Inside the Quantum Innovation Engine

Peter Thomas
Apr 27
4 min read

From the USS Callister to Infinity, the Uncopyable Competitive Advantage

Black Mirror continues to deliver twisted takes on tech, but none quite like Season 7’s “USS Callister: Into Infinity”—a simulated universe called "Infinity" powered by a digital clone of the genius developer who created it, working tirelessly for eternity.

It’s unsettling. Brilliant.

And eerily familiar to anyone building products today.

Because in our world, that digital clone?

It’s the innovation engine.

The secret differentiator.

The thing no competitor can touch.

But here’s the catch: sometimes, that engine goes rogue.

The Search for Differentiation

In product development, the holy grail is a point of differentiation that competitors can’t easily replicate. It’s the special ingredient—what we might call the “Infinity Core”—that fuels growth, love, loyalty, and even obsession.

Get it right, and you become Apple. Get it wrong, and you become…

Theranos: The Cult of a Phantom Feature

The Promise: One drop of blood. Hundreds of tests. Radical disruption of diagnostics.

The Problem: The feature didn’t exist.

The Fallout: A $10B illusion built on vapor. Real lives endangered. A company undone by its own mythology.

Lesson: Uncopyable advantage must be real. Theranos built a product around the story of differentiation—but skipped the part where it actually worked.

Juicero: Engineering Without a Job

The Promise: A Wi-Fi-enabled juicer to revolutionize home wellness.

The Problem: You could squeeze the same juice packs by hand—faster, cheaper, and with less drama.

The Fallout: $120M in VC money gone. A masterclass in overengineering.

Lesson: If your “differentiator” adds complexity without solving a real need, it’s not innovation—it’s performance art.

So What Does Work?

Innovation isn’t about being clever.

It’s about being right—for the customer, for the moment, and for the world you’re about to change.

You don’t need more ideas.

You need intention.

A precision-guided process that doesn’t just ask what’s possible—

It asks what’s worth building.

Because every iconic product—the ones people remember, love, and refuse to live without—solves three things with relentless clarity:

What truly matters to the customer?

How do we deliver it in a way no one else can?

How do we make that delivery so elegant, so unexpected, so right—that it becomes uncopyable?

That’s not luck.

That’s design.

And it starts with the right people empowered with the right tools:

1. Jobs-To-Be-Done (JTBD)

Don’t guess—understand.

What job is your product hired to do in real life?

2. Value Curve Analysis

Don’t hug the line. Shift the curve.

Reimagine what “better” means—and move the market to meet you.

3. SIT (Systematic Inventive Thinking)

Creativity with constraint is innovation.

Subtraction, division, task unification—they’re your tactical edge.

4. TRIZ

Break the rules. Solve the paradox.

TRIZ shows you how to make the impossible… inevitable.

A Haruna Success Story: 水ゼリー – Turning Water into Experience

水ゼリー wasn’t just a new product.

It was a new category—a jelly you drink like water, with the hydration of a beverage and the experience of a dessert.

Clear. Clean. Fun. Functional.

JTBD: What Job Did It Do?

Job: “Help me hydrate in a way that feels satisfying, fun, and emotionally refreshing—without sugar, guilt, or boredom.”

In Japan’s crowded tea and water market, people wanted hydration… but without the flat, predictable experience of typical bottled drinks.

Emotional Jobs:

Let me have a little moment of satisfaction and fun.
Give me something nostalgic but clean.
Help me escape the blah of bottled drinks.

Functional Jobs:

Small, refreshing, snack-like beverage for mid-afternoon.
Conveniently portable from vending machines.
Cool + light in hot months when appetite is low

Value Curve: Where Did We Break Away?

The data shows this isn’t just an innovation. It’s a snack replacement, a hydration experience, and an emotional ritual for a new generation of vending machine consumers.

Sales Performance

Despite launching during the COVID-19 pandemic, 水ゼリー became a breakout hit, exceeding projections and triggering emergency production increases.

Its jelly texture, nostalgic ramune flavor, and transparent appearance made it viral on social media—especially with teens and young adults.

Most sales occurred between 4–6 PM, when customers sought a light pre-dinner treat.

Repeat purchase rate: 26.5% overall, and a staggering 44.5% among males aged 10–20.

SIT: How Did We Invent It?

Subtraction: Remove artificial flavors, colors, and unnecessary complexity—retain only what's essential: clarity, fun, and a clean sensory experience.
Division: Break apart the idea of “drink” and “snack” as separate categories—rebuild them as one.
Task Unification: Combine hydration + texture + emotional refreshment into a single, portable format.

TRIZ: What Contradictions Did We Resolve?

“Make it light, but satisfying.”
“Make it novel, but familiar.”
“Make it healthy, but fun.”

That’s the Infinity Core. That’s the power of engineered differentiation.

Building the Real Infinity (Without the Clones)

Your “uncopyable advantage” can’t be a gimmick. Or else you’ll trap yourself in your own simulation—just like Daly.

It must be an ecosystem.

A mindset.

A mechanism that evolves, improves and compounds over time.

Apple’s M-series chips
Tesla’s OTA software ecosystem
Nintendo’s design-first gameplay philosophy
Haruna’s Japan-rooted innovation model ( 👋😉 )

These aren’t just features.

They’re cloned engines of value—silently running, silently winning.

Final Thought

USS Callister wasn’t just a Black Mirror episode.

It was a warning.

When the quest for innovation and differentiation loses touch with purpose, empathy, and reality… it becomes a trap.

Sometimes for the customer.

Sometimes for the creator.

But when you combine creativity with structure—vision with tools—difference with discipline?

You don’t just make a product.

You make something no one else can.

You create something uncopyable.

While anyone can eventually copy the Water Jelly concept itself,

They can't copy what mattered most:

The first-mover advantage. The emotional connection built with customers. The halo effect that lifted the entire brand.

When you move first with meaning, you build trust.

And when you build trust, everything you touch becomes harder to replace.

Let’s co-create the future.

Peter Thomas

Chief Innovation Officer

Haruna Group

Haruna Co-Create