Disruptive Innovation and User Centricity

Question 1

What types of innovation are there?

Answer 1

Component change: Change, Strengthening
Architecture change:
Yes, Radical Change Architectural change
No Modular Change Enhancing Change

Sometimes the innovation is not radical, it’s about re-shuffling some dimension.

Question 2

What is a disruptive innovation?

Answer 2

Innovation that helps create a new market and value network and eventually goes on to disrupt an exiting market and value network (over a few years or decades).
Initially they improve products or services in ways the market does not expect, typically first by designing for a different set of customers in the new market and later by lowering prices in the existing market.

Question 3

What types of disruptive innovations are there?

Answer 3

a) Low-end Disruptive Innovation
Innovation is cheaper and lower in quality than existing products in core performance attributes.
Appeals to low-end price sensitive segment.
Over time it becomes mainstream.

b) High-end Disruptive Innovation
Better performance on dimensions that current customers do not greatly value.
Innovation appeals to a super-premium niche.
Over time, further developments improve the innovator’s performance on the attributes mainstream customers value.

Question 4

What is the threat behind Disruptive Innovation?

Answer 4

It has to be customer-led. There are two classing mistakes:

(1) the R&D labs can get it right, but the Marketing department is driven by mainstream customers who drive the resource allocation process.
(2) the Marketing gets it right by listening to consumers, but R&D is driven by a specific technology trajectory.