"This reminds me of a design story about the innovation of the Swiffer by Design Continuum.  They self promoted their research into cleaning habits, while in the end, coming to the same conclusion which happened to be based on a product that P&G found in Japan.  Bose was the first successful company to sell the soundboard 4 years ago, Id like to hear about the research they did to come up with their ah-ha moment.   "