DISCONTINUOUS INNOVATION AND THE NEW PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT PROCESS

Although many new-products professionals may harbor hopes of developin g ''the next big thing'' in their respective industries, most product development efforts focus on incremental innovations. Accordingly, mos t research on the new-product development (NPD) process focuses on the development of evolutionary products. For new-products professionals seeking insights into the means for achieving breakthrough innovations , a fundamental question remains unanswered: Does the NPD process for discontinuous products differ from the process for incremental, or con tinuous, products? To provide a better understanding of managerial pra ctices associated with discontinuous innovation, Robert Veryzer presen ts findings from an in-depth study of eight discontinuous product deve lopment projects. The study explores the key factors that affect the d iscontinuous NPD process, as well as the methods that the firms in thi s study use for assessing the radically new products they have in deve lopment. From the findings in this study, he develops a descriptive mo del of the discontinuous product development process, and he offers in sights into the requirements for effective management of discontinuous innovation projects. Although half the firms in the study use a forma l process for evaluating radically innovative products, the participan ts in the study generally do not employ a formal, highly structured pr ocess for managing discontinuous NPD efforts. However; these firms do follow a consistent, logical process in the development of radical inn ovations, and their process differs significantly from incremental NPD processes. The processes used by the firms in this study are more exp loratory and less customer driven than the typical, incremental NPD pr ocess. The impetus for all the projects in this study comes from the c onvergence of developing technologies, various contextual or environme ntal factors (for example, government regulations), and a product cham pion or visionary. Starting from these drivers, the discontinuous NPD process focuses on formulating a product application for the emerging technologies. In all cases, these firms developed prototypes at nit ea rlier stage than the typical, incremental NPD process. To aid in the f ormulation of a new product application from emerging technologies, pr ototype construction in these discontinuous NPD projects precedes oppo rtunity analysis, assessment of market attractiveness, market research , and financial analysis. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Inc.