"The challenge we face," said G. Gil Cloyd in the December 2004 issue of IndustryWeek, "is the competitive need for a very rapid pace of innovation. In the consumer products world we estimate that the required pace of innovation has doubled in the last three years. That means we have less time to benefit from any innovation that we bring into the marketplace."
Cloyd, then chief technology officer at Procter & Gamble, graced the cover of that December issue as IW's Technology Leader of the Year. "[Cloyd] has successfully shown how any company can contend with the classic innovator's dilemma -- most innovations fail, but companies that don't innovate die," wrote IW's John Teresko of Cloyd's accomplishments.
These days, Cloyd's role at P&G is undergoing its own change. That's because the Cincinnati-based consumer products giant recently announced that Cloyd will retire Sept. 1 after more than 33 years with the company. In announcing the P&G tech leader's impending retirement, chairman and CEO A.G. Lafley said, "[Cloyd] transformed P&G's innovation while preserving the essential part of P&G's R&D organization -- world-class technologists who are masters of core technologies critical to P&G's businesses."
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