It was the beginning of 2019 when I met Cornel. He was already known for his innovation success, being Head of Innovation in one of the largest automotive companies in the world and elected as one of first Romanians in the European Forbes 30 under 30 list. He just provided a speech at Măgurele Science Park, in front of a group of managers from one of the top car dealers in Romania, and I was coming back from a Design Thinking workshop with a group from a bank. Our meeting was supposed to end in 30’ but it lasted for more than 2 hours.

The topic: start a new division in Ascendis, on innovation. The introductions were short, the topic was hot. I remember Cornel asking me: what was the problem I wanted to solve. And, then, quicky we got aligned on the WHY?: we considered that Romania and Eastern Europe is full of creativity, but lacks the means to change creativity into impact. We wanted to change that. At the end of the meeting we realized our purpose: we want to contribute changing Romania’s and Eastern Europe’s differentiator, from financial efficiency to innovation.

We had, after the first meeting, a lot of iterations, from defining our target groups and the journey of an idea in an organization, to creating flows to enhancing innovation.

After our first meeting we had many more iterations. We defined our target groups and the journey behind an idea, how it grows in an organization. It was all digital pen and paper, and some of our drawings can be seen here:

Months of intensive works, F2F workshops, hundreds of calls and tens of client meetings followed. And then, we launched X by Ascendis, the new innovation division of Ascendis, at the now / DO event, in front of over 1,000 people. It was October 2019.

The vision remains the same, but the way we contribute to it is broader that initially thought. Now, we address companies, institutions and universities, provide services that help change cultures and mentalities, generate ideas with impact, create new products, services and user experiences, educate employees and young people and transform knowing into doing. Our goal remains the same – to contribute changing the differentiator of Romania and Eastern Europe form financial efficiency to innovation.