TRIZ Guide Book JTMKPUO

PAGE GUIDE Pages
1
No. Content 2
1. Introduction 4
2. What is TRIZ? 9
3. Why Does TRIZ Work for Business and Management? 10
4. Thinking with Ideality 12
5. Finding A Right Problem Is A Problem Too 13
6. “Basic XTRIZ” PROCESS 16
7. There Is More in TRIZ: Creating What’s Next 17
8. Road mapping The Future 18
9. Triz For Business and Management: A Roadmap 19
10. Examples of Using Triz In Business And Management 20
11. Conclusions 20
12. Principle 1 Segmentation 21
13. Principle 2 Taking out 22
14. Principle 3 Local quality 23
15. Principle 4 Asymmetry 23
16. Principle 5 Merging 24
17. Principle 6 Universality 24
18. Principle 7 Nested Doll 25
19. Principle 8 Anti-Weight 25
20. Principle 9 Prior Counteraction 25
21. Principle 10 Prior Action 26
22. Principle 11 Cushion in Advance 26
23. Principle 12 Equipotentiality 27
24. Principle 13 The Other Way Round 28
25. Principle 14 Spheroidality – Curvature 28
26. Principle 15 Dynamics 29
27. Principle 16 Partial or Excessive Action 30
28. Principle 17 Another Dimension 31
29. Principle 18 Mechanical Vibration 31
30. Principle 19 Periodic Action 32
31. Principle 20 Continuity of Useful Action 32
32. Principle 21 Rushing Through 33
33. Principle 22 Blessing in Disguise 33
34. Principle 23 Feedback 34
35. Principle 24 Intermediary 34
36. Principle 25 Self-Service 34
37. Principle 26 Copying 35
38. Principle 27 Cheap Short-Living Objects 35
39. Principle 28 Replace Mechanical System 36
40. Principle 29 Pneumatics and Hydraulics 36
41. Principle 30 Flexible Membranes/Thin Films 37
42. Principle 31 Porous Materials 37
43. Principle 32 Color Change 38
44. Principle 33 Homogeneity 38
45. Principle 34 Discarding and Recovering
46. Principle 35 Parameter Change

47. Principle 36 Phase Transition 39
48. Principle 37 Thermal Expansion 39
49. Principle 38 Accelerated Oxidation 40
50. Principle 39 Inert Atmosphere 40
51. Principle 40 Composite Materials 41
52. References 42-43

Student Guide Book ’40 Inventive Principles’

Font: Century Gothic. Size 11

Content arrangement by Mohd Amirul Helmi Ismail, Mohd Adil Mokti & Mohd Assidiq.
Department Information Technology & Communication.Politeknik Ungku Omar, Perak.
MALAYSIA.

JTMKPUOPRESS Copyright © 2019 Website | http://jtmk.puo.edu.my

TRIZ

INTRODUCTION

Technology innovation has always been among the most crucial factors driving the
progress of human civilization. Today it also becomes clear that business innovation is
not less important to successfully compete and becomes the necessity. Modern
business environment is extremely dynamic and fast, information technology and
global networking eliminate borders, which used to keep businesses in their comfort
zones, the market continuously demands better services, competition even between
small companies moves to a global scale. At the same time there is no solid and
proven method that would help with business innovation. In search for a solution, more
and more business people turn their attention to TRIZ.

TRIZ is a term which is used for the Theory of Solving Inventive Problems 1 . TRIZ
was originated in the middle of the 20th century in the former Soviet Union to develop
a method which would support a process of generating inventive ideas and
breakthrough solutions in a systematic way. Although relatively little known outside ex-
USSR before the end of last century, today TRIZ is going global: more and more
companies and organizations worldwide start recognizing TRIZ as the best practice of
innovation. Among which are General Electric, Procter & Gamble, Intel, Samsung.

While TRIZ nowadays is known and used in technology and engineering,
applications of TRIZ in business and management areas have been practically
unknown. This should not be surprising: TRIZ was created by engineers for engineers.
The vast majority of TRIZ professionals work in the areas of technology rather then
business due to historic reasons. In addition, many TRIZ experts working in the
technology areas are vaguely familiar with specifics of business environments,
therefore direct applications of “technological” TRIZ have not been always successful.
A separate version TRIZ for Business and Management was needed.

Relatively recently, within last 10-15 years, several TRIZ developers started to
expand application of TRIZ to business and management areas [3,10,13,14]. The results
appeared to be rather encouraging: a number of seemingly unsolvable business and
management problems were solved quite effectively and efficiently. Such situation
triggered further development of TRIZ for Business and Management, which has been
actively evolving during recent years. A major step in further promotion of “business
TRIZ” was made by Darrell Mann’s book “Hands-On Systematic Innovation for Business
and Management”.

This paper proposes a brief overview of essential parts of TRIZ for Business and
Management which are already successfully used to generate new business ideas
and solutions and is intended for readers familiar with TRIZ as well as for those who
never heard about TRIZ.

1.TRIZ is a Russian acronym written in Latin characters. In Russian it stands for “Teoria
Resheniya Izobretatelskikh Zadatch”

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WHAT IS TRIZ?
TRIZ was developed as a theory and a set of applied tools to support solving so-called
“no ordinary” problems in technology and engineering: problems which cannot be
solved with known formal methods, for example, mathematical optimization or
configuration change. Such problems require new, out of the box solutions unknown
before. Usually we refer to such solutions as “innovative” or “inventive” while calling
the problems innovative (or inventive) as well. To develop TRIZ, Russian inventor
Genrich Altshuller (founder of TRIZ) and his associates studied a vast massive of
technological solutions, patents, inventions, and extracted a number of common
solution patterns which existed among them [1,2]. Another important achievement of
TRIZ studies was discovering mechanisms which help to transform an ill-defined initial
problem situation to a solution by solving an inventive problem at abstract level thus
drastically reducing solution search space by directly navigating to the area of most
relevant solutions. Such approach helps to re-use previous experience available as a
collection of high-order solution patterns and reduces time and efforts needed to
solve an innovative problem.

During many years of evolution TRIZ developers introduced a number of
different techniques and tools which support different phases of a process of solving
innovative problems and innovation road mapping.

More information about classical “technological”. In general, regardless of an
application area, today the TRIZ methods and techniques can be used in the
following situations:
1. To solve a specific problem which is formulated as a negative or undesired effect
(e.g. a product degrades too fast, an engine breaks, a project fails, a customer
leaves, sales drop, and so forth) or as the lack of needed performance or control (e.g.
speed is too low, insufficient sales, poor management of a supply chain).
2. To explore a system (business or technological), discover existing bottlenecks and
barriers which can be removed by innovative solutions found with TRIZ tools and
techniques.

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3. To analyze evolutionary potential of technological or a business system and
propose strategies for developing next generations of the system.
4. To predict potential failures in new products and processes and help with their
prevention.
Modern TRIZ is a large body of knowledge [17], which is a combination of a theory of
solving inventive problems and systems evolution, analytical tools and methods for
problem solving and analysis, collections of patterns of solutions, databases of specific
effects and technologies, and techniques for creative imagination development.

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WHY DOES TRIZ WORK FOR BUSINESS AND MANAGEMENT?

If a role of TRIZ has to be defined in a single sentence, TRIZ provides creative phases
of innovation with knowledge-based systematic support. While most of the basic TRIZ
principles were drawn from the studies of technological inventions, the ways we solve
problems and generate ideas are rather similar in virtually every area. For instance,
TRIZ postulates that one of the major driving forces of evolution of a certain
technology is a stepwise resolution of contradictions emerging between the current
technology capabilities and our growing demands. A concept of evolution through
contradictions resolution was known in philosophy long before TRIZ, but the TRIZ
researchers developed this concept further and made it applicable for supporting
technological innovation. The same idea of evolution through contradictions
resolution appears to be true for many other domains: social, political, business,
economic. As an example, an old and seemingly solid business model will not survive
when its business environment changes because the model starts facing
contradictions; and in many cases the business model has to be radically improved
since compromising and optimizing will only help to incrementally improve the model.

