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Generation Of Innovations : Frederick Tudor's Ice Trading Success

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Generation of Innovations: The Key to Frederick Tudor’s Ice Trading Success
Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple, is probably the first person people think of when it comes to innovation. As the creator of one of the most popular smartphones, he said “innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower.” Jobs’ legacy made several entrepreneurs ponder upon a question: how did he come up with so many innovations? The steps to the generation of innovations, argues sociologist Everett M. Rogers in his book Diffusion of Innovation, are recognizing problems or needs, researching, developing, commercializing, diffusing and adopting, and consequences. Nevertheless, Steve Jobs is not the only business leader with innovative ideas. In the early 1800’s, a businessman named Frederick Tudor, also known as the “Ice King,” established an ice trading company that shipped ice to parts of the world where ice was difficult to obtain. Some people may ask: how is ice trading significant when we can obtain ice from our refrigerators? The development of refrigeration technology started in the 1800’s , while the first commercial fridge came out about 100 years later. As a result, people in the past used natural ice to preserve food. In other worlds, many places in the world, especially those near the equator, could not preserve food with ice because of the warm climate. In F.H. Forbes’ Scribner’s Monthly “Ice,” he discusses the timeline of Tudors’ ice trading career and various innovations

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