At MEET ITALY we pride ourselves on our effort to provide a platform that stimulates intellectual curiosity and forward thinking, so when the opportunity to talk about Global Good came along we didn’t shy away.

On March 7th, MEET ITALY is back for the new year with an exceptional speaker: Maurizio Vecchione, executive VP of Global Good and Research at Intellectual Ventures.

Maurizio is the quintessential MEET ITALY man. Originally from Udine, Italy, Maurizio made the journey to the U.S. and formed academically at the University of Berkley after his initial studies at the Scuola Internazionale Superiore di Studi Avanzati in Trieste, Italy.

In the U.S., he made his mark by contributing to the building of nine start-ups and by helping to launch over 50 commercial products which resulted in more than $1 billion in shareholder value. He also served as CEO of Arrogene and CEO of CompuMed. His work has touched many different fields, from software to wireless, from internet to life sciences.

In 2013, he took on a new significant challenge. He entered into a collaboration with software tycoon and philanthropist Bill Gates in order to bring a new dawn to developing countries: Global Good Fund. This project is designed to invent and deploy technology to improve life in emerging societies. Maurizio’s mission is to be the catalyst for new research and inventions that can benefit humanity in global health and development.

Maurizio’s approach in this endeavor is reverse innovation or the process to generate innovation in emerging markets and then export it to the developed world. Corporations and other research entities that practice reverse innovation find it liberating to apply their R&D in markets unconstrained by the legacy framework that often may stifle unconventional thinking.

A vast body of research is developing on this dynamic. Those interested in the topic can look up Professor Vijai Govindarajan of the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth University who has written extensively on the reverse innovation process. His research indicates that by developing dynamic business models in emerging markets first, as opposed to scaling down products from the developed world, new long-term value can be achieved. Prof. Govindarajan believes that by reverse innovating, the global economy can be transformed and improved.

Maurizio is truly on the forefront of implementation of this new paradigm as he deploys resources to study issues from the perspective of those in poor countries, in an effort to identify gaps that science and technology can solve. HIs belief is that succeeding at that level can have a magnified impact for societal change.

Maurizio sees as essential elements of success the so called three As: Affordability, Appropriateness, and Accessibility.

Join us for a stimulating evening on March 7th, 2019 at the Italian Cultural Institute in Westwood. Maurizio Vecchione’s presentation is a collaboration between MEET ITALY and the Italian Cultural Institute of Los Angeles.

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