One of the most significant contributions of TRIZ was that it identified strategies
and patterns for resolving contradictions: both very generic like resolving
contradictions in time and space, and more specific, like "Consider doing the
opposite action instead of an intended one". The high degree of abstraction makes
major discoveries and principles of TRIZ domain independent with respect to creative
problem solving. Even the current system of generic principles and patterns of TRIZ can
be applied to almost every man-made system created to add a certain value. Today
TRIZ is used in business, software architectures, marketing and advertisement,
pedagogy. In many schools of the former USSR kids learn to think with TRIZ – via games,
puzzles, fairy tales. Although originally developed for engineering applications, today
TRIZ gradually develops to a universal problem-solving paradigm which is based on a
heuristic approach to generate breakthrough ideas.

An answer to the
question “Why does TRIZ work
for other areas?” resides in
understanding the underlying
mechanisms of our thinking
when we deal with no ordinary
problems – solutions to which
are unknown, and a problem-
solving method is not
available. Does our brain use
different mechanisms to solve
two seemingly different
problems which require
resolving two, again, seemingly totally different conflicts? At the first glance, yes – but
is it true? For instance, we can use the same brainstorm or a method of analogies to
solve very diverse problems in different areas, why not to suppose that there is a more
exact method for solving different problems in a systematic way? And as TRIZ proves,
such method exists.

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Let us have a look at two problems. The first problem comes from technology: to
launch and bring a spaceship to an orbit, the ship needs to overcome the Earth
gravity force. Which means the ship has to carry many tons of fuel to reach the speed
needed to break the gravity barrier. But after the largest part of fuel has been burned,
the remaining part has to carry the entire ship including very large and massive empty
fuel tanks! This drastically decreases the useful load of the ship.

Now let us have a look at the second problem. When a start-up company enters the
phase of growth, its board decides to aggressively invest to marketing activities. But
all of a sudden the expected marketing budget was cut and the company’s
marketing executive was confronted with a problem: he already defined a size of a
new marketing team which would be needed to reach the targets and even started
to hire, but then under the new budget limitations the company would not be able to
participate in all exhibitions that were planned. And vice versa, if the size of the
marketing team remains small, the company would participate in all exhibitions, but
then the overall performance of the marketing team would not be as desired by the
end of the next year. To increase the budget was not possible.

There are two ways to approach both problems. The first way is to apply optimization.
We can find an optimal ratio between the capacity of fuel tanks and the weight of
useful load in a spaceship. In the second case, we can optimize a number of hired
specialists and the number of exhibitions. Most likely, both solutions will not satisfy us
since they offer trade-offs. We sacrifice either the useful load of the ship in the first
case or the performance of the marketing team in the second case. Probably,
optimal solutions will work, but only to a certain extent. When an optimal solution stops
meeting our growing demands, we should come up with a breakthrough. How? We
need to forget about optimization and apply breakthrough thinking.

Before TRIZ, this part remained a mystery. There was no any systematic method
to support problems solving process except brainstorm, which is still completely based
on trials and errors. None of the psychological methods of boosting our creativity deal
directly with a problem – they deal with our creative capabilities, imagination, and
divert us to explore different directions that we would not look at with “ordinary”
thinking. However what directions to explore and how – remains completely unclear
in these methods.

In fact, Genrich Altshuller was the first who applied empirical scientific
approach to understand how we solve problems which require creative thinking, and
which can not be handled with formal methods. During many years he studied
hundreds of thousands of solutions from different areas of technology and made a
conclusion that a seemingly great diversity of inventive solutions complies with a
relatively small set of abstract solution patterns. He also identified what a
“breakthrough solution” means. The breakthrough solution emerges because of
eliminating a contradiction: a major barrier which does not let us to solve a problem.
We used to think in terms of optimization and trade-offs, while breakthrough solutions
require breakthrough thinking.

Breakthrough thinking is difficult for many reasons. First, we all (or at least, most
of us) are the prisoners of “psychological inertia” inherent to every human being. To
bring our thinking out of the box, we need to distract ourselves from concepts

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associated with a specific problem that we try to solve, forget about existing solutions
(which won’t help anyway), to see a problem under a new angle, or even many new
angles. Brainstorm and its modifications were introduced to help with this process.
However, brainstorm is not guiding us towards solutions. For relatively simple problems,
brainstorm works pretty well. For more complex and difficult problems we have to
make thousands of trials, and there is no guarantee that we find a solution we want.

Let us see how we can model both problems in TRIZ terms. A contradiction in
TRIZ is represented by a couple “positive effect vs. negative effect”, where both
effects appear as a result of a certain condition. For instance, if we make the fuel
tanks of large capacity, we will be able to bring a ship to the orbit, but at the same
time the useful load will be low (Situation “A” at the picture). Both positive and
negative effects will be replaced by each other if we design fuel tanks of small
capacity (Situation opposite to “A”, we indicate it as “-A”):

As we can see, to satisfy both demands the fuel tanks to have both high and
low capacity at the same time. This does not seem to be possible, so we need to find
a solution which will satisfy both demands in some other way.
The same way of modeling can be applied to the problem with the marketing team:

After we have identified the contradictions, the next step is to solve them. Not
to compromise or optimize, but to eliminate each contradiction in a “win-win” way.
To help with that, TRIZ proposes a range of tools which can be applied depending on
a complexity of a contradiction. The most popular technique for a majority of

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problems is a collection of 40 Inventive Principles and so-called “Contradiction Matrix”
which provides a systematic access to the most relevant subset of Inventive Principles
depending on a type of a contradiction. Although 40 Inventive Principles look similar
for both Technology and Business applications, the matrices are different. While the
Matrix for Technology and Engineering was originally developed by Altshuller in the
1960s, a Contradiction Matrix for TRIZ in Business and Management was developed by
Darrell Mann and introduced in. If a contradiction cannot be resolved with a Matrix,
there are more sophisticated techniques to deal with contradictions, such as ARIZ
(stands for Algorithm for Solving Inventive Problems).
Suppose, we identified the following solution pattern which can be applied to both
above mentioned problems: Inventive Principle #2: “Taking Away” (only “business”
definition of the principle is shown):

As seen, an Inventive Principle does not offer an exact solution. Instead, it proposes
several rather generic strategies and
recommendations, which still must be
translated to a specific solution. However, these
strategies and recommendations already
successfully resolved similar contradictions in
the past, which means that by re-using them we
significantly increase our chance to find a
needed solution. Now our task is to apply these
recommendations and come up with new
ideas within the context of our problems.
Examples of using 40 Inventive Principles in
various non-technological areas.

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Now, what to “take away” in the second
problem? Exhibitions are needed to expose
products of the company. Therefore, the products
should be taken away! A solution to the marketing
problem was to complete the marketing team as
planned and participate in full only in most
important exhibitions with the company’s own
booths. As soon as new marketing professionals
joined the company, they were requested to
search for those businesses which would be willing to share a booth and co-promote
products, thus significantly cutting expenses for the exhibition fees. Was contradiction
resolved in a win-win way? Certainly yes, since the company increased their
marketing force just as planned, and at the same time exhibited their products at all
exhibitions, exactly as planned. Of course, someone can argue that co-promoting
products might decrease the marketing performance, but this is already a new
problem which again might require breakthrough thinking. How to make co-
promotion of products to be more effective? Even more effective, than just promotion
of a single product? Is this problem solvable? Absolutely, yes. We just must find how,
and we have tools for that. To some, the solution with copromotion might seem to be
too far away from the recommendation “take away”. It is not so if you know TRIZ. First,
the inventive principles serve as triggers to activate our creative imagination. But
second, if you know TRIZ well, you know one of the underlying mechanisms of systems
evolution: integration to more complex structures by merging two or more systems.
This knowledge helps to come up with best ideas much quicker. We will discuss TRIZ
trends of systems evolution below in the article.

