Based out of the San Francisco-Silicon Valley region, Foundry 415 Innovation Group provides corporate innovation consulting services and executive education program services to global enterprises, government agencies, and tech startups. The firm has helped 40+ global corporations achieve measurable outcomes by uncovering new trends and opportunities, scouting cutting-edge startups for strategic partnership, investment, or acquisition, and successfully piloting new business concepts. They also offer custom executive education and coaching programs for transformational leaders to innovate from within and bespoke acceleration programs that propel startups to new heights.
As the Growth Strategist at Foundry 415 Innovation Group, Mallek Aminullah’s core responsibilities include designing and implementing corporate innovation programs that begin with establishing game-changing strategies and creating measurable growth. The company acts as adjunct members of the client team, providing mindful guidance and support to internal teams tasked with championing innovation within their organizations. Their optimized methodology allows for a surgical approach to pinpoint how emerging technologies can solve pressing business challenges and proactively clear innovation blockades. “We capture a holistic view of the client organization at every engagement to identify synergies amongst internal teams that could amass further support. Our dedication to go beyond isolated project goals and create overall corporate value is what allows us to build trusting and long-term relationships with our clients,” says Mallek.
Creating his Path
Early on in his career, Mallek always wanted to be involved in the startup community. This drive landed him several growth-oriented roles in startups such as head of business development & partnerships, and head of expansion. As his experience grew, he was also asked to mentor in accelerator programs across Australia. “I was very fortunate that in my early 20s, I was able to hone the necessary skills to drive growth for startups across Europe, South East Asia, and Oceania. This provided me with a global lens on how I approach business challenges as I leverage my experience across these diverse geographies and team dynamics to understand where impactful opportunities lie,” says Mallek.
He wanted to craft a brand for himself as a Growth Strategist who is passionate about helping organizations build meaningful innovation capabilities. Thus, bringing him into his current industry, innovation consulting. Mallek’s innovation consulting career started in Malaysia, where he helped corporations accelerate innovation by crafting strategies around the disruption faced in their industries. Often, he would shed light on what startups in their industry are providing to identify opportunities for his corporate clients. This allowed him to lead several open innovation initiatives for corporate and government agencies in Malaysia. With the aspiration to further build his expertise in this field, he opted to do an MBA program in San Francisco, which led him to where he is today, with Foundry 415 Innovation Group, helping global corporations engage with startups through various open innovation initiatives.
A Working Style Curated with Experience
Mallek has two working styles that he believes separate him from other executives. The first is adopting a futurist approach to strategy crafting. The futurist approach compels him to look beyond traditional industry borders and reimagine the competitive landscape with expansive thinking. “Often innovation is done in silos within large companies, this divergent approach can create a sense of urgency at an enterprise level which could then mobilize other relevant business units to meet innovation goals,” he explains.
The second working style is having an ecosystem-centric approach, delivering value for organizations at an accelerated pace through targeted partnerships and collaboration. This is the basis of his reliance on open innovation activities, as large corporations have the opportunity to leverage external expertise and assets to craft a competitive advantage.
Facing Challenges with Determination
At the age of 23, Mallek was with a TravelTech startup based in London. His team got accepted into an accelerator program in Brisbane, Australia. Due to conflicting commitments by the senior members of the team, Mallek was selected to relocate to Brisbane for 6 months on his own to take part in the accelerator program. While there, he was tasked with not only taking part in the accelerator program but also leading the expansion of the startup into the APAC region.
Given his limited experience at the time, this was one of the most challenging assignments of Mallek’s career. He was able to stay in touch with his team in London to help guide him through the challenges faced but this was infrequent. He had to build his networks in a completely new region to identify opportunities for the startup and build a support system for his professional development such as mentors and relevant technology experts. He learned quickly from his network of more experienced and established players in the region to understand how he could accelerate his efforts toward his goals. Through the help of some mentors, he was able to develop a partnership plan in 4 months that allowed the startup to evaluate potential collaboration opportunities effectively.
“This was my first exposure to how effective an ecosystem-centric approach could be to drive growth. I learned that there is always room to learn from what others within or outside your industry might be doing and executing this could turn an unfamiliar territory familiar very quickly,” shares Mallek.
