Kayaking and lead-user innovations

One of the big differences between incremental (continuous, evolutionary) innovations and radical (discontinuous, revolutionary, breakthrough) innovations is that, from the firm's perspective, incremental innovations follow an inside-out trajectory to market. By contrast, radical innovations tend to follow an outside-in trajectory. In other words, radical innovations often come from users or, more specifically, lead users. Eric von Hippel, professor at MIT, defines lead users as users whose, "present needs foreshadow general demand" and, importantly, "expect to obtain high benefit from a solution to their needs."

In some industries, such as medical instruments, many radical/breakthrough innovations come from users themselves (e.g. brain surgeons), which is totally understandable, considering the environment in which they work. Another area in which lead users create radical/breakthrough innovations is leisure. This is partly due to the fact that in this industry, people are quite passionate about what they are doing: there is an incentive to innovate. Examples of products that were originally developed by lead users here include sports drinks, the sports bra and skateboards.

There is a really fascinating interview here with Carla Bliss, professor at Harvard Business School. In the interview, professor Bliss discusses her research into lead-user innovations in the water sports industry, specifically, kayaking. This interview sheds some interesting light on how industries develop, dominant designs, user-manufacturers and established manufacturers.

After reading the article, you should note that there is a definite shift, or "tipping point," where the emphasis moves from exploring to exploiting an innovation. A must read!