Another important issue is what to consider as “business innovation”. In technology,
innovation means successful introduction of an invention to the market, which is a
patented or a patentable solution thus unknown to anyone in the past. In business, a
solution can be new if it has never been used before in an organization, and as long
as it solves a problem, it can be also regarded as innovative. For instance, the idea of
product co-branding is well known in the business world, but each new case of co-
branding be treated as innovative as well. But the degree of “innovativeness” of
solutions can be different. TRIZ recognizes 5 different levels of innovative solutions [1],
and their description can be found in almost every introductory TRIZ text.

The bottom line: working with TRIZ on difficult and complex problems, instead of time-
consuming and often inefficient exploration of all possible ideas, we are directly
guided towards the area of so-called “strong” solutions, and, ultimately, to the area
of solutions with the highest degree of ideality.

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Dealing with psychological inertia. With random methods, we might be looking for a
black cat in a dark forest without a flashlight. The bigger the forest is, the less chance
is to find the cat. With TRIZ, we are directly directed to the area of solutions which are
most relevant to our problem.
THINKING WITH IDEALITY
Ideality is one of the key concepts of TRIZ. The degree of ideality indicates a ratio
between the perceived value delivered by a certain system, product or service and
all types of expenses and investments needed to produce this value. In short, the
degree of ideality is defined as useful functionality of a system minus all negative
factors that diminish its value and divided by costs.

For instance, if I plan to purchase a notebook PC and I find one with excellent
performance, but it is too heavy and noisy, I probably will not buy it. I will also avoid
buying a very lightweight, silent but slow notebook PC. In fact, I want a notebook PC
with great performance, extremely lightweight, with a battery which lasts not hours
but years, which never breaks, and preferably for free! Which means, in the TRIZ terms,

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I want an “ideal” notebook PC. In TRIZ, the formula of ideality is qualitative, and usually
serves to compare different solutions to the same problem.

Ideality is a powerful concept since it requires defining an ultimate system – an
“ideal” system. An ideal system is a system which does not exists, but its function is
delivered. Altshuller noted that increasing of the degree of ideality is a trend which
governs evolution of almost each technical system. The same happens with business
systems: the more we can deliver with less, the more effective and efficient the system
will be. For instance, introducing IT support helps businesses to greatly reduce
expenses by automating business processes. Using web-based marketing through
social networks helps entrepreneurs reach millions of potential customers around the
globe without leaving a house. Of course, a completely ideal system may not exist
due to the law of energy preservation but keeping the concept of ideality in mind
when solving problems or designing new systems provides a platform for the “right
thinking”. Although modern management methods, such as “Lean” and Six Sigma
also increase the degree of ideality, they only do it within certain limits, while TRIZ
techniques help to provide disruptive changes to drastically increase the degree of
ideality of systems. Therefore, many Six Sigma specialists take TRIZ training and
integrate TRIZ with Six Sigma practices; see, for instance.

FINDING A RIGHT PROBLEM IS A PROBLEM TOO

In many situations, just to define and attack a single contradiction might not be
enough. Difficult problems and complex challenges are usually featured by many
interrelated contradictions. In many cases, resolving one contradiction might not
necessarily provide us with expected results. Changing one part of a system usually
causes changes in the other parts too, therefore we need to recognize and deal with
system complexity to move in a right direction and try see “a whole picture” as much
as possible. The better we define all involved and underlying sub-problems which
compose an overall problem, the easier it will be to understand the roots of
contradictions and find exactly at what level a problem must be solved.

TRIZ proposes several tools and techniques to recognize and present problems
within systems. To define problems in terms of contradictions, at ICG T&C, we
introduced a technique called “Root-Conflict Analysis” (RCA+). The technique helps
with top-down decomposition of a general problem defined as a negative or
ineffective result to a tree of interrelated contradictions [16,18]. Depending on a
problem, a resulting RCA+ diagram can include from one to 20-30 and even more
contradictions. RCA+ also includes specific recommendations how to select
contradictions to solve the problem in most effective and efficient ways.

Although RCA+ was introduced only a dozen years ago, it has been already
successfully applied to over thousands of real-life projects from both technological
and business areas. In addition to its modeling power, the use of RCA+ considerably
structures and clarifies thinking with TRIZ and helps to learn TRIZ faster.

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A typical RCA+ Diagram of a business problem
Another TRIZ tool is known as Function Analysis [20]). This technique helps to
identify negative, insufficient, or poorly controllable interactions within a system, and
locate “sore” points in various types of systems. The techniques can be applied in
technology, supply chains, organizations, business services, and so forth. What is also
important, analysis of functional interactions helps to reveal “hidden” undesired
interactions which either lower the system’s performance or can be sources of
potential failures, thus uncovering potential for further improvement.

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Another technique which is based on exploring a system functionality to extract
problems and based on causal approach is “Problem Formulator”, developed and
introduced by Ideation International. There are reports available about successful
application of this technique for Business Process Improvement.
“Basic xTRIZ” PROCESS
To support a problem-solving process with TRIZ for Business and Management, we
developed a process called “Basic xTRIZ”:
1. Situation Analysis and Problem Formulation: Understanding what a problem
situation is, documenting a problem, defining solution criteria, constraints, goals, and
targets.
2. Problem Mapping and Decomposing: application of RCA+ to decompose a
general problem and create a map of manageable contradictions.
3. Key Issue or Problem Selection: Identifying what critical conflicts (contradictions)
should be resolved to achieve the expected results.
4. Using TRIZ Patterns to Generate Solution Ideas: application of TRIZ techniques, such
as Contradiction Matrix and Inventive Principles to eliminate selected conflicts,
generation of new solution ideas.
5. Building Ideas Portfolio: composing a tree of generated ideas.
6. Scoring and Selection of best Solution Candidates: applying Multi-Criteria Decision
Matrix to evaluate the Idea Portfolio and identify best solution candidates.

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This process supports a logical transition from a problem to a portfolio of innovative
ideas. Each phase of the process provides outcome which serves as input data for
the next phase. A case study with Basic xTRIZ is presented in [18].
THERE IS MORE IN TRIZ: CREATING WHAT’S NEXT
In the previous part of the paper we investigated how the “problem-solving” part of
TRIZ can be used for business problems. However, TRIZ is not only about problem
solving. In fact, problem solving in TRIZ is regarded as a part of a process of systems
evolution, and therefore a large part of modern TRIZ foundations is formed by the
Theory of Technical Systems Evolution. This theory studies patterns, trends, and
regularities which govern evolution of the technological world [19]. Again, both
technological systems and business systems are examples of artificial systems created
by a human mind; therefore, we can assume that again, the underlying principles of
systems evolution are if not identical, then at least similar. During evolution, these
systems experience similar types of barriers, and we use quite similar patterns to
overcome these barriers. Many people with TRIZ knowledge and experience can
quickly recognize the patterns of “classical” TRIZ in virtually every area of human
activity.
Breakthrough solutions, which are sometimes called “disruptive” innovations, do not
appear out of the blue: they emerge as a response to the necessity to go beyond
limitations and constraints imposed by old solutions. Just like digital photography
replaced analog photo films and disrupted the photo industry, a new business model
of combining Apple’s iPod™ with iTunes™ service disrupted already existing market
of digital music players. iPod™ itself was not a big innovation – there were already
dozens of brands on the market, but it won over thanks to Apple innovative business
model.
A question is: are such changes predictable? And the answer is, yes. This is due to the
fact that TRIZ explores not only certain specific trends, but generic lines of evolution
which specify successive transformations experienced by a system’s or some system
component structure from the moment of started delivering the needed functionality
to delivering functionality with the highest degree of ideality. Compare the first Ford
car and a modern Ferrari. Or a start-up company and a major player on the global
market it wants to eventually become. During evolution, both systems experience
many qualitative transformations to respond changing and growing market demands
– quality, safety, reliability, comfortability, and so on. Yes, both systems operate on

