Creating innovations that scale across borders

August 19, 2026 - 19:41

A new book coauthored by MIT Professor Amos Winter is rethinking how breakthrough ideas grow from local solutions into worldwide impact. Titled Global by Design, the work walks readers through the entire innovation journey, starting with spotting real problems and ending with strategies for scaling both at home and abroad.

The book challenges the old model where a product is designed in one wealthy country and then shipped to developing markets. Instead, Winter and his coauthor argue that the best innovations often begin with deep local insight, especially in resource-constrained settings. By understanding the unique constraints of a place, such as limited electricity, poor roads, or low-cost manufacturing, teams can design solutions that are not only affordable but also robust enough to work everywhere.

A key theme is that scaling is not just about making something bigger. It is about adapting the core idea to different cultural, economic, and regulatory environments. The authors use real case studies from their work with MIT's Global Engineering and Research Lab, including projects on water pumps, wheelchairs, and agricultural tools. These examples show how a design that works in rural India might need a different business model or supply chain to succeed in sub-Saharan Africa or Latin America.

The book also offers practical frameworks for teams, from startups to large corporations, on when to standardize and when to localize. It pushes back on the idea that global success means one universal product. Instead, it suggests a portfolio approach where a shared technology platform can be customized for regional needs without losing efficiency.

Winter, who has spent years testing prototypes in the field, stresses that listening to end users is not a nice-to-have but a requirement. The book is written for engineers, entrepreneurs, and policy makers who want to move beyond pilot projects and create lasting change. With clear steps and honest lessons from failures, Global by Design is a timely guide for anyone trying to solve big problems in a connected but uneven world.