Client Impact
New innovation capabilities help hit growth targets year after year
Global population has risen past 7 billion. But arable farmland and water resources have hit up against hard limits. The world needs to find new ways to produce more food from less. To help meet this challenge, Syngenta harnessed Innosight's innovation capabilities framework.
As one of Earth’s largest agri-businesses, Syngenta aims to achieve many different kinds of growth on a daily basis. Formed in 2000 as a result of a large merger, the Basel, Switzerland firm found itself unable to bring to market enough new products to achieve consistent, organic growth—even though the 25,000-employee company was spending $1 billion annually on R&D to generate new ideas.
Sub-par prioritization and implementation meant those ideas simply weren’t finding their way into new seeds and crop protection products. The executive team brought in Innosight to help put in place an innovation capabilities framework and growth plan. The focus was on creating repeatable growth through innovation. At the same time, the company put forth an ambitious ten-year growth goal, setting annual revenue targets out to the year 2016.
A series of interactive sessions brought Innosight’s methodology to key scientists and business unit leaders. Frameworks such as “jobs-to-be-done” spread beyond the core group to the point where Syngenta held regular innovation workshops in all of its geographic regions, from its U.S. base in North Carolina to its divisions across Europe, Latin America, Africa, Asia and the Middle East. The Innosight teachings helped the company reorganize—by consolidating all of its product groups together while launching geographical units on finding solutions to specific customer, climate and crop problems in each region.
The next five years saw an explosion of new products that not only boosted land productivity but also the personal productivity of farmers. Syngenta benefited not from just a few new products but from a repeatable way to bring to market successful hybrids seeds and new ways to protect soy, barley, wheat, sugarcane, corn, apples, and flowers from drought and disease.
“When you’re in agriculture,” says Bill Knowles, Syngenta’s chief of corporate learning, “you’re in the growth business.” And Syngenta has found a way to deliver consistent growth both to farmers and investors all over the world. Syngenta hit its growth targets again and again, increasing revenue by 45 percent over the first five years of its plan, to nearly $11.6 billion, and doubling net income. During that time, it has been tracking and reporting “new products” as a measurable category—one that accounted for about $700 million in new global revenue and growing a double the rate of the overall company. As a result, Syngenta was named one of the “world’s innovative companies” on annual lists by Fast Company and Forbes.
Says Knowles: “The tools and processes that Innosight brought to us remains the foundation of our innovation efforts today.” Over the complete ten year time frame of its strategy, Syngenta’s market value tripled, from $14 billion to reach $43 billion in its deal to be acquired in 2016 by ChemChina.
“Our engagement with Innosight helped us improve our ability to meet our strategic objective of launching innovative growth businesses.”
Syngenta
Huron is a global professional services firm that collaborates with organizations to help solve their most complex challenges and achieve their most ambitious goals. Working across the private and public sectors, we partner closely with clients to improve performance, accelerate transformation, and unlock new opportunities for growth.
Our clients choose us because of our deep industry and technical expertise and proven track record of turning sound strategies into action. By combining practical experience, innovative thinking, and advanced analytics and technology, Huron helps organizations translate today’s ideas into tangible results and long-term value.
© Copyright 2026, All rights reserved by Huron