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radically different principles: a car is based on the laws and principles of physics and
chemistry, while a company is based on business, psychological, market, and social
laws and principles. But when we consider both systems at a higher plane, we will see
that both a car and a company can be presented as networks (systems) of generic
components which deliver certain functions, process either material or information,
are engaged in transactions, interact with other components of outer systems,
provide reactions and feedback, and so forth. If you feed wrong oil to a car engine,
the car will break. If you feed wrong information to a company, the company will
break, too.
Thus, a while ago, we formulated a daring hypothesis: many of the generic evolution
lines which were uncovered by “technological” TRIZ could be successfully used within
the business systems and environments. Over the time, it appeared to be true. Let us
have a look, for example, at one of the trends of evolution of classical TRIZ: a so-called
“Trend of Dynamics Growth”, which states that “A component of a system, which
experiences the ever-growing demands of environment, tends to increase its degree
of dynamics (or, degree of freedom in other words) during evolution.” This line of
evolution for technical (physical) systems looks as follows:

One of the contradictions driving evolution of a mobile phone is a size of a phone vs.
ergonomics and functionality. A contradiction is that we want to have a large screen,
but we do not like to increase the overall dimensions of the phone. This contradiction
is being solved in many different ways, and one of them is to increase the degree of
dynamics of the phone. For instance, a “flip-flop” design of the phone makes it
possible to have both a large screen and large keypad, and to avoid increasing the
overall sizes of the phone when the phone is not used. Finally, a screen of the phone
can be reduced if we can use a projecting system which projects image on a wall or
any other available surface.
This line of evolution does not mean that products created at each new step will
replace products created at the previous steps, since all depends on the ideality and
purposes of newly proposed solutions. It is not always the case when a new product

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will be superior in every aspect, therefore both new generations and previous
generations can co-exist and take their own niches on the market.
Now, the same trend of Dynamics Growth for business systems and services. Its
formulation is slightly different from the “technological” trend:

Let us have a look, for example, at the evolution of a news media company: from a
large company of the beginning of the 20th century which used numerous staff to
gather news, and then printed and distributed newspapers, to a network of
companies which delivered different functionality and, as one of the possible
scenarios of the nearest future – to a completely web-based media company which
uses sophisticated software and numerous bloggers to present and comment on the
latest news. Will this be the final step in evolution of mass media delivering news? No.
Because thanks to TRIZ we know how systems tend to evolve even when they reach
a final phase of evolution along a certain trend.
In a “flat” world [4], where the borders of a physical world are quickly removed, only
dynamic business structures will succeed. If yesterday a circle of potential clients for a
oneman consulting business could be reliable protected by geographic location,
today, thanks to the Internet, a consultant in Boston can lose against a consultant
from Singapore if the latter takes a higher position among search results produced by
Google or Yahoo. But application of this trend should always be considered at both
macro- and micro-scales: When we look at the first phase of a system – non-dynamic
system, we can talk about both some large company itself and a small group in that
company. They both can be considered non-dynamic and follow the evolutionary
path defined by the trend of Dynamics Growth. As well as a large business process
and any its smaller event.
Why iPod™ won over other music players? Not only because of design and sound
quality. But because in combination with online services, it offers great dynamics and
flexibility. You can quickly find and upload songs, delete songs you do not like, shuffle,
create play lists, watch video, connect, etc. Should business services be similar to
iPod™? Certainly. They already tend to become more and more dynamic. These

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companies which will permanently upgrade their services, add new parts to the
existing service, eliminate unneeded parts, customize configurations, involve third
parties and users to the process will win, or, at least, stay alive.
Therefore, it is not a surprise that the Trend of Dynamics Growth complies with one the
rules defined by Jack Welch’s (former CEO of General Electric) key business
strategy:
“Business leaders who treat change like the enemy will fail at their jobs. Change is the
one constant, and successful business leaders must be able to read the ever-
changing business environment.” [11].
ROADMAPPING THE FUTURE
Thanks to TRIZ, now we better understand mechanisms of evolution of man-made
systems. Knowing TRIZ trends of evolution we can evaluate where our business system
or business product is today, how it has been evolving, what contradictions drive
evolution of the system and identify its evolutionary potential.
To decide what part of our business model or our value proposition we would like to
innovatively improve, we use a tool “Value-Conflict Mapping” which helps to extract
barriers existing within a business model which prevent from meeting critical current
and future demands [21]. VCM is performed by completing a table which matches
customer demands and market trends with certain parts of a system and their
properties responsible for fulfilling the demands and trends. The methods help to
establish the contradictions between the key market demands and trends and the
components of a current system being analyzed.

Understanding the underlying mechanisms of man-made systems evolution,
knowledge of the trends and patterns of evolution help us to organize and establish

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a process of forecasting what will happen next with our system, product, or service.
But this is not exactly a forecast process. By applying the patterns of evolution, we
come up with new ideas and solutions during the process. Therefore, we do not merely
forecast but create new ideas during the process, and the output of such process is
a roadmap with a number of new ideas on what to turn our system into in the future.
TRIZ FOR BUSINESS AND MANAGEMENT: A ROADMAP
TRIZ is not a single technique or a method, therefore we need a roadmap which helps
to select which techniques of TRIZ should be used to deal with one or another situation
and define a strategy in each particular situation. A sample roadmap which we
introduced at ICG T&C divides all situations to four categories and proposes a relevant
set of tools/techniques together with a process for each category. Some parts of the
Roadmap are already well elaborated, and some require additional research and
polishing.
This roadmap is only limited to presenting key techniques of TRIZ for Business and
Management, and each process might include a number of additional tools which
are used during the process, such as Multi-Screen Diagram, Comparative Ranking,
Multi-Criteria Decision Matrix, and so forth.

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EXAMPLES OF USING TRIZ IN BUSINESS AND MANAGEMENT
Since 1999, I have been more and more involved to developing and using TRIZ for
Business and Management Applications. The list below is based on real experience
and highlights some real projects where TRIZ was used:
• Increasing sales effectiveness (industry)
• Generating a new marketing concept which helped to increase sales (IT services)
• Resolving a number of conflicts within a supply chain (industry)
• Inventing a new business model (marketing services)
• Resolving conflicts during corporate merger (telecom industry)
• Increasing performance of a training process (financial services)
• Discovering a new market for a service (agriculture)
• Defining a range of new business products and combinations “product-service”
(agriculture)
• Increasing the degree of ideality of a service: increasing value while lowering costs
(automotive services)
• Predicting potential failures of a new business model (financial services)
• Generating radically new advertising concepts (IT industry)
• Predicting short- and long-term evolution of a specific service (IT services)

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CONCLUSIONS

This paper was supposed to provide a reader with a very brief overview of what TRIZ
can bring to the business world to enhance and accelerate business and
management innovation. Although introduced very recently, TRIZ for Business and
Management has proven its effectiveness on a number of successful case studies. We
need to further study business specific trends and patterns of business systems
evolution, create business-specific databases, and so forth. But the same applies to
TRIZ itself – it has been ever-evolving science. And as practice shows, even with a
current body of TRIZ knowledge for Business and Management we can successfully
solve problems and come up with new innovative solutions. The power of analytical
tools of TRIZ is that they can be used to identify broad range of problems and
challenges, while TRIZ patterns and problem-solving techniques can help to generate
better ideas. TRIZ can also be integrated with other methodologies, like QFD, FMEA,
Technology Road mapping, Six Sigma.

