{"id":48855,"date":"2026-08-03T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-08-03T02:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nxpo.or.th\/th\/?p=48855"},"modified":"2026-08-05T12:05:12","modified_gmt":"2026-08-05T05:05:12","slug":"the-reverse-innovation-journey-a-new-model-for-strengthening-thailands-innovation-ecosystem-and-delivering-real-solutions-for-industry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nxpo.or.th\/th\/en\/48855\/","title":{"rendered":"The Reverse Innovation Journey: A New Model for Strengthening Thailand’s Innovation Ecosystem and Delivering Real Solutions for Industry"},"content":{"rendered":"
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One of the most significant gaps in Thailand’s innovation ecosystem is the disconnect between innovation development and actual market demand. As a result, many innovations fail to progress beyond the development stage and achieve commercial success. At the same time, however, large corporations are actively seeking innovative solutions to address business challenges, while startups possess the creativity and agility to develop technologies that meet those needs. Recognizing this opportunity, NXPO launched The Reverse Innovation Journey, a new model designed to connect large corporations with startups. Inspired by the Corporate-Startup collaboration model adopted in many countries to drive innovation, this mechanism brings large corporations and startups together to exchange ideas and co-create innovations that directly address real market needs and have stronger commercial potential.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Building effective collaboration among large corporations, startups, and researchers, however, is not always straightforward. Each group operates with different objectives, working styles, and constraints. As a result, an innovation intermediary is essential to facilitate collaboration and enable all parties to work together effectively.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Such intermediaries are often found within universities and innovation support organizations, including business incubators, science parks, innovation centers, accelerators, and University Holding Companies (UHCs). These organizations play a vital role in connecting industry, entrepreneurs, and researchers, helping translate research and innovation into solutions that address genuine market needs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To explore this approach, NXPO piloted the use of universities and related mechanisms\u2014particularly UHCs\u2014as key intermediaries linking industry, startups, and researchers. The initiative seeks to examine how these mechanisms can bridge the gap between technology developers and technology users while fostering innovations that more effectively respond to business needs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the heart of The Reverse Innovation Journey is the concept of Reverse Pitching,<\/strong> which reimagines the traditional pitching process. Rather than having startups present their solutions to large corporations, the process begins with corporations presenting their business challenges and unmet needs to startups and researchers. By giving startups a clear understanding of real market needs from the outset, they can develop innovations that address real-world challenges more effectively while reducing the problem of technology mismatch\u2014where technologies fail to align with actual market and industry needs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

NXPO piloted this model in collaboration with King Mongkut’s Institute of Technology Ladkrabang (KMITL), which served as both a strategic partner and an innovation intermediary. Working closely with large corporations, KMITL helped identify suitable business challenges for the Reverse Pitching process while organizing a boot camp to equip startups with the knowledge and skills needed to respond effectively to real-world innovation challenges. Several leading companies from different industries participated in the initiative, including Bangchak Corporation, Central Retail Digital, and Krungthai Bank. Their participation generated a diverse range of innovation challenges spanning energy, customer services, marketing technologies, and inclusive financial services, resulting in a broad portfolio of innovation opportunities that attracted startups with expertise across multiple fields.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The challenges presented by participating corporations also reveal how Thailand’s industries are evolving in line with global industrial transformation, particularly in two key areas: sustainable development and customer experience. From the perspective of sustainable development, the challenges reflected both environmental and social priorities. On the environmental front, Thailand’s industries\u2014especially the energy sector\u2014are increasingly embracing the principles of the circular economy while advancing toward net-zero greenhouse gas emissions. On the social front, several challenges highlighted the importance of designing products, services, and support mechanisms that promote inclusiveness, safety, and fairness for all users. In terms of customer experience, the challenges demonstrated businesses’ growing commitment to developing a deeper understanding of consumer behavior, expectations, and experiences. Companies are increasingly leveraging digital platforms, social media, and multiple customer touchpoints to systematically gather, analyze, and respond to customer insights. Overall, these innovation challenges underscore the Thai industrial sector’s increasing emphasis on advancing ESG and sustainability while deepening its understanding of customers and designing more responsive customer experiences\u2014an approach that closely aligns with current global industry trends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

More than 30 teams of researchers, entrepreneurs, and startups submitted proposals to participate in the Reverse Pitching program, with 12 teams ultimately selected to move forward. A significant number of the selected participants were university students who balanced their academic studies with participation in the program. Their involvement demonstrated both the potential and determination of Thailand’s next generation of innovators to apply classroom knowledge to solving real industrial challenges. Many of the participating startups were early-stage ventures with limited resources. Despite these constraints, they remained committed to developing their products in collaboration with large corporations. Their participation reinforced NXPO’s confidence that, with the right mechanisms to connect and support them, these young innovators and emerging startups can become a driving force in advancing Thailand’s innovation ecosystem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

NXPO launched The Reverse Innovation Journey with the goal of fostering collaboration among industry, startups, and researchers to accelerate the development of technologies and innovations that better address the needs of businesses and the marketplace.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Following the pilot project, NXPO connected promising teams with relevant funding sources and support mechanisms, including the TED Fund, enabling them to further develop their prototypes, advance toward commercialization, and establish long-term partnerships with industry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time, NXPO will synthesize the lessons learned from the pilot into policy recommendations and practical guidelines to support universities, science parks, business incubators, innovation centers, and other innovation intermediaries in adopting and adapting similar collaboration mechanisms. Expanding the use of this model will create more opportunities to translate industry challenges into technology and innovation development while strengthening Thailand’s innovation ecosystem over the long term.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“NXPO believes that scaling this model nationwide will help build a<\/strong> stronger innovation ecosystem<\/strong> for Thailand, establish a more effective demand-driven innovation mechanism, and supports sustainable economic development.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the most significant gaps in Thailand’s in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":48856,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[30],"tags":[2927,2144,3119,1870],"class_list":["post-48855","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-en","tag-reverse-pitching-en","tag-startup-en","tag-the-reverse-innovation-journey-en","tag-uhc-en"],"featured_image_src":"https:\/\/www.nxpo.or.th\/th\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/The-Reverse-Innovation-Journey.jpg","author_info":{"display_name":"admin","author_link":"https:\/\/www.nxpo.or.th\/th\/author\/adminsti\/"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.nxpo.or.th\/th\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/The-Reverse-Innovation-Journey.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nxpo.or.th\/th\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48855","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nxpo.or.th\/th\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nxpo.or.th\/th\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nxpo.or.th\/th\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nxpo.or.th\/th\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48855"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.nxpo.or.th\/th\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48855\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":48859,"href":"https:\/\/www.nxpo.or.th\/th\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48855\/revisions\/48859"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nxpo.or.th\/th\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48856"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nxpo.or.th\/th\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48855"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nxpo.or.th\/th\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48855"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nxpo.or.th\/th\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48855"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}