Characterisits of Disruptive Innovation

The Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University recently published (Fall of 2012) an article: "Mastering the art of disruptive innovation in journalism" by Clayton M. Christensen, David Skok, and James Allworth.  Christensen had developed a theory of disruptive innovation to explain how businesses grow, become successful, and then falter as startups take away their customers.  This has been demonstrated in multiple industries, and this article applies it to the field of journalism.  

But in this study they propose that disruption comes about because of the job the service or product allows one to do.  They suggest that you need to ask three questions to identify that job:

• What is the job audiences want done?
• What kinds of employees and structure does the company need so it can fulfill that job-to-be-done?
• What is the best way to deliver that information to audiences?

As markets and products are disrupted, they are replaced with markets and products that do the job better.  How does one move from providing a solutions one way to providing the same solution in a better and different way? A way that replaces the old way? A disruptive way?  This article suggest that there are three things one needs to examine: resources (or capabilities), processes, and priorities.  All of these are difficult to change as they are part of the culture of the company.  New ways often need to be done by new people, new processes, and new priorities that are separate from the old ones.

A recent article in the Wall Street Journal indicates that magazines add pages dropped 8.2% in 2012 and 32% since 1908.  This illustrates the problem of old media be supplanted by the new media.

One area that they don't address which I believe is critical is the technology trends that cross and merge to make these new ways of doing things possible.

Is 3D a Distruptive Technology?

Last year at CES 3D was everywhere. This year at CES there was very little mention of it.  One can buy 3D TV but most people that I know never turn on the function.  I personally have 2 TVs with 3D capability, but have never used it.

3D doesn't seem to fit the definition of a disruptive technology.  It is not something that emerging markets are using and the big players all have it, so it is not something that appears at this time to create new markets or displace established ones.

Is it just too soon?  Is 3D a sleeping technology waiting for the right application of the technology to make it really take off?  Ot is it just another technology that can be used when special effects are desired.

I was at the dentist the other day and he had a 3D machine that took a 3D image of your tooth.  Similar to a CAT scan for you mouth.  Maybe 3D is a niche market today, but will it break out into something bigger?

Are the requirements for special glasses holding it back.  Will glasses-less 3D catch on better?  Or do we have to wait for Google glasses to make 3D available for any and everything?

What do you think?  Will 3D be disruptive?

What Will Be Disruptive in 2013?

In 1995 Harvard Business Review published "Disruptive Technologies: Catching the Wave"
by Joseph L. Bower and Clayton M. Christensen.  This article addressed one of the most consistent patterns in business, i.e. the inability to stay at the top of their industry when tecnologies or markets change.  Ultimately, these authors posit, the problem is that they stay too close to their customers.  The result of this closeness is that investments are strongly influenced by existing customers.  The technology they could have invested in was not wanted by their customers - until their customers wanted it, and then it was too late.  The technologies that enter through emerging markets are ignored, because existing customers don't want it, and the emerging markets are too small to address.  The technology in the emerging markets are also often not as good as what currently exist, but the rate of improvement is often faster than that of existing technology. 

"For example, although personal computers did not meet the requirements of mainstream minicomputer users in the early 1980s, the computing power of the desktop machines improved at a much faster rate than minicomputer users’ demands for computing power did. As a result, personal computers caught up with the computing needs of many of the customers of Wang, Prime, Nixdorf, Data General, and Digital Equipment. Today they are performance-competitive with minicomputers in many applications. For the minicomputer makers, keeping close to mainstream customers and ignoring what were initially low-performance desktop technologies used by seemingly insignificant customers in emerging markets was a rational decision—but one that proved disastrous."

 The Harvard Business Review Blog published on January 10, 2013: "Disruptive Trends to Watch in 2013"

"The pattern that simple, convenient, low-priced solutions would grow from humble beginnings to create and transform industries had not yet been identified."

But, that excuse no longer applies.  Many have built on the work of Clayton Christensen and have identified the critical phases of disruptive technology:

1. Conception. When a disruptive idea is first born, typically far away from the market's mainstream. In these early days, there typically are a range of companies experimenting with a new model, fighting to figure out a sustainable business model.
2. Coming of age. When at least one of the would-be disruptors crosses from the fringes to more mainstream applications.
3. Crossing over. When the disruptor becomes the mainstream. Sometimes this shift results in the whole-sale replacement of the previous market leader; sometimes it creates a completely parallel market (which typically ends up being larger than the previous market due to the democratizing power of disruption).

The article goes on to identify those technology in 2012 that have proven disruptive and predict four technology that will be disruptive in 2013:

1. 3-D printing
2. The Internet of Things
3. New healthcare business models
4. Low-cost, online, competency-based learning universities     

These are all worth watching and have been suggested by others a potential disruptive technologies of the near future.  What do you think?  Will these be disruptive?