, Apala is fascinated by Indian history and culture and loves ethnic outfits. She loves traveling, seeing temples, historical sites, and beautiful landscapes. She has been all over Europe, North America, and Asia. She is trained in classical Indian dance and is learning international ballroom dance. Apala has also been a radio jockey and news reporter with one of India's top radio stations and often wonders about getting back to that in between contextual innovation projects! One of her current obsessions is to listen to different renditions of Othello, Macbeth, Hamlet and King Lear. |
