What is MATI?

History, Approach and Philosophy

MATI (the Management of Accelerated Technology Insertion) began in 1996 with two small groups of firms working under the auspices of the National Center for Manufacturing Sciences (NCMS). These companies had recognized that the new competitive environment demanded customer and context responsive innovation that was strategic, rapid, timely and integrated across both the business and technology value chains. Dissatisfied with what was generally available in the technology management field to guide practice and tools improvement, as manifest in the literature and from both consultants and academia, the two small groups merged to tackle the challenge.

Starting in 1997, they formed what is now known as MATI I, a five firm consortium consisting of General Motors, Kodak, Lucent, Rockwell and Westinghouse (subsequently acquired by Siemens), working in collaboration with faculty, staff and student support drawn from the Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University.

The success of MATI I as measured by the recognized benefits that had been derived by the participating firms led to a decision by the MATI I board to continue and expand the consortium beyond its originally planned end date of December 1998 and five company membership. Established over the January through August period, the MATI II consortium was launched in September 1999 with 16 (and growing) best-in-class member firms.

MATI II is a self-financed not-for-profit consortium of firms working in collaboration with selected university, particularly Kellogg School, personnel and a similar affiliated consortium based out of the University of Cambridge in the UK. Dedicated to the identification, review, refinement and integration of technology management tools for practical business application, it is managed by its own board of directors, one from each member firm. Through active, creative and open sharing of experiences, issues, ideas and insights among its members, MATI has already leapt into a leadership position in the technology management field, in general and particularly in the area of roadmapping and decision management.

Membership

MATI II membership continues to grow but currently consists of: Baxter, The Coca-Cola Company, DSM Desotech, Ford, General Motors, IBD Inc., Kraft, Kellogg, Lucent, McDonalds, Motorola, Redex Packaging, Roche, Rockwell, Siemens-Westinghouse and United Technologies.

In addition, an alliance has been developed with a similar consortium at Cambridge. This consortium includes: ABB, BAE Systems, BG Technology, Domino Printing Sciences, Federal Mogul, Hoogovens, Lucent, Marconi, Philips, Rolls Royce Aero, The Post Office, Unilever and Com Dev. MATI members have access to the Cambridge web site and may participate in Cambridge events at the Cambridge consortium member discounted rate.

MATI Activities

Meetings

MATI meetings are unusual in the extent to which they are member-driven and enabled and the degree of interaction between companies and individuals with similar concerns. A key benefit of MATI stems from this interaction. Although guest speakers may be invited, the core of the meetings is presentations by member companies on pressing issues, insights, experiences and approaches.

Since its inauguration in September 1999, seven plenary meetings have been held (Meeting Summaries.) For the most part, meetings are held at company locations to enable greater participation of hosting firms and special focus on their particular interests and needs. Generally, between 30 and 40 persons attend meetings.

To enable new members to benefit from both the experience and knowledge generated in MATI I, the first quarter of the year of MATI II was devoted to an extended series of level setting meetings requested by its board.

Future Meeting Plans and Schedule

Subject to Board revision (2000/2001 approved plan), 5 Plenary Meetings to be held: 1. A Lessons-learned and general level-set meeting in the Fall (additional level-set process assistance for new firms on a fee-for-service basis.) 2. Three largely Task-force designed and led meetings (generally to be scheduled for November, February and April). 3. A joint meeting in July with Cambridge, alternating between the US and UK.

Task Forces and Interest Groups

To facilitate in-depth exploration of issues and practices and encourage interaction among MATI member companies, task forces and interest groups are formed. These may have links to organizations outside of MATI. Three ongoing task forces are currently active and are the primary focus of MATI II: roadmapping, technology transfer and strategy/portfolio management.

Interest groups exist or are forming that may evolve into distinct task forces in the following areas:standards management, intra-organizational studies futures studies currently under the strategy/portfolio management task force, technology sourcing, biotechnology roadmapping and food industry roadmapping (both under roadmapping), SME's and supply chain issues, R&D/technology-marketing and intellectual property.

MATI Deliverables and Achievements

Although much of the value of MATI is intangible, in addition to the activities noted, significant deliverables have been developed in the form of tools, templates and cases, core presentations and papers and additional materials. 78 such items totaling approximately 1,500 pages are available to MATI members through the summary document linked below and via this website. Item descriptions may be viewed by clicking on MATI Deliverables below or on the menu bar (MATI members only may access the linked documents.)

These deliverables were developed primarily during the course of MATI II, i.e., from September, 1999 to early June, 2000. In a very few cases, relevant MATI I documents are also cited. The deliverables are organized under general headings, for the most part related to MATI Task-forces:

A. Roadmapping
B. Technology Strategy and Portfolio Management
C. Technology Transfer
D. Technology Sourcing
E. Intra-organizational Issues
F. Standards Management
G. Technology Management

The first three categories (shown bold), having been the major focus of MATI II attention during the first three-quarters of MATI II's existence, contain the largest number of items. These categories are further subdivided, without trying to maintain complete consistency given their varying content, as follows:

Core Documents

• tools and templates
• company cases
• organizational considerations
  (or sub-topics as appropriate)

Additional Materials (generally structured by special topic areas)

In-depth Study Materials including bibliographies

Items D through F above (not in bold face), being shorter are not subdivided. The Technology Management category (G), contains general and miscellaneous topics which are either new and/or which have not yet, become formalized into task-force efforts: - Technology - Marketing (includes both technology management in market-driven firms and technology-marketing relations) - Intellectual Property Issues - The Field of Technology Management - SMEs/Supply Chain

MATI Deliverables

MATI II Entitlements and Benefits

MATI II Obligations