Lyreco Pioneers is an annual program with two main goals.
To engage and empower every single employee of the Lyreco Group of companies to be more innovative, find a home for their ideas and learn new skills that can in turn inspire others to follow in their footsteps.
To identify solutions to challenges faced by Lyreco and our Customers.
In December 2021 we announced our six Lyreco Pioneer teams and in January they started a four month Incubation Program where they learned everything they need to know about creating a startup within a big company like Lyreco.
The program (developed with in partnership with Schoolab) covered design thinking, business models, financial models, pitch skills and so much more. It was designed to give them everything they needed to turn their idea into a business prototype, and from there into something that can be pitched.
This brings us to the first ever Lyreco Pioneers Demo Day!
A demo day is normally the dénouement of a startup incubation program. Founders have the opportunity to pitch their idea to a jury or panel of investors. The best ideas receive funding and they are able to scale their idea into a real world product or service. This is exactly what our demo day was as well.
Each of our teams was given six minutes to pitch their idea to a panel made up of experts from across the Lyreco world as well a key customer and one of our strategic partners.
The six ideas pitched were:
TrackIt - B2B shipping transparency platform to provide customers with real-time information about the whereabouts of the products they've order from us.
Greener Together - A customer loyalty program that rewards sustainable purchasing with lower prices on sustainable products.
Lyreco Design - creating a truly circular process by turning post industrial plastic waste into 3D printer filament and then producing high quality 3D printed products back to the customer.
ReUse Boxes - creating an infrastructure to encourage the reuse of Lyreco delivery boxes.
Sustainable Dashboard - A real time snapshot of the CO2 impact of the products our customers buy from us (including shipping and other factors).
Smart Workplace - An IOT enabled office that automatically manages lighting and environmental controls based on who is currently using the space.
Our jury spent some time debating which of the ideas should be accelerated (funded to become a real product that we can launch to our customers). In the end it was a tough decision, but the jury chose the Sustainable Dashboard project from Poland.
The other teams should not feel too disappointed - during the jury discussions, several of the ideas were discussed as possible innovation projects to be launched in one or more countries by the local MDs!
Overview of the event
Winning Pitch
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