

'The Innovator's Dilemma' -- innovation in the hard-disk industry. - timr
http://www.businessweek.com/chapter/christensen.htm

======
notauser
Summary: You should stop listening to your customers if there is a new, bigger
market of new customers out there who want something different from the
customers you already have. This is especially true if your current customers
are going to go away and/or change their mind about what they actually want in
the near future.

Some examples:

\- Change from 5.25" to 3.5", not wanted by desktop customers, but the new
portable market wanted it. Companies that only listened to the desktop market
failed, so new entrants (with no existing customers) mostly won.

\- Change from 3.5" to 2.5", largely conducted by incumbent firms as customers
who wanted 3.5" disks also wanted 2.5" disks.

As always this is harder to do than say :)

~~~
Alex3917
"Summary: You should stop listening to your customers if there is a new,
bigger market of new customers out there who want something different from the
customers you already have."

I didn't read this article, but the HBS version had the point that the time to
switch over to the new process is when the trajectory of the new process along
the original variable puts it above the level that the satisficers want, not
above the old process. So in other words you should adopt the new hard drive
process when the trajectory puts the storage capacity ahead of what the
satisficers want, not ahead of where the storage capacity of the old HD
process will be. That is the point where the customers will switch over to the
new process for the other benefits it provides.

This graph and the paragraph underneath explains it better:
<http://web.mit.edu/6.933/www/Fall2000/teradyne/clay.html>

------
simoncoggins
A very interesting article.

My first thought was how it relates to Microsoft as mentioned in this article:
[http://seekingalpha.com/article/80363-why-microsoft-will-
nev...](http://seekingalpha.com/article/80363-why-microsoft-will-never-win-
again) . Their fear of web apps undermining Windows/Office prevented them from
taking a lead in the emerging market.

------
tptacek
Most famous startup book ever. Read before any other book. Will absolutely
light a fire under your ass.

Lots of lessons here, but to my mind the best is: your first version should
suck. Not will, "should". On some measurable obvious axis, disruptive
technologies are inferior to their predecessors, which is why the industry
giants haven't done them already. Christianson's book is full of examples of
things that looked crappy to the incumbents and their customers, but worked
for some subset of the market, and then wound up eating the whole industry.

------
aswanson
This podcast is long, but well worth the listen:

<http://itc.conversationsnetwork.org/shows/detail135.html>

