In the first chapter of Wharton on Emerging Technologies, authors discuss the management challenges on emerging technologies.The chapter also discusses the various challenges faced by the established companies while embracing emerging technologies and ways to overcome these challeges. According to the textbook, emerging technologies are science-based innovations that have the potential to create a new industry or transform an existing one. Emerging technologies are also defined as any knowledge based innovative application that has entered or created a new market.
The authors say that for the established companies emerging technologies is totally a different game and has to compete with the rapidly changing technologies.Though large companies have all the infrastructure and technology, main challenges they face are technological ambiguity,uncertain markets ,rapidly changing trends. To encounter these challenges, the managers of the established companies should have a different approach and mind set in their decision making, planning, resource allocation,market analysis and the R & D.
By providing the examples of two companies, the authors suggest that to be sucessful in emerging technologies, companies must have dynamic approach with the changing trends,understand the customers use of technology, have disciplined imagination ie., learning from experiment and understand the pattern of emerging technologies. Even though there are frameworks, approaches and perspectives to help manage challenges on emerging technologies, the authors say that there would always be certain inconsistencies that the businesses has to deal with.
The word that caught my attention in this book is 'Creative Destruction'- occurs when something new kills the old ones.This word was coined by Joseph Schumpter ,an Austrian Economist in 1946, in his work titled "Capitalism,Socialism and Democracy". Creative destruction as I undertsand it is the phenomenon of radical innovations making the existing technologies obsolete or out-dated. It follows a vicious cycle where one technology is invented and it rises rapdily only to be replaced by another radical innovation.I found this article interesting where the writer says that the Google will be the next victim of Creative Destruction.
It was mentioned in the book that the top 15 spenders in R&D were large corporation in 1998, but, I have few question as in this economic downturn are the companies willing to invest in R&D? What would be the fate of small companies which are into emerging technologies?
http://www.businessinsider.com/2009/2/google-next-victim-of-creative-destruction-goog
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You might take a look at Brekke's blog – she referenced an article that discusses emerging technologies and innovation during an economic downturn. The link is: http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=2086
ReplyDeleteI think this would hold true for smaller companies, as well, depending on the emerging technology. I would imagine large and small companies might try to embrace more green IT initiatives, in hopes of saving money on power, electricity, travel expenses, etc. Also, I read an interesting on companies scaling back on advertising budgets and moving to free social networks to advertise (http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_pwwi/is_200810/ai_n30945203). I think more companies will definitely move towards this avenue (Twitter, Facebook, even Virtual Worlds) to cut down on costs but still try market and advertise effectively to their target audience. and I wonder if we might see more emerging technologies geared towards saving money or making current operations run more cost effectively?
The Wharton article touches upon two important facets of innovation:
ReplyDeletea) Stock Market doesn't reward it and
b) Innovation can be outsourced.
Recent research suggests the stock market is not good at valuing intangibles, uncertain innovation or technological change. What this means for large, publicly traded firms is that they may face a disadvantage in engaging in radical innovation, and this innovation may instead take place in venture capital-funded startups.
Outsourcing of innovation itself could turn out to be the wave of the not-so-distant future. Particularly in the pharmaceutical area, there has been a focus on how firms acquire innovation that has been undertaken by small, privately funded firms such as biotech startups. It may be that the locus of much really radical innovation is shifting outside of the large organizations to small start-ups.