Dr. Brian Ottum has worked, researched and consulted in the new product development arena for 20 years. He is president of Ottum Research & Consulting, a supplier of market research and new product development consulting. Dr. Ottum's clients include 3M, Johnson Controls, Whirlpool, Ford Motor Company and Dow Chemical.

Dr. Ottum worked in consumer research and product development at The Procter & Gamble Company for 7 years. While there, he was responsible for new product upgrades for the Pampers, Luvs, and Charmin brands, as well as the international market research for Camay and Oil of Olay.

Dr. Ottum has a B.S. in Chemical Engineering, and an MBA. His Ph.D. is focused on market research during new product development. His dissertation found what separates success from failure by studying 60 recent new product projects. The #1 factor was market research. The resulting paper was a finalist in the Journal of Product Innovation Management's Best Paper of 1997 award.

Over the past ten years, Dr. Ottum has been responsible for helping clients get closer to their customers. He has developed state-of-the-art research methods in customer needs identification (using KJ analysis), concept screening & optimization (using instantaneous keypad studies), and price-setting (using discrete choice modeling). He also does legal claim support statistical consulting.

Dr. Ottum is co-founder of the Great Lakes Chapter of the Product Development & Management Association (PDMA). He teaches workshops at PDMA conferences, and wrote a chapter for Irwin's Handbook of New Product Development (both editions). He has earned PDMA's New Product Development Professional certification.

Dr. Ottum is a frequent speaker on innovation topics at national conferences and at company sites. A member of Mensa, Dr. Ottum is an instructor in the University of Michigan's Executive Education Program. He was selected for Marquis' Who's Who in America, 54th edition, 2000.

See http://mywebpages.comcast.net/ottum/ for more information.