Sprint scenario

A Nordic FMCG company has traditionally relied on external research, innovation and design partners to develop new product concepts. 

Its experienced marketing team has started experimenting with AI, but mainly for individual tasks rather than as part of a connected development process.

As the company plans its next innovation cycle, the CMO raises a question: what if the team could take a new product idea much further internally, using AI to connect market intelligence, positioning, concept development and visualization?

Rather than discussing the possibilities in theory, the team decides to put the approach to the test through a one-week Innovation Sprint.

Meet Frank

Frank is one of the fictional archetypes in the AI Business Council, representing a CMO veteran managing complex global brand portfolios. His challenge provides the starting point for this AIBC Lab sprint.

The challenge

How far can we go with AI?

Sprint focus

SYNCHRONIZE

Finding the right opportunity

The Sprint begins Monday morning by bringing together the team's existing category knowledge, commercial experience combined with AI-powered market and category intelligence to identify a suitable product-development challenge.

To keep the exercise focused, we select an everyday product: hand soap for the mid-priced grocery segment. It's a familiar category with established consumer habits, strong competition and limited differentiation between many existing products.

Using a visual category positioning exercise, the team explores different consumer needs, purchasing motivations and potential opportunities.

Existing positioning and target group definitions are used against AI-simulated perspectives, to help narrow the exploration to one promising territory: bringing a more considered everyday experience to an accessible household product.

The team now has a focused opportunity to develop—and a practical test of how AI can support the earliest stages of innovation.

REFINE

Bringing the product to life

The selected opportunity becomes the starting point for developing a new concept.

Working across positioning, messaging, product expression and packaging, the team uses AI-powered visualization to explore alternative directions and bring ideas to life.

Simulated consumer perspectives help question the relevance, clarity and differentiation of the emerging concept. Human judgment guides the creative choices, and one direction is developed into a named product concept with an initial brand identity, proposition and packaging mockup.

But the experiment also reveals something beyond the product itself.

Activities that previously involved several separate briefs, handovers and development cycles can now be explored together. The team experiences how quickly ideas can move between market intelligence, creative development, visualization and simulated feedback—and where its own expertise becomes even more important.

The result is both a tangible product concept and a practical demonstration of a more connected innovation process.

ACTIVATE

Redefining how to innovate

In one week, the team has moved from asking what AI could contribute to product innovation to experiencing how it can expand the development process.

The hand soap concept provides a tangible starting point for further consumer testing, product feasibility assessment and commercial evaluation. It is not a finished product ready for launch, but a direction the organization can continue developing.



In parallel, the team translates its experience into an initial AI Innovation Workflow, showing how market exploration, positioning, concept development, visualization and simulated feedback could become part of its ongoing work.

The workflow identifies where human expertise and decision-making remain central, where AI can expand capacity and where external specialists and real consumer validation are still needed.

The Sprint ends with two connected opportunities: a new product direction to explore and a practical starting point for developing the marketing team's own AI-powered innovation capabilities.

Potential sprint outcome

Product concept prototype
A named and visualized product proposition combining positioning, messaging and initial packaging design.

AI innovation workflow
A visual working model connecting human expertise with AI-powered market exploration, concept development and validation.

90-day activation plan
A practical plan for testing the workflow in the marketing team's ongoing activities, identifying priorities, responsibilities and capabilities to develop.

More sprint challenges