Leveraging Technology and Staying Ahead
At Foundry 415, Mallek and his team continuously evaluate digital tools that could further optimize their internal operations and external deliverables. Vetting new tools by engaging with internal and external stakeholders allows them to get a rapid understanding of current technological capabilities and where human intervention is needed. For example, some of the activities provided include Startup Showcases and Demo Days. Increasingly, they are expected to host these events in a hybrid format given the nature of distributed teams. They often find the use of advanced communication and conferencing tools helps them meet the expectations set by their clients. “We are also leveraging generative AI to accelerate and improve various aspects of our work with clients. Given the relatively nascent stage of generative AI, this often means experimenting with different platforms and use cases and having the discernment to separate the hype from approaches that are truly impactful for our work and our clients,” shares Mallek.
Foundry 415 has a role in driving new opportunities for corporations by engaging with high-impact startups. Therefore, they are constantly scanning the horizon for new developments in technologies that are impacting industries. Being at the heart of Silicon Valley, they are actively monitoring the VC and startup ecosystem here for signals on what might come. They apply the same practice to their own industry and ensure there is enough agility in the team to craft a unique position during times of change.
Rewards and Motivations
During his MBA in San Francisco, Mallek was the President of the Social Impact Club and they were awarded the Largest Impact on Global Community by the student body. This was largely to do with their work to drive social entrepreneurship across the student body. They had various initiatives that provided the opportunity for social enterprises across the globe to share their experience in building their companies with the students. Finally, they also allowed for a social enterprise to provide traditional garments as part of Graduation wear, where the proceeds were provided to communities in Ghana.
Mallek believes that a lot of the challenges faced early on have brought him to where he is currently positioned. In the spirit of growth, he highlights the skills and capabilities he hopes to gain as he grows in his career. He is keen to further build his expertise as an innovation consultant and will constantly be learning new approaches and frameworks around corporate innovation. Strategic futurist frameworks and tools such as strategic foresight, scenario crafting, and horizon scanning are always of interest to him, as they encourage expansive thinking and challenge contradictions. “This is an area I am always looking to improve on and apply in my work,” he says.
“Technologies that replace physical capabilities of humans are inherently less risky than those that replace cognitive capabilities of humans.” This quote was provided to Mallek by one of his professors in his MBA. He feels it’s incredibly insightful to understand what kind of risks you are taking with the technologies you plan to adopt. It also indicates the level of human intervention still required depending on the task that needs to be done by said technology. “It’s always a quote I go back to should I have any doubts,” he shares.
Challenges in the Industry
In Mallek’s opinion, the most urgent challenges that businesses face currently are navigating the increasingly blurred industry lines and ambiguity of technological capabilities which compound the complexities faced by corporate decision makers. This is primarily due to digitalization taking place across many verticals at an accelerated pace.
Senior executives in global companies are constantly challenged with defining their strategies in embracing emerging technologies to craft competitive advantages. Understanding the relationship between technological developments and macro environment signals would be a critical capability to overcome this challenge. For instance, some technology use cases influence regulatory developments such as the use of Metaverse, while other use cases are influenced by regulatory developments such as the case with Fintech platforms. Being able to synthesize signals in the macro environment, and understand the interactions between specific technologies helps to identify growth opportunities.
Preparing for the Year Ahead
The Foundry team is made up of entrepreneurs with a growth-oriented mindset. They are in a high growth phase this year and continuing into 2024. In the next few years, Foundry 415 will solidify its position as an innovation agency nestled in Silicon Valley capable of leveraging new technologies from startup ecosystems to drive measurable outcomes for global companies. “As the innovation needs of our clients grow in complexity, we will expect to meet this with a growing team of diverse minds and backgrounds and continue to deliver value at an accelerated pace,” says Mallek.
Advice for Aspiring Entrepreneurs:
“My advice to aspiring entrepreneurs is to try and understand where your passion lies and craft a path that could provide you with the most learning opportunities. Even if this is in areas outside your original ideas and goals. Be thoughtful throughout the process on what can be learned and keep focus on internal or personal goals rather than external accolades.”