But what really matters is not amount of information in the TRIZ databases, but a new
way of breakthrough thinking proposed by TRIZ: coming up with successful innovative
ideas through eliminating contradictions towards ideality. Instead blind search and
jumping to ideas and conclusions too fast, we thoroughly analyze a situation, reveal
contradictions, and resolve them in “win-win” way. Understanding the mechanisms of
systematic evolution and can help businesses to define strategic development based
on a scientifically-grounded approach rather than on guesses, trials and errors. This
way of thinking will enrich everyone who wants to stay at the leading edge of
innovation. TRIZ for business and management can be used at both large
multinational enterprises and small businesses run by entrepreneurs.

About the author:

Valeri Souchkov, certified TRIZ Master has been involved with TRIZ and Systematic Innovation
since co-founding Invention Machine Labs in Minsk, Belarus in 1988. Since that time, he
partnered with several organizations and trained and consulted customers worldwide, among
which are a number of Fortune 500 companies. He is the author or RCA+, a technique which
is used to support analysis of innovative situations. In 2000, he initiated and cofounded the
European TRIZ Association ETRIA and since 2003 heads ICG Training and Consulting
(www.xtriz.com), a company in the Netherlands that develops, uses and promotes techniques
and tools of Systematic Innovation for commercial and government organizations in
technology and business areas. Valeri Souchkov is also an invited lecturer of the University of
Twente and TIAS Business School on TRIZ and Systematic Innovation. He can be reached at
[email protected]

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40 Inventive Principles with Examples

Principle 1 Segmentation

A. Divide an object into independent parts
- Different focal length lenses for a camera
- Gator-grip socket spanner
- Multi-pin connectors
- Multiple pistons in an internal combustion engine
- Multi-engine aircraft
- Stratification of different constituents inside a chemical process vessel

B. Make an object sectional - easy to assemble or disassemble
- Rapid-release fasteners for bicycle saddle/wheel/etc.
- Quick disconnect joints in plumbing and hydraulic systems
- Single fastener V-band clamps on flange joints
- Loose-leaf paper in a ring binder

C. Increase the degree of fragmentation or segmentation
- Multiple control surfaces on aerodynamic structures
- 16 and 24 valve versus 8 valve internal combustion engines
- Multi-zone combustion system
- Build up a component from layers (e.g. stereo-lithography, welds, etc)

Principle 2 Taking out

A. Extract the disturbing part or property from an object
- Non-smoking areas in restaurants or in railway carriages
- Children-only areas in public places and home
- Sunday school
- Public bars and lounge bars in pubs
- Women or men only bars / waiting rooms
- Air Conditioning in the room where you want it with the noise of the
system outside the room
(The contradiction here is noise vs coolness- the cooler it gets the noisier it
gets- this solves the contradiction by putting the noise elsewhere )

B. Extract the only necessary part (or property) of an object
- Scarecrow
- Sound of a barking dog (with no dog) as a burglar alarm
- Economy class on planes (travel but no frills)
(This involves understanding all the functionality and selecting only what you
want- e.g. windows provide ventilation and light - with air conditioning you
may not need windows which open)

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Principle 3 Local quality

A. Change of an object's structure from uniform to non-uniform
- Reduce drag on aerodynamic surfaces by adding riblets or 'shark-skin'
protrusions
- Molded hand grips on tools
- Drink cans shaped to facilitate stable stacking
- Material surface treatments / coatings - plating,
- Erosion / corrosion protection, case hardening, non-stick, etc.

B. Change an action or an external environment (or external influence) from
uniform to non-uniform
- Introduce turbulent flow around an object to alter heat transfer
properties
- Strobe lighting
- Take account of extremes of weather conditions when designing
outdoor systems
- Use a gradient instead of constant temperature, density, or pressure

C. Make each part of an object function in conditions most suitable for its
operation
- Freezer compartment in refrigerator
- Different zones in the combustion system of an engine
- Night-time adjustment on a rear-view mirror
- Lunch box with special compartments for hot and cold solid foods and
for liquids

D. Make each part of an object fulfil a different and/or complementary useful
function
- Swiss-Army knife
- Combined can and bottle opener
- Sharp and blunt end of a drawing pin
- Rubber on the end of a pencil
- Hammer with nail puller

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Principle 4 Asymmetry

A. Change the shape or properties of an object from symmetrical to
asymmetrical
- Asymmetrical funnel allows higher flow-rate than normal funnel
- Put a flat spot on a cylindrical shaft to attach a locking feature
- Oval and complex shaped O-rings
- Coated glass or paper
- Electric Plug
- Introduction of angled or scarfed geometry features on component
edges
- Cutaway on a guitar improves access to high notes
- Spout of a jug
- Cam
- Ratchet
- Aerofoil – asymmetry generates lift
- Eccentric drive
- Keys

B. Change the shape of an object to suit external asymmetries
(e.g. ergonomic features)
- Human-shaped seating, etc
- Design for left and right handed users
- Finger and thumb grip features on objects
- Spectacles
- Car steering system compensates for camber in road
- Wing design compensated for asymmetric flow produced by propeller
- Turbomachinery design for boundary layer flows (‘end-bend’)

C. If an object is asymmetrical, increase its degree of asymmetry
- Use of variable control surfaces to alter lift properties of an aircraft wing
- Special connectors with complex shape/pin configurations to ensure
correct assembly
- Introduction of several different measurement scales on a ruler

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Principle 5 Merging

A. Bring closer together (or merge) identical or similar objects or operations in
space
- Automatic rifle / machine gun
- Multi-color ink cartridges
- Multi-blade razors
- Bi-focal lens spectacles
- Double / triple glazing
- Strips of staples
- Catamaran / trimaran

B. Make objects or operations contiguous or parallel; bring them together in
time
- Combine harvester
- Manufacture cells
- Grass collector on a lawn-mower
- Mixer taps
- Pipe-lined computer processors perform different stages in a calculation
simultaneously
- Vector processors perform the same process on several sets of data in a
single pass
- Fourier analysis – integration of many sine curves

Principle 6 Universality

A. Make an object perform multiple functions; eliminate the need for other
parts
- Child's car safety seat converts to a pushchair
- Home entertainment center
- Swiss Army knife
- Grill in a microwave oven
- CD used as a storage medium for multiple data types
- Cleaning strip at beginning of a cassette tape cleans tape heads
- Cordless drill also acts as screwdriver, sander, polisher, etc

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Principle 7 Nested Doll

A. Place one object inside another
- Retractable aircraft under-carriage
- Voids in 3D structures
- Injected cavity-wall insulation
- Paint-brush attached to inside of lid of nail-varnish, etc.
- Lining inside a coat

B. Place multiple objects inside others
- Nested tables
- Telescope
- Measuring cups or spoons
- Stacking chairs
- Multi-layer erosion/corrosion coatings

C. Make one part pass (dynamically) through a cavity in the other
- Telescopic car aerial
- Retractable power-lead in vacuum cleaner
- Seat belt retraction mechanism
- Tape measure

Principle 8 Anti-Weight

A. To compensate for the weight of an object, merge it with other objects that
provide lift
- Kayak with foam floats built into hull cannot sink
- Aerostatic aero plane contains lighter-than-air pockets
- Hot air or helium balloon
- Swim-bladder inside a fish
- Flymo cutting blade produces lift

