Neo4j Innovation Lab - Accelerate Innovation through Graph Thinking

Neo4j Innovation Lab
Accelerate Innovation
Through Graph Thinking
A PARADIGM SHIFT IN MINDSET

Industry’s Largest Dedicated Investment in Graphs
Global Head of Business Design
and Strategic Programs
Stefan Wendin
Neo4j - The Graph Company
• Creator of the Neo4j Graph Platform

• ~300 employees

• HQ in Silicon Valley, other oﬃces include London,
Munich, Paris, Stockholm, Malmö…

• $170M in funding from Morgan Stanley Expansion
Capital, One Peak Partners, Fidelity, Sunstone, Conor,
Creandum, and Greenbridge Capital

• Over 13M+ downloads,

• 250+ enterprise subscription customers with over half
with >$1B in revenue
PLEASE CONNECT:
stefan.wendin@neo4j.com

linkedin.com/in/stefanwendin

…and we all know that
when a developer call you
Steve Jobs it’s not
compliment.
Competence sweater since 1990

PERSPECTIVES

Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact.
Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth

― Marcus Aurelius
It’s all about
perspective
PERSPECTIVES

I love child things because
there's so much mystery when
you're a child.
PERSPECTIVES

When you're a child,
something as simple
as a tree doesn't make
sense…
PERSPECTIVES

You see it in the
distance and it looks
small…
PERSPECTIVES

IDEATION IS OVERRATED
…but as you go closer,
it seems to grow

– you haven't got a
handle on the rules
when you're a child.

We think we understand the rules
when we become adults but what
we really experience is a narrowing
of the imagination
― David Lynch

What most people
think innovation looks
like…

What most people
working with
innovation think
innovation looks like…
Disruption
Status quo

I love child things because
there's so much mystery when
you're a child. When you're a
child, something as simple as a
tree doesn't make sense.
What I actually do

The limits of my
language are the limits
of my world
― Ludwig Wittgenstein

(graphs)-[:ARE]->(everywhere)

Most people don’t know
when their problem is a graph
problem
The graph problem problem

A PARADIGM SHIFT IN HOW WE THINK ABOUT DATA
Beneﬁts created when we connect people,
things, patterns, insights, ecosystems,
behavior …
We’re living in a world
that is increasingly
connected.

The reality is that most data is still stored,
siloed and processed in the shape of rows,
columns and tables
But the way most data
is stored looks diﬀerent

the word is not the thing it describes.
Whenever the map is confused with the
territory, a 'semantic disturbance' is set up in
the organism. The disturbance continues until
the limitation of the map is recognized
The map is not the
territory,
– Alfred Korzybski Dec 28, 1931.

“A Non-Aristotelian System and its Necessity for Rigour in Mathematics and Physics"

Enterprises derive extraordinary value from
connections in their data
Enabled by Connections
But data is stored with legacy
technology in silos
Held Back by Legacy
Companies Are:

Discrete data, as represented
in a relational database
DATA-STRUCTURE MATTERS

Data represented as a graph
DATA-STRUCTURE MATTERS

A Paradigm Shift in

How We Think About Data

However every change
comes with a cost

🤮
💩
😭
😬
🤬
😢
😳
😳
😃
🧐
😒
🤩
🥵
THE KUBLER-ROSS – CHANGE CURVE
Change Curve
The Kubler-Ross

When time spent arguing
about something is
signiﬁcantly longer than just
testing it.
The “another sheet in excel” paradox

– Yogi Berra / Jan L. A. van de Snepscheut
In theory there is no diﬀerence
between theory and practice.

In practice there is.

• Speed up time-to-validation

• Comprehensive learning through prototyping

• Craft meaningful value propositions
Innovation Task
Neo4j Solutions
Lab Sweet spot

Neo4j Solutions
Lab Sweet spot
Help companies accelerate innovation and digital
transformation through graph thinking.
What we do
We generate and prototype graph projects together
with customers and prospects.
How we do it
Expected Outcome
To provide a deep understanding of graph thinking and the
new possibilities in innovation and digital transformation
that is enabled by adopting Neo4j and graphs.
Innovation Lab:

Sprint — 4 day workshop

Accelerator Program — Four consecutive Lab Sprints
Methodology

Identify Target
Use Case
Generate
Data Model
Related “Graph
Questions”
Executive Feedback
Presentation
Build Prototype/
Wireframes
The Lab in A Nutshell 🥜

Executive Feedback
Presentation
Executive Feedback
Presentation
Build Prototype/Wireframes
Key entitiesNorth StarOpportunitiesChallenges Identify Target
Use Case
Generate Data
Model
Related “Graph
Questions”
Source data to
populate model
Storyboarding/
Mockups
Identify Stakeholders /
Personas / Synopsis
Build QueryImport Data
Finalize & Present
Day 3.5
The Lab in A Nutshell 🥜

