Community Forum – Forecasting Disruptive Technologies

Resource Type
Survey (Community Forum)
Author
Innovation Research Interchange
Topic
Disruptive Innovation
Associated Event
Publication

How do you forecast disruptive technologies?

We are looking to learn how companies distinguish between disruptive and breakthrough technologies. How do you define and identify disruptive technology? What is the process you use to identify them? Do you have any recommendations for identifying them in advance? – Joseph George, Fellow, Advanced Innovation, Research, Quality & Technology, Kellogg Company and the Early IDs of Disruptive Technologies ROR Working Group

Community Responses

Ted Farrington, Senior Director – PepsiCo Advanced Research
I like Clay Christiansen’s original definition for disruptive technology: basically jumping from the end of one technology S-curve to the beginning of a new S-curve, in the same general product space.  For breakthrough, or radical, innovation I like the definition used by Gina O’Connor and her team during the IRI ROR project “Radical Innovation – Phase Two”:

Breakthrough (or radical) innovation =

1.  new to the world performance features,
2.  5-10X (or greater) performance improvement, or
3.  30 – 50% (or greater) reduction in cost.

If one includes 3. in the definition of breakthrough innovation, then there is some overlap between breakthrough and disruptive.  Some folks leave 3. out of the breakthrough definition, making the two more clearly distinct.

Bruce Merrifield, IRI Emeritus, Chief Executive Officer, Pridco Management
One way to look at it might be to think of a technology that not only has a 10x cost/performance advantage over an existing market solutions to a need…but also has a multiplier factor in terms of application to a number of different independent markets as well.

The Bell Labs transistor made the vacuum tube obsolete, but has since become the primary building block of every electronic device known to man…restructuring industries and creating new ones…

If it had only displaced vacuum tubes it would still be a major breakthrough.

Hope this is helpful…

Michael Lake, IRI Emeritus, Formerly “Idea Hunter-Gatherer” for Westvaco Corporation
In my opinion, you must first identify the ballpark in which you want to play.  Then “grow” individuals who have knowledge of the history of this ballpark and have or can develop network of thought-leaders within the targeted market.  These individuals should have a near-free-reign to travel and interact with these thought-leaders, so these “idea hunters” – as described in the book “Radical Innovation”, documenting the ground-breaking research sponsored by the IRI in the 90’s – can develop a gut-feel for what the customer’s customers are seeking.  The active question should be “What is important to insure this populations’ competitiveness into the future?”  This process takes years – not months – so management needs to have patience while they’re funding this important work that can forecast future “wants and needs” that provide the motivating force behind the development of disruptive technologies.  As the President of Westvaco – John Luke Sr, the present John Luke’s dad – once told me, “the only quarter that’s meaningful is a ‘quarter of a century’ so leaders must resist the urging of the financial community which stresses only quarter-of-a-year performance”.

Join the Conversation!