B. To compensate for the weight of an object, make it interact with the
environment (use aerodynamic, hydrodynamic, buoyancy and other forces)
- Vortex generators improve lift of aircraft wings
- Wing-in-ground effect aircraft
- Hydrofoils lift ship out of the water to reduce drag
- Make use of centrifugal forces in rotating systems (e.g. Watt governor)
- Maglev train uses magnetic repulsion to reduce friction

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Principle 9 Prior Counteraction

A. When it is necessary to perform an action with both harmful and useful
effects, this should be replaced with counteractions to control harmful effects
- Make clay pigeons out of ice or dung - they just melt away
- Masking objects before harmful exposure: use a lead apron for X-rays,
use masking tape when painting difficult edges etc.
- Predict effects of signal distortion - compensate before transmitting
- Buffer a solution to prevent harm from extremes of pH

B. Create beforehand stresses in an object that will oppose known
undesirable working stresses later on
- Pre-stress rebar before pouring concrete
- Pre-stressed bolts
- Decompression chamber to prevent divers getting the bends

Principle 10 Prior Action

A. Perform the required change of an object in advance
- Pre-pasted wall paper
- Sterilize all instruments needed for a surgical procedure
- Self-adhesive stamps
- Holes cut before sheet-metal part formed
- Pre-impregnated carbon fiber reduces lay-up time and improves
"wetting"

B. Pre-arrange objects such that they can come into action from the most
convenient place and without losing time for their delivery
- Manufacture flow-lines
- Pre-deposited blade in a surgery cast facilitates removal
- Car jack, wheel brace, and spare tire stored together
- Collect all the tools and materials for the job before starting

Principle 11 Cushion in Advance

A. Prepare emergency means beforehand to compensate for the relatively low
reliability of an object (‘belt and braces’)
- Multi-channel control system
- Air-bag in a car / Spare wheel / Battery back-up / Back-up parachute
- Pressure relief valve
- Emergency lighting circuit
- Automatic save operations performed by computer programs
- Crash barriers on motorways
- ‘Touch-down’ bearing in magnetic bearing system

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Principle 12 Equipotentiality

A. If an object has to be raised or lowered, redesign the object’s environment
so the need to raise or lower is eliminated or performed by the environment
- Canal locks
- Spring loaded parts delivery system in a factory
- Mechanic’s pit in a garage means car does not have to be lifted
- Place a heavy object on ice, and let ice melt in order to lower it
- Angle-poise lamp; changes in gravitational potential stored in springs
- Descending cable cars balance the weight of ascending cars

Principle 13 The Other Way Round

A. Invert the action used to solve the problem
- To loosen stuck parts, cool the inner part instead of heating the outer
part
- Vacuum casting
- Rotary engines
- Test pressure vessel by varying pressure outside rather than inside
- Test seal on a liquid container by filling with pressurized air and
immersing in liquid; trails of bubbles are easier to trace than slow liquid
leaks

B. Make movable parts (or the external environment) fixed, and fixed parts
movable
- Hamster wheel
- Escalator
- Rotate the part instead of the tool
- Wind tunnels
- Moving sidewalk with standing people
- Drive through restaurant or bank

C. Turn the object (or process) 'upside down'.
- Clean bottles by inverting and injecting water from below
- Turn an assembly upside down to insert fasteners

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Principle 14 Spheroidality – Curvature

A. Move from flat surfaces to spherical ones and from parts shaped as a cube
(parallelepiped) to ball-shaped structures
- Use arches and domes for strength in architecture
- Introduce fillet radii between surfaces at different angles
- Introduce stress relieving holes at the ends of slots
- Change curvature on lens to alter light deflection properties
B. Use rollers, balls, spirals
- Spiral gear (Nautilus) produces continuous resistance for weight lifting
- Ball point and roller point pens for smooth ink distribution
- Use spherical casters instead of cylindrical wheels to move furniture
- Archimedes screw
C. Go from linear to rotary motion (or vice versa)
- Rotary actuators in hydraulic system
- Switch from reciprocating to rotary pump
- Push/pull versus rotary switches (e.g. lighting dimmer switch)
- Linear motors
- Linear versus rotating tracking arm on a record turntable ensures
constant angle of stylus relative to groove
- Screw-thread versus nail
D. Use centrifugal forces
- Centrifugal casting for even wall thickness structures
- Spin components after painting to remove excess paint
- Remove water from clothes with a spin dryer rather than a mangle
- Separate chemicals with different density properties using a centrifuge
- Watt governor
- Vortex/cyclone separates different density objects

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Principle 15 Dynamics

A. Change the object (or outside environment) for optimal performance at
every stage of operation
- Gel fillings inside seat allow it to adapt to user
- Adjustable steering wheel (or seat, or back support, or mirror position...)
- Shape memory alloys/polymers
- Racing car suspension adjustable for different tracks and driving
techniques
- Car handbrake adjustable to account for brake pad wear
- Telescopic curtain rail - "one size fits all"

B. Divide an object into parts capable of movement relative to each other
- Bifurcated bicycle saddle
- Articulated lorry
- Folding chair/mobile phone/laptop/etc
- Collapsible structures
- Brush seals

C. Change from immobile to mobile
- Bendy drinking straw
- Flexible joint
- Collapsible hose is flexible in use, and has additional flexibility of crosssection
to make it easier to store

D. Increase the degree of free motion
- Use of different stiffness fibres in toothbrush – easily deflected at the
edges to prevent gum damage, hard in the middle
- Flexible drive allows motion to be translated around bends
- Loose sand inside truck tyre gives it self-balancing properties at speed
- Add joints to robot arm to increase motion possibilities

Principle 16 Partial or Excessive Action

A. If you can’t achieve 100 percent of a desired effect - then go for more or
less
- Over spray when painting, then remove excess
- Fill, then "top off" when pouring a pint of Guinness
- Shrink wrapping process uses plastic deformation of wrapping to
accommodate variations in vacuum pressure
- ‘Roughing’ and ‘Finish’ machining operations
- Over-fill holes with plaster and then rub back to smooth

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Principle 17 Another Dimension

A. Move into an additional dimension - from one to two - from two to three
- Coiled telephone wire
- Curved bristles on a brush
- Pizza-box with ribbed (as opposed to flat) base
- Spiral staircase uses less floor area
- Introduction of down and up slopes between stations on railway reduces
overall power requirements
B. Go from single storey or layer to multi-storey or multi-layered
- Player with many CDs
- Stacked or multi-layered circuit boards
- Multi-storey office blocks or car-parks
C. Incline an object, lay it on its side
- Cars on road transporter inclined to save space
D. Use the other side
- Press a groove onto both sides of a record
- Mount electronic components on both sides of a circuit board
- Print text around the rim of a coin
- Paper clip - works by pressing both sides of paper together

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Principle 18 Mechanical Vibration

A. Cause an object to oscillate or vibrate
- Electric carving knife with vibrating blades
- Shake/stir paint to mix before applying
- Hammer drill
- Vibration exciter removes voids from poured concrete
- Vibrate during sieving operations to improve throughput
- Musical instrument

B. Increase its frequency (even up to the ultrasonic)
- Dog-whistle (transmit sound outside human range)
- Ultrasonic cleaning
- Non-destructive crack detection using ultrasound

C. Use an object's resonant frequency
- Destroy gallstones or kidney stones using ultrasonic resonance
- Bottle cleaning by pulsing water jet at resonant frequency of bottles
- Tuning fork
- Increase action of a catalyst by vibrating it at its resonant frequency

D. Use piezoelectric vibrators instead of mechanical ones
- Quartz crystal oscillations drive high accuracy clocks
- Piezoelectric vibrators improve fluid atomisation from a spray nozzle
- Optical phase modulator

E. Use combined ultrasonic and electromagnetic field oscillations
- Mixing alloys in an induction furnace
- Sono-chemistry
- Ultrasonic drying of films – combine ultrasonic with heat source

