Conclusion articles M&I
Lecture 2: Curse of success
Article Tripsas, Mary (1997): “Complementary assets and incumbent survival in the
typesetter industry”.
(about success)
This article examines how investment, technical capabilities, and complementary assets impact the
survival and success of incumbent firms.
Incumbents (inzittende) fail or thrive because of 3 things:
- Investment behavior– do they invest in radical or incremental changes?
- Technical capabilities – Are incumbents able to match the technical quality of products from
new entrants in competence-destroying technologies? Good for incremental changes. But
core competencies can become core rigidities. Established firms can become more passive to
change (inertia).
- Complementary assets (CA) – (manufacturing processes, sales networks, etc.) firms that have
access to SCA can lead to exploitation which is necessary for advantage towards competitors.
Complementary assets lead to incumbent firms still standing while new destroying, technological
changes come.
If a firm invests (little myopia), but they can’t handle the competitor than the incumbent has core
rigidities and not core competences anymore. Incumbents can invest and have superior technical
capabilities, but if they don’t have CA they can still lose market share. CA is immensely important.
Findings suggest a dual approach to maintaining adaptability: investment in technology while
safeguarding complementary assets to remain competitive.
Teacher:
Established firms were handicapped by their prior experience, because their approach to new
product development was shaped by it. They were consistently inferior to those of new entrants.
Incumbents did not necessarily suffer commercial consequences as a result of this technical
inferiority. When their specialized complementary assets retained their value, they were found to
buffer incumbents from the effects of competence destruction.
1
,Article Hillebrand, Bas (2011): “Customer Orientation and Future Market Focus in New
Service Development (NSD)” (SME)
(about success)
The paper explores whether a dual focus—balancing current customer needs (customer orientation)
with anticipated future trends (future market focus)—can mitigate organizational inertia and support
greater innovativeness. Often companies prioritize customization and service improvement over
disruptive innovations, which can lead to inertia.
- Customer orientation – Firms should sufficiently understand their target customers to be
able to create superior value for them. This involves a company’s dedication to understanding
and satisfying current customer needs. However this can lead to inertia and not exploring
new technologies and markets. Can restrict flexibility.
- Future market focus – Thus a firm also needs to have attention for emerging needs and
future market developments, because the current customers often don’t know there future
needs and are not good for identifying potentially new customer segment. Prevents firms
being myopic and inertia. Encouraging firms to adopt new practices, technologies, and
models even if they disrupt existing operations – Cannibalize.
There are two mechanisms that influence firm innovativeness:
(1) Service R&D strength : the level to which the service firm has resources and capacity for new
service technology development compared to its competitors.
(2) Willingness to cannibalize (WTC) = the extent to which a firm is prepared to reduce the
actual or potential value of its investments. Cannibalization, 3 dimensions:
1. Willingness to cannibalize sales - are you willing to give up the sales (even on a successful
product)?
2. Willingness to cannibalize routines/capabilities - “core capabilities leading to core rigidities”.
Are you willing to unlearn?
3. Willingness to cannibalize previous investments - sounds easy but is difficult in practice.
Investment considered as costs. People have the tendency to ignore some costs.
How to link this to cannibalization? : These existing firms need to be willing to let go of things that
made them successful the past years. Firms willing to cannibalize choose more radical innovations.
Firms not willing to cannibalize choose more incremental innovations. Cannibalization is the opposite
of Inertia.
The conceptual model shows the influence of:
- Customer orientation towards cannibalization is negative (-)
- Future market focus towards cannibalization is positive (+)
Large firms are more innovative. However, larger firms experience more inertia where WTC sales and
routines are involved. Small firms are more agile where innovation is concerned.
The results indicate that while customer orientation can lead to short-term success, it is the future
market focus that significantly drives long-term innovation and adaptability. Firms that balance both
orientations are more likely to succeed in dynamic environments. This dual approach can enhance
their innovative capabilities and overall competitiveness. While customer focus helps to meet
immediate demands, future market focus promotes adaptability and readiness for new trends.
2
, Lecture 3: Adoption
Article Hubert (2019): “The Influence of Acceptance and Adoption Drivers on Smart Home
Usage”
(About adoption)
The article investigates factors influencing the acceptance and adoption of smart home technologies,
utilizing an integrative model combining Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), Innovation Diffusion
Theory (IDT), and Perceived Risk Theory (PRT).
- TAM (Technology acceptance model)= Emphasizes perceived usefulness (PU) and perceived
ease of use (PEOU) as primary acceptance drivers, these 2 show the attitudes toward
technology and the acceptance of it.
- IDT (innovation diffusion theory Roger’s) (Diffusion is whether it spreads and how it spreads
within the society) = focusses on technology-related determinants. Explores innovation
attributes like compatibility (CO) (how well the product works with others), trialability (TRI) (if
the product can be tested), visibility (VI), and result demonstrability (RD), which influence
how technologies integrate into daily life.
- PRT (Perceived risk theory) = Highlights the role of perceived risks, including security,
performance, and time risk, which may deter adoption.
Results:
- CO, PU – TAM relevant for acceptance.
- Innovation factors impact acceptance indirectly through PU, PEOU.
- Risk perceptions negatively impact adoption especially performance risks and security.
Teacher:
However, not everyone is ready to adapt. Pro-innovation bias = the implicit belief that an innovation
is inherently good and should be adopted by the whole society. Why is that a problem? Because
people tend to hang on to things they already have. Loss aversion as an explanation for non-
adoption.
