The courage to change and reinvent your business in the digital age

Welcome back to our weekly series, The Winning Entrepreneur: Your Weekly Guide to Success, designed for ambitious entrepreneurs and people who want to turn their ideas into successful businesses. Before the holiday break, we talked about how giants like Jordan, Ma, and Cuban built their empires from scratch. Today, we’re going to explore how to reinvent your business in the digital age.

In a market dominated by rapid technological changes and increasingly demanding consumers, the ability to reinvent one's business model has become crucial for the survival and success of companies. But what does innovation really mean and what are the most illuminating examples?

The revolution of business models

Adobe is a prime example of a successful transformation. The company abandoned perpetual licensing to embrace a subscription model with Creative Cloud. This shift initially frightened investors, but it proved successful: in just three years, subscription revenue surpassed traditional licensing, creating a more stable and predictable revenue stream.

Even traditional industries are embracing change. Porsche , with its “Porsche Drive” program, gives customers access to multiple models through a monthly subscription, attracting a new generation of consumers who prefer access to ownership.

Innovate prices to create value

Uber has revolutionized the transportation industry not only with its platform, but also with a dynamic pricing system that responds to demand in real time. Surge pricing has allowed it to optimize driver availability during peak hours, improving service efficiency and customer satisfaction.

Disney World followed a similar approach for its theme parks, introducing variable pricing based on the time of year. This strategy allowed for a better distribution of visitors and a significant increase in revenue.

Diversify to grow

LEGO demonstrates how diversification can revitalize a historic brand. Through strategic partnerships with franchises like Star Wars and Marvel , the company has created new, highly successful product lines. Expanding into education with LEGO Education has opened up additional revenue streams, transforming a toy manufacturer into a global education and entertainment company.

Agile structures for innovation

Amazon has turned organizational agility into a competitive advantage with its “two-pizza teams,” groups small enough to be fed with two pizzas. This structure has allowed the company to quickly launch new services and quickly adapt to market needs. Prime, AWS, and Alexa were born out of this culture of agile innovation.

Haier has completely rethought its structure by creating autonomous micro-enterprises. Each unit operates as an independent startup, with surprising results in terms of innovation and speed of response to the market.

The future is in services

Rolls-Royce transformed the aviation industry from selling engines to a “Power by the Hour” model, where airlines pay based on actual flight hours. This approach created a perfect alignment between the interests of the supplier and those of the customer.

Key lessons for innovation

Successful innovation requires three key elements: a deep understanding of customer needs, a willingness to experiment on a small scale before implementing radical changes, and a corporate culture that supports change.

As Adobe, LEGO , and Rolls-Royce demonstrate , traditional business models can be successfully reinvented when innovation responds to real market needs. The key is not to follow the fads of the moment, but to create authentic value through solutions that solve real problems.

In the process of innovation, it is essential to maintain a balance between experimentation and stability. Amazon , despite being an innovation giant, always tests new ideas on a small scale before implementing them globally.

Business model innovation is not a one-off event but an ongoing process that requires vision, courage, and persistence. Businesses that thrive are those that maintain curiosity and a willingness to question themselves, even when traditional business seems to be working.

Essential readings for innovation

I have added at the end of the text the fundamental readings that can guide the business transformation:

Zone to Win by Geoffrey Moore: A Practical Guide to Managing Innovation in Large Organizations.

Platform Revolution by Parker, Van Alstyne, and Choudary: An in-depth look at how digital platforms are transforming business.

The Invincible Company by Osterwalder: Concrete Tools for Reinventing Your Business Model.

Blue Ocean Strategy by W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne: Strategies for creating new markets rather than competing in existing ones.