Day 4
1A. FINALIZE PROTOTYPE
2. EXECUTIVE FEEDBACK
• Consolidate Queries, Graphs & UI

• Assemble presentation
• Present result to feedback team

• Collect executive feedback

• Questions & Answers
2. FINALIZING SPRINT
• Consolidation of deliverables

• Deciding on possible next steps

• Complete sprint
Preparing and presentation
Prototyping & Executive Feedback
FEEDBACK
Day 2 – 3
1A. REFINING MODEL
• Revisit model

• Work out if it’s complete enough

• Iterate
3. DEFINING PROTOTYPE
• Decide on Use Case

• Define final deliverables
1B. STORYBOARDING
• Establish premise for prototype

• Identify current paradigms

• Make case for connections in
data, given these paradigms
2A. BUILD QUERIES
• Build out queries

• Test graph traversals

• Match queries with prototype
functionality
2B. WIREFRAMING
• Build out UI

• Build out mock functionality
• Collect feedback on UI

• Collect feedback on Graph

• Make adjustments
Splitting up in groups
Group A – Data track Group B – UX/UI track
• Shifts- exercise

• Mapping/Data Flows

• Deriving Query Foundation
Day 1
Introduction and setting up
Graph Thinking & Use Case Generation
1. NEO4J & GRAPH THINKING
• The paradigm of connected data and
graph thinking

• Establish fundamental understanding
of Cypher & Neo4j
2. USE CASE DEFINITION
3. INCREMENTAL MODELING
• Chose relevant question

• Build model

• Identify Key Properties

• Iterate

• Defining Sprint Target
Preparing data
2-4 weeks
For example ingesting,
cleaning and structuring
of the data.

 
Support from Neo4j field
team can be arranged on
demand
PREPARATION
OUR METHODOLOGY IN A NUTSHELL
Innovation Lab Sprint

The Neo4j Innovation
Lab Experience

Generating
Use Cases

Head of Digital Innovation
UX Designer
Lead Developer
Machine Learning/
Data Scientist

Data Modeling

Adam Cowley, Neo4j
Field Engineer
Data Modeling

Building
Prototypes

Lab Sprint Outcome
Explorations and new insights
Using Neo4j and graphs to explore new insights from a customer
support perspective.

— Baba Shiv
Stanford Graduate School of Business
“If you build a polished prototype, others
will see flaws. If you build a rough
prototype, others will see potential”

“Strategy”
Customer’s Team
(Between 3-8 participants)
“IT”
“Digitization” “Sales”
“Operations” “R&D/Innovation”
Neo4j Field Engineer
• Facilitates graph-modeling exercises
• Expert in Neo4j/Architecture & Data Science
• Cypher-queries for prototype
UX-designer
• Facilitates storyboarding/wireframing
• Builds UI-tool for prototype
Labs Leader
• Head facilitator & Team Leader
• Facilitates the use case generation-segment
• Project manages prototyping
Neo4j Innovation Lab Team
+
Facilitation
Engineering/
Data Science
Design
Neo4j Innovation Lab Team
PARTICIPANTS

Software Companies
Heavy Industry
FMCG
Cruising Companies
Logistics
Financial Services
Media
Health Care
Energy
Telco
Industries Use Cases
Recommendation Engines
Smart Cities
Personalization
Fraud Detection
Data Lineage
Construction Planning
Regulatory Compliance
Media Advertising Systems
Supply Chain
Preventive Health Care Tools
Churn Prediction
Customer Service Automation
Customer Journey Mapping
Retail Bill of Materials
Churn Prediction

Feedback
Received
“The productivity and output enabled by how the
days were structure and the exercises within the
sessions has been an eye-opener.”
— Procter & Gamble
“Very impressed. Intense and fun! We got a
lot done in just a week. Great experience and
super effective.”
— Santander Consumer Bank
“Unexpected and pretty incredible that it’s
possible to achieve such relevant and
applicable results in such a limited time
period.”
— Schibsted Media Group
“Involving. Knowledge building. Fun! Extremely
valuable and mind opening”
— Alfa Laval

The Accelerator program -
Transformation at Scale

Digital Transformation with Graphs

Best in class
ACCELERATOR PROGRAM

Airline-customer
Large telco in Europe
Telco
Online Retail
Consulting
Investment Banking
Software
Financial Services
H120172014 2015 2016 H22017 2018
200
Digital Transformation with Graphs

Innovation Lab Accelerator Program
Accelerator Program Example:
•Innovation Lab program piloted in 2019, with full roll-out in 2020

Innovation Lab Accelerator Program
•In-between Innovation Lab Sprints we provide training, professional
services and strategy depending on customer needs.

Global Head of Business Design
and Strategic Programs
Stefan Wendin
PLEASE CONNECT:
stefan.wendin@neo4j.com

linkedin.com/in/stefanwendin

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