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Principle 19 Periodic Action

A. Instead of continuous action, use periodic or pulsating actions
- Hitting something repeatedly with a hammer
- Pile drivers and hammer drills exert far more force for a given weight
- Replace a continuous siren with a pulsed sound
- Pulsed bicycle lights make cyclist more noticeable to drivers
- Pulsed vacuum cleaner suction improves collection performance
- Pulsed water jet cutting
- ABS car braking systems

B. If an action is already periodic, change the periodic magnitude or
frequency
- Improve a pulsed siren with changing amplitude and frequency
- Dots and dashes in Morse Code transmissions
- Use AM, FM, PWM to transmit information

C. Use pauses between actions to perform a different action
- Clean barrier filters by back-flushing them when not in use
- Inkjet printer cleans heads between passes
- Brush between suction pulses in vacuum cleaner
- Multiple conversations on the same telephone transmission line
- Use of energy storage means – e.g. batteries, fly-wheels, etc

Principle 20 Continuity of Useful Action

A. Carry on work without a break. All parts of an object operating
constantly at full capacity
- Flywheel stores energy when a vehicle stops, so the motor can keep
running at optimum power
- Constant output gas turbine in hybrid car, or APU in aircraft, runs at
highest efficiency all the time it is switched on
- Constant speed / variable pitch propeller
- Self-tuning engine – constantly tunes itself to ensure maximum efficiency
- Heart pacemaker
- Improve composting process by continuously turning material
- Continuous glass or steel production

B. Eliminate all idle or intermittent motion
- Self-cleaning / self-emptying filter eliminates down-time
- Print during the return of a printer carriage - dot matrix printer, daisy
wheel printers, inkjet printers
- Digital storage media allow ‘instant’ information access
- Kayaks use double-ended paddle to utilise recovery stroke
- Computer operating systems utilise idle periods to perform necessary
housekeeping tasks

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Principle 21 Rushing Through

A. Conduct a process, or certain stages of it (e.g. destructible, harmful or
hazardous operations) at high speed
- Cut plastic faster than heat can propagate in the material, to avoid
deforming the shape
- Shatter toffee with a hammer blow
- Drop forge
- Flash photography
- Super-critical shaft – run through resonant modes quickly
- Bikini waxing (ouch!)

Principle 22 Blessing in Disguise

A. Use harmful factors (particularly, harmful effects of the environment or
surroundings) to achieve a positive effect
- Use waste heat to generate electric power
- Recycle scrap material as raw materials for another – e.g. chipboard
- Vaccination
- Lower body temperature to slow metabolism during operations
- Composting
- Use centrifugal energy in rotating shaft to do something useful – e.g.
seal, or modulate cooling air
- Use pressure differences to help rather than hinder seal performance

B. Eliminate the primary harmful action by adding it to another harmful
action to resolve the problem
- Add a buffering material to a corrosive solution (e.g. an alkali to an acid,
or vice versa)
- Use a helium-oxygen mix for diving, to eliminate both nitrogen narcosis
and oxygen poisoning from air and other nitrox mixes
- Use gamma rays to detect positron emissions from explosives

C. Amplify a harmful factor to such a degree that it is no longer harmful
- Use a backfire to eliminate the fuel from a forest fire
- Use explosives to blow out an oil-well fire
- Laser-knife cauterizes skin/blood vessels as it cuts

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Principle 23 Feedback

A. Introduce feedback to improve a process or action
- Automatic volume control in audio circuits
- Signal from gyrocompass is used to control simple aircraft autopilots
- Engine management system based on exhaust gas levels is more
efficient than carburettor
- Thermostat controls temperature accurately
- Statistical Process Control - measurements are used to decide when to
modify a process
- Feedback turns inaccurate op-amp into useable accurate amplifier
B. If feedback is already used, change its magnitude or influence in
accordance with operating conditions
- Change sensitivity of an autopilot when within 5 miles of an airport
- Change sensitivity of a thermostat when cooling vs. heating, since it
uses energy less efficiently when cooling
- Use proportional, integral and/or differential control algorithm
combinations

Principle 24 Intermediary

A. Use an intermediary carrier article or intermediary process
- Play a guitar with a plectrum
- Use a chisel to control rock breaking/sculpting process
- Dwell period during a manufacture process operation
B. Merge one object temporarily with another (which can be easily removed)
- Gloves to get hot dishes out of an oven
- Joining papers with a paper clip
- Introduction of catalysts into chemical reaction
- Abrasive particles enhance water jet cutting
- Bouquet garni in cooking

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Principle 25 Self-Service

A. An object must service itself by performing auxiliary helpful functions
- A soda fountain pump that runs on the pressure of the carbon dioxide
used to carbonate the drinks. If it won’t fizz, it’s empty!
- Halogen lamps regenerate the filament - evaporated material is redeposited
- Self-aligning / self-adjusting seal
- Self-cleaning oven / glass / material
- Abradable materials used in gas turbines such that initial running-in ‘cuts’
optimum seals into lining

B. Use waste resources, energy, or substances
- Use heat from a process to generate electricity: co-generation
- Use animal waste as fertilizer
- Use food and lawn waste to create compost
- Use pressure difference to reinforce seal action

Principle 26 Copying

A. Replace unavailable, expensive or fragile object with available or
inexpensive copies
- Imitation jewellery
- Astroturf
- Crash test dummy

B. Replace an object, or process with optical copies
- Do surveying from space photographs instead of on the ground
- Measure an object by scaling measurements from a photograph
- Virtual reality / Virtual mock-ups / electronic pre-assembly modelling

C. If visible optical copies are used, move to infrared or ultraviolet copies
- Make images in infrared to detect heat sources, such as diseases in
crops, or intruders in a security system
- Use UV as a non-destructive crack detection method
- UV light used to attract flying insects into trap

Principle 27 Cheap Short-Living Objects

A. Replace an expensive object with a multiple of inexpensive objects,
compromising certain qualities, such as service life
- Disposable nappies / paper-cups / plates / cameras / torches etc
- Matches versus lighters
- Throw-away cigarette lighters
- Sacrificial coatings / components

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Principle 28 Replace Mechanical System

A. Replace a mechanical system with a sensory one
- Replace a physical barrier with an acoustic one (audible to animals)
- Add a bad smell to natural gas to alert users to leaks
- Finger-print/retina/etc scan instead of a key
- Voice activated telephone dialling

B. Use electric, magnetic and electromagnetic fields to interact with the
object
- To mix 2 powders, electrostatically charge one positive and the other
negative
- Electrostatic precipitators separate particles from airflow
- Improve efficiency of paint-spraying by oppositely charging paint
droplets and object to be painted
- Magnetic bearings
- Field activated switches

C. Replace stationary fields with moving; unstructured fields with
structured
- Early communications used omni-directional broadcasting. We now use
antennas with very detailed structure of the pattern of radiation
- Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) scanner

D. Use fields in conjunction with field-activated (e.g. ferromagnetic)
particles
- Heat a substance containing ferromagnetic material by using varying
magnetic field. When the temperature exceeds the Curie point, the
material becomes paramagnetic, and no longer absorbs heat
- Magneto-rheological effect – uses ferromagnetic particles and variable
magnetic field to alter the viscosity of a fluid
- Ferro-magnetic catalysts
- Ferro-fluids – e.g. Magnatec oil – stay attached to surfaces requiring
lubrication

Principle 29 Pneumatics and Hydraulics

A. Use gas and liquid parts of an object instead of solid parts (e.g.
inflatable, filled with liquids, air cushion, hydrostatic, hydro-reactive)
- Transition from mechanical to hydraulic or pneumatic drive
- Inflatable furniture / mattress etc
- Gel filled saddle adapts to user
- Hollow section O-rings
- Hovercraft
- Gas bearings
- Acoustic panels incorporating Helmholtz resonators