3
Lecture 2: Curse of success
Article Tripsas, Mary (1997): “Complementary assets and incumbent survival in the
typesetter industry”.
(about success)
This article examines how investment, technical capabilities, and complementary assets impact the
survival and success of incumbent firms.
Incumbents (inzittende) fail or thrive because of 3 things:
- Investment behavior– do they invest in radical or incremental changes?
- Technical capabilities – Are incumbents able to match the technical quality of products from
new entrants in competence-destroying technologies? Good for incremental changes. But
core competencies can become core rigidities. Established firms can become more passive to
change (inertia).
- Complementary assets (CA) – (manufacturing processes, sales networks, etc.) firms that have
access to SCA can lead to exploitation which is necessary for advantage towards competitors.
Complementary assets lead to incumbent firms still standing while new destroying, technological
changes come.
If a firm invests (little myopia), but they can’t handle the competitor than the incumbent has core
rigidities and not core competences anymore. Incumbents can invest and have superior technical
capabilities, but if they don’t have CA they can still lose market share. CA is immensely important.
Findings suggest a dual approach to maintaining adaptability: investment in technology while
safeguarding complementary assets to remain competitive.
Teacher:
Established firms were handicapped by their prior experience, because their approach to new
product development was shaped by it. They were consistently inferior to those of new entrants.
Incumbents did not necessarily suffer commercial consequences as a result of this technical
inferiority. When their specialized complementary assets retained their value, they were found to
buffer incumbents from the effects of competence destruction.
1
,Article Hillebrand, Bas (2011): “Customer Orientation and Future Market Focus in New
Service Development (NSD)” (SME)
(about success)
The paper explores whether a dual focus—balancing current customer needs (customer orientation)
with anticipated future trends (future market focus)—can mitigate organizational inertia and support
greater innovativeness. Often companies prioritize customization and service improvement over
disruptive innovations, which can lead to inertia.
- Customer orientation – Firms should sufficiently understand their target customers to be
able to create superior value for them. This involves a company’s dedication to understanding
and satisfying current customer needs. However this can lead to inertia and not exploring
new technologies and markets. Can restrict flexibility.
- Future market focus – Thus a firm also needs to have attention for emerging needs and
future market developments, because the current customers often don’t know there future
needs and are not good for identifying potentially new customer segment. Prevents firms
being myopic and inertia. Encouraging firms to adopt new practices, technologies, and
models even if they disrupt existing operations – Cannibalize.
There are two mechanisms that influence firm innovativeness:
(1) Service R&D strength : the level to which the service firm has resources and capacity for new
service technology development compared to its competitors.
(2) Willingness to cannibalize (WTC) = the extent to which a firm is prepared to reduce the
actual or potential value of its investments. Cannibalization, 3 dimensions:
1. Willingness to cannibalize sales - are you willing to give up the sales (even on a successful
product)?
2. Willingness to cannibalize routines/capabilities - “core capabilities leading to core rigidities”.
Are you willing to unlearn?
3. Willingness to cannibalize previous investments - sounds easy but is difficult in practice.
Investment considered as costs. People have the tendency to ignore some costs.
How to link this to cannibalization? : These existing firms need to be willing to let go of things that
made them successful the past years. Firms willing to cannibalize choose more radical innovations.
Firms not willing to cannibalize choose more incremental innovations. Cannibalization is the opposite
of Inertia.
The conceptual model shows the influence of:
- Customer orientation towards cannibalization is negative (-)
- Future market focus towards cannibalization is positive (+)
Large firms are more innovative. However, larger firms experience more inertia where WTC sales and
routines are involved. Small firms are more agile where innovation is concerned.
The results indicate that while customer orientation can lead to short-term success, it is the future
market focus that significantly drives long-term innovation and adaptability. Firms that balance both
orientations are more likely to succeed in dynamic environments. This dual approach can enhance
their innovative capabilities and overall competitiveness. While customer focus helps to meet
immediate demands, future market focus promotes adaptability and readiness for new trends.
2
, Lecture 3: Adoption
Article Hubert (2019): “The Influence of Acceptance and Adoption Drivers on Smart Home
Usage”
(About adoption)
The article investigates factors influencing the acceptance and adoption of smart home technologies,
utilizing an integrative model combining Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), Innovation Diffusion
Theory (IDT), and Perceived Risk Theory (PRT).
- TAM (Technology acceptance model)= Emphasizes perceived usefulness (PU) and perceived
ease of use (PEOU) as primary acceptance drivers, these 2 show the attitudes toward
technology and the acceptance of it.
- IDT (innovation diffusion theory Roger’s) (Diffusion is whether it spreads and how it spreads
within the society) = focusses on technology-related determinants. Explores innovation
attributes like compatibility (CO) (how well the product works with others), trialability (TRI) (if
the product can be tested), visibility (VI), and result demonstrability (RD), which influence
how technologies integrate into daily life.
- PRT (Perceived risk theory) = Highlights the role of perceived risks, including security,
performance, and time risk, which may deter adoption.
Results:
- CO, PU – TAM relevant for acceptance.
- Innovation factors impact acceptance indirectly through PU, PEOU.
- Risk perceptions negatively impact adoption especially performance risks and security.
Teacher:
However, not everyone is ready to adapt. Pro-innovation bias = the implicit belief that an innovation
is inherently good and should be adopted by the whole society. Why is that a problem? Because
people tend to hang on to things they already have. Loss aversion as an explanation for non-
adoption.
3
