Hedge your bets: Options investing in new product development Brad Barbera, President and founder of Pi Innovation, presented "Hedge your bets: Options investing in new product development" at the Minneapolis Regional Innovation Round Table on September 14, 2017. Hedge your bets - Brad Barbera Download “Go big or go home” is the mantra of many a Las Vegas gambler ... oftentimes, of one who goes home broke. Product development need not be all-or-nothing big bets. In fact, they shouldn’t be! Instead, leverage the investment strategy of hedge fund managers by treating your new product development efforts as options. You’ll go back to the office with a practical tool that helps with the most critical component of valuing an investment in NPD (or in options, for that matter): accurately forecasting the future. In this presentation, you will learn: “What are options” and why do people invest in them? How are options valued? How can NPD work be treated like options investing? How do I value an NPD project the way options are valued?