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Principle 30 Flexible Membranes/Thin Films

A. Use flexible shells and thin films instead of three-dimensional
structures
- Use inflatable (thin film) structures
- Taut-liner trucks
- Tarpaulin car cover instead of garage
- Store energy in stretchable bags – accumulators in a hydraulic system
B. Isolate the object from its external environment using flexible
membranes
- Bubble-wrap
- Bandages/plasters
- Tea bag
- Shrink wrapping

Principle 31 Porous Materials

A. Make an object porous or add porous elements (inserts, coatings, etc.)
- Drill holes in a structure to reduce the weight
- Cavity wall insulation
- Transpiration film cooled structures
- Foam metals
- Use sponge-like structures as fluid absorption media
B. If an object is already porous, use the pores to introduce a useful
substance or function
- Use a porous metal mesh to wick excess solder away from a joint
- Store hydrogen in the pores of a palladium sponge. (Fuel "tank" for the
hydrogen car - much safer than storing hydrogen gas)
- Desiccant in polystyrene packing materials
- Medicated swabs/dressings

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Principle 32 Colour Change

A. Change the colour of an object or its external environment
- Use safe lights in a photographic darkroom
- Use colour-changing thermal paint to measure temperature
- Plastic spoon which changes colour when hot - for baby food
- Temperature-sensitive dyes used on food product labels to indicate
when desired serving temperature has been achieved
- Electrochromic glass
- Light-sensitive glasses
- Camouflage
- Dazzle camouflage used on World War 1 ships
- Employ interference fringes on surface structures to change colour (as
in butterfly wings, etc)

B. Change the transparency of an object or its external environment
- Use photolithography to change transparent material to a solid mask for
semiconductor processing
- Light-sensitive glass

C. In order to improve observability of things that are difficult to see, use
coloured additives or luminescent elements
- Fluorescent additives used during UV spectroscopy
- UV marker pens used to help identify stolen goods
- Use opposing colours to increase visibility – e.g. butchers use green
decoration to make the red in meat look redder

D. Change the emissivity properties of an object subject to radiant heating
- Use of black and white coloured panels to assist thermal management
on space vehicles
- Use of parabolic reflectors in solar panels to increase energy capture
- Paint object with high emissivity paint in order to be able to measure its
temperature with a calibrated thermal imager

Principle 33 Homogeneity

A. Objects interacting with the main object should be of same material (or
material with identical properties)
- Container made of the same material as its contents, to reduce
chemical reactions
- Friction welding requires no intermediary material between the two
surfaces to be joined
- Temporary plant pots made out of compostable material
- Human blood transfusions/transplants, use of bio-compatible materials
- Make ice-cubes out of the same fluid as the drink they are intended to
cool
- Join wooden components using (wood) dowel joints

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Principle 34 Discarding and Recovering

A. After completing their function (or becoming useless) reject objects, make
them go away, (discard them by dissolving, evaporating, etc) or modify during
the process
- Dissolving capsule for medication.
- Bio-degradable containers, bags etc.
- Casting processes – lost-wax, sand, etc.
- During firing of a rocket, foam protection is used on some elements; this
evaporates in space when shock-absorbance is no longer required

B. Restore consumable / used up parts of an object during operation
- Self-sharpening blades – knives / lawn-mowers etc
- Strimmer dispenses more wire automatically after a breakage
- Self-tuning automobile engines
- Propelling pencil
- Automatic rifle

Principle 35 Parameter Change

A. Change the physical state (e.g. to a gas, liquid, or solid)
- Transport oxygen or nitrogen or petroleum gas as a liquid, instead of a
gas, to reduce volume

B. Change the concentration or density
- Liquid soap
- Abradable linings used for gas-turbine engine seals

C. Change the degree of flexibility
- Vulcanize rubber to change its flexibility and durability
- Compliant brush seals rather than labyrinth or other fixed geometry
seals

D. Change the temperature or volume
- Raise the temperature above the Curie point to change a ferromagnetic
substance to a paramagnetic substance
- Cooking / baking etc.

E. Change the pressure
- Pressure cooker cooks more quickly and without losing flavours
- Electron beam welding in a vacuum
- Vacuum packing of perishable goods

F. Change other parameters
- Shape memory alloys/polymers
- Use Curie point to alter magnetic properties
- Thixotropic paints / gels etc.
- Use high conductivity materials – e.g. carbon fibre

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Principle 36 Phase Transition

A. Use phenomena of phase transitions (e.g. volume changes, loss or
absorption of heat, etc.)
- Latent heat effects in melting / boiling
- Soak rocks in water, then freezing causes water to expand – thus
opening fissures in rock, making it easier to break
- Heat pumps use the heat of vaporization and heat of condensation of a
closed thermodynamic cycle to do useful work
- Volume expansion during water-to-steam transition
- Superconductivity

Principle 37 Thermal Expansion

A. Use thermal expansion, or contraction, of materials
- Fit a tight joint together by cooling the inner part to contract, heating the
outer part to expand, putting the joint together, and returning to equilibrium
- Metal tie-bars used to straighten buckling walls on old buildings
- Thermal switch/cut-out
- Shape memory alloys/polymers
- Shrink-wrapping
B. Use multiple materials with different coefficients of thermal expansion
- Bi-metallic strips used for thermostats, etc
- Two-way shape memory alloys
- Passive blade tip clearance control in gas turbine engines
- Combine materials with positive and negative thermal expansion
coefficients to obtain alloys with zero (or specifically tailored) expansion
properties – e.g. cerro-tru alloy used in the mounting and location of fragile
turbine blade components during manufacture operations

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Principle 38 Accelerated Oxidation

A. Replace common air with oxygen-enriched air
- Scuba diving with Nitrox or other non-air mixtures for extended
endurance
- Place asthmatic patients in oxygen tent
- Nitrous oxide injection to provide power boost in high performance
engines

B. Replace enriched air with pure oxygen
- Cut at a higher temperature using an oxy-acetylene torch
- Treat wounds in a high pressure oxygen environment to kill anaerobic
bacteria and aid healing
- Control oxidation reactions more effectively by reacting in pure oxygen

C. Expose air or oxygen to ionising radiation
- Positive ions formed by ionising air can be deflected by magnetic field in
order to (e.g.) reduce air resistance over an aerodynamic surface
- Irradiation of food to extend shelf life
- Use ionised air to destroy bacteria and sterilise food

D. Use ionised oxygen
- Speed up chemical reactions by ionising the gas before use
- Separate oxygen from a mixed gas by ionising the oxygen

E. Replace ozonised (or ionised) oxygen with ozone
- Oxidisation of metals in bleaching solutions to reduce cost relative to
hydrogen peroxide
- Use ozone to destroy micro-organisms and toxins in corn
- Ozone dissolved in water removes organic contaminants from ship hulls

Principle 39 Inert Atmosphere

A. Replace a normal environment with an inert one
- Prevent degradation of a hot metal filament by using an argon
atmosphere
- MIG/TIG welding
- Electron beam welding conducted in a vacuum
- Vacuum packaging
- Foam to separate a fire from oxygen in air

B. Add neutral parts, or inert additives to an object
- Naval aviation fuel contains additives to alter flash point
- Add fire retardant elements to titanium to reduce possibility of titanium
fire
- Add foam to absorb sound vibrations – e.g. hi-fi speakers

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Principle 40 Composite Materials

A. Change from uniform to composite (multiple) materials
- Aircraft structures where low weight and high strength are required
- Composites in golf club shaft
- Concrete aggregate
- Glass-reinforced plastic
- Fibre-reinforced ceramics
- Hard / soft / hard multi-layer coatings to improve erosion properties

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