Understanding Unsuccessful Innovation

Most studies of innovation that examine determinants of success or failure look exclusively at the factors that make innovation successful. To better understand causes and patterns of unsuccessful or failed innovation within firms, we conducted 19 case studies of failure from the past 20 years. These cases draw primarily from coverage by the popular and trade presses and highlight clear models of failure. This paper examines all aspects of the product or business process life cycle and found that innovation failure typically revolves around firms ’ inadequate pre-launch development activities, which lead to products that do not function properly or in which the marketplace has no interest. There is a gap between innovation, market-specific product launch, and successful innovation as typically presented in the literature. This paper exploits this gap and identifies those products and processes that are introduced but fail to achieve widespread adoption as unsuccessful innovation or innovation failures.

Source: NSF - Statistics on U.S. Science and Engineering Resources - September 2, 2021 Category: Statistics Source Type: news