Senior business leaders recently gathered for “Our New Future – Choice, Not Chance,” hosted by BIP UK Consulting, to examine how companies can innovate for success and remain resilient in a rapidly evolving global landscape.

Anton Musgrave, Co-Founder of Futureworld International Ltd, delivered the keynote “CTRL+ALT+DEL – A Global System Reboot.” In his speech, he challenged conventional notions of how businesses should prepare for the future.

Afterwards, Brand Finance was part of a panel discussion covering innovation and brand strategy. The panel included:

• Mike Rocha, Chief Commercial Officer, Brand Finance
• Andre van den Berg, Head of Chief Executive’s Office, Anglo American
• Daksh Gupta, Group CEO of Huws Gray
• Moderator: John M Neill, CBE, former Chairman and CEO of Unipart Group

We covered a range of interesting topics – these were some of the key lessons from the event.

Why do disruptive innovations fail?

We discussed the work of Harvard Business School Professor Clayton Christensen, who helped popularise the term “disruptive innovation,” many new ventures fail. Although the widely quoted “95%” failure rate appears more urban myth than established fact, some sources suggest roughly 40% of product innovations fail; others place the figure as high as 70–90%.

Regardless of the precise statistic, Brand Finance’s data-based approach to brand strategy focuses on how firms can maximise the probability of successful innovation:

1. Building an innovation ecosystem
   Samsung has built an innovation ecosystem by investing in research efforts at many levels. From early-stage academic exploration to venture investments in promising start-ups, Samsung covers the entire innovation lifecycle. By distributing the risk and drawing on multiple sources of creativity, they reduce the likelihood that any single failure derails the broader enterprise.
2. Consumer-led innovation
   Bringing customers into the ideation process from the outset increases the chance that fresh concepts meet real-world needs. As an illustration, the Global Hotels Alliance completely revamped its loyalty programme, “Discovery,” by listening to consumer needs and frustrations. By developing simple and transparent “Discovery Dollars,” giving recognition benefits to customers, and adding locally relevant perks, the Global Hotels Alliance significantly boosted the programme’s differentiation in a crowded market.
3. Brand-led innovation
   A strong brand can act as an economic moat, as an asset that helps new products or services stand out. Patagonia’s “Worn Wear” programme reinforces the brand’s environmentally conscious positioning by extending product life. Airbnb’s “Experiences” connect travellers with local hosts in a way that supports Airbnb’s foundational promise of belonging anywhere. Apple’s retail store concept proved transformative by extending the brand’s commitment to user-friendly experiences into the bricks-and-mortar environment. These examples underscore how well-aligned brand and innovation strategies can strengthen the brand and drive revenue growth simultaneously.
4. Staff empowerment
   Beyond Brand Finance’s primary areas of research and work, organisations such as 3M, Google, Atlassian and others have historically empowered significant proportions of staff to spend time on innovative projects. This has led to very successful products like Adsense and Google News.

Balancing performance marketing and brand-building

A perennial topic in boardrooms is balancing short-term revenue gains with long-term investments. In marketing, this is known as the tension between:

• Performance marketing: Immediate, data-driven campaigns aimed at closing sales quickly.
• Brand marketing: Building reputation and awareness among consumers not yet ready to buy.

Brand Finance has found that businesses often focus too heavily on performance campaigns because the immediate ROI is easily measured. However, brand marketing is what creates future growth potential, prompting customers to think of a company first when they do enter the market. Brand Finance data shows that strong brands also correlate with higher shareholder returns and stronger operating margins over the long run.

Evidence-based allocation

Research suggests a 60:40 split (brand to performance) is ideal for many consumer-facing businesses, whereas in B2B it may invert to 40:60. Yet organisations frequently underinvest in brand-building by devoting significantly less than this to longer-term efforts. The risk is a “zero-sum” game: doubling down on quick-win campaigns increases short-term sales but often fails to grow the category or brand’s presence over time.

Making the case for brand investment

In helping clients navigate these trade-offs, Brand Finance uses financial and behavioural modelling to measure brand value, demonstrating how robust brand equity can protect pricing, expand market share, and support profitable innovation.

Looking Ahead

This panel offered a direct reminder: Disruptive innovation is essential, but it should be undertaken carefully and with clear links to customer demand and brand positioning to insure against risk of failure. Similarly, balancing near-term promotional effectiveness with long-term brand-building is a hallmark of resilient organisations.

These principles reflect a mindset of proactively shaping the future—an approach that resonated with the broader theme of the event, “Choice, Not Chance.” By investing in dedicated innovation arms, fostering broad ecosystems, harnessing consumer-led ideas, leveraging strong brand positioning, and embracing a balanced marketing mix, companies can tilt the odds of success in their favour.