The New Geography of Innovation | Mehran Gul

How the geography of innovation is shifting and what it means for the new world order

I first met Mehran at the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos. He led the Digital Transformation of Industries Initiative at the time. While at the Forum, he ended up submitting an essay that won the Financial Times-McKinsey Bracken Bower Prize for writers under 35.

That essay, after five years of diligent research, is now published as his first book, “The New Geography of Innovation.” Mehran secured a six-figure book deal, but ended up spending a lot more on collecting data, conducting interviews, building a hypothesis, revising it multiple times, and putting it together in a form that will delight entrepreneurs, academics, investors, and curious people across the spectrum.

The output speaks for itself. Among other things, I admire how energized he is about the puzzle, even after a full-throttle effort over half a decade.

Read his book and check out our hour-long conversation about the core constructs.

P.S. Thanks, Hassan, for the thoughtful introduction many years back.