Home About us Contact
|
Home About us Contact | ||
|
|
||
NPD Process (npd + process)
Selected AbstractsNew product development practices of urban regeneration units: a comparative international studyINTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF NONPROFIT & VOLUNTARY SECTOR MARKETING, Issue 4 2004Roger Bennett The new product development (NPD) activities of 14 not-for-profit urban regeneration organisations in three cities (London, Copenhagen and Boston) were examined to establish the degree to which they reflected the best practices recommended by the academic NPD literature in the for-profit field. Executives in each organisation were questioned about the stages of the NPD process that they activated most intensively, relationships between marketing staff and technical urban development specialists, mechanisms for consulting end users of place products, methods for generating new ideas and the major problems they experienced. Parallels between the NPD behaviour of nonprofit urban regeneration organisations managing projects involving widespread change and that previously observed among for-profit organisations engaged in the development of radically new products were investigated. Copyright © 2004 Henry Stewart Publications [source] Marketing research and new product development success in Thai food processingAGRIBUSINESS : AN INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL, Issue 2 2003Prisana Suwannaporn Marketing plays an important role in new product development (NPD) through several mechanisms. One is crossfunctional communication and collaboration so that marketing issues are integrated into the NPD process. Another is the strategic orientation of NPD, which includes marketing strategy issues such as customer orientation and market fit. Third, marketing research plays a specific role, as it provides the information and knowledge which marketing brings into its NPD roles. We show that use of marketing research is the most important determinant of higher NPD success in Thailand's food processing industry. Crossfunctional communication is also an important success factor, but strategy and planning elements are not very critical in this industry in Thailand. [EconLit classification: M310; Q130.] © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Agribusiness 19: 169,188, 2003. [source] Working with concepts in the fuzzy front end: exploring the context for innovation for different types of concepts at Volvo CarsR & D MANAGEMENT, Issue 1 2007Maria Backman Automotive firms are balancing the increasing needs for cost and time efficiency with the necessity of developing more innovative products to stand out on in a competitive market. The strive for efficiency has led to an increasingly structured development process with limited allowances for deviations. Previous academic work has pointed out the importance and embedded potential of the fuzzy front end, where new concepts still have the possibility to impact the new product development (NPD) process. However, most research has focused on the transfer of new technologies, while concepts based on e.g. customer or market knowledge have been more or less neglected. This paper discusses the need for alternative and contingent approaches in the front end of NPD to also consider the transfer of other types of concepts. More specifically, it addresses the need to distinguish between different types of concepts and to explore their different prerequisites in NPD. It is argued that customer- and market-based concepts experience certain difficulties due to the history and power of technology in research and development (R&D) domains in the automotive context as well as a lack of support from the existing, formal processes. In this paper, we argue that all new concepts need to be conceptualized before being introduced to the NPD process, but that does not always suffice. Concepts other than technology concepts also need a contingent package to enable an evaluation in the context of the R&D process , they need to be contextualized. This paper draws on an in-depth case study of Volvo Cars within a long-lasting collaborative research setup. It is based on an interview study with key persons in the areas of concept work and NPD, and uses an insider/outsider approach. [source] The Relative Importance of Interfirm Relationships and Knowledge Transfer for New Product Development Success,THE JOURNAL OF PRODUCT INNOVATION MANAGEMENT, Issue 2 2007Mette Praest Knudsen The relationship and network literature has primarily focused on particular partner types, for example, buyer,supplier relationships or competitor interaction. This article explores the nature and relative importance of different types of interfirm relationships for new product development (NPD) success. The underlying premise of the study is that not only the type of interfirm relationships but also the combination of relationships are important for NPD performance. The interaction with a specific type of partner is expected to influence innovative performance by means of appropriate knowledge transfer. Varying needs for external knowledge, and thus types of relationships, are observed depending on the particular stages in the NPD process, the character of the knowledge base of the firm, and the industrial conditions. The absorption of external knowledge is discussed using the degree of redundancy in knowledge, which is defined as the degree of overlap in the knowledge base of the sender and the recipient of knowledge. Hence, the degree of redundancy has direct implications for the ease and, hence, use of knowledge shared with an external partner. The article is based on data from the Know for Innovation survey on innovative activities among European firms, which was carried out in 2000 in seven European countries covering five industries. The article explores the extent of use of external relationships in collaborative product development and finds that customers are involved more frequently in joint development efforts. Second, the industry association of the most important relationship is studied, and the results show that firms tend to partner with firms from their own industry. The danger in this approach is that firms from their own industry tend to contribute similar knowledge, which ultimately may endanger the creation of new knowledge and therefore more radical product developments. The analyses combine the finding that relationships with customers are used most frequently at both early and late stages of the product development process, with a second and more contradictory finding that at the same time customer relationships have a negative impact on innovative success. Moreover, the combination of customers, with both universities and competitors, has a significant negative effect on innovative performance. The potential causes of this apparent paradox can be narrowed down to two: (1) the average customer may be unable to articulate needs for advanced technology-based products; and (2) the average customer may be unable to conceptualize ideas beyond the realm of his or her own experience. Based on this evidence the article cautions product development managers to think explicitly about what certain customers can contribute with and, more importantly, to match this contribution directly with their own sense of what direction product development should go in the future. Finally, the role of complementary as well as supplementary knowledge is investigated for innovative success finding that sharing of supplementary knowledge with external partners in NPD leads to a positive effect on innovative performance. The article is concluded by a discussion of the implication of this finding for building knowledge within the firm and for selecting external partners for NPD. [source] The Role of Resource Access, Market Considerations, and the Nature of Innovation in Pursuit of Standards in the New Product Development ProcessTHE JOURNAL OF PRODUCT INNOVATION MANAGEMENT, Issue 5 2003Arvind Sahay Standards influence new product development (NPD) in high-technology markets. However, existing work on standards has focused exclusively on one aspect of standards,compatibility standards. This article has the following goals. First, we delineate the concept of customer interface standards as distinct from compatibility standards. This distinction is important from a product development and technology adoption perspective. Second, we propose and show that antecedent factors may motivate a firm differently about the emphasis that the firm should put on a type of standard (compatibility or customer interface) that it follows. For example, we propose that appropriability regime affects pursuit of customer interface standards and compatibility standards differently. Finally, we illustrate how resource access and the nature of the innovation also influence a firm's decision to pursue a standard type. Finally, we propose that pursuit of different standards (customer interface or compatibility) affects the NPD process in terms of (1) sourcing and dissemination of technology and (2) the customer utility for the product, which influences adoption. We collected perceptual data from a sample of marketing and technology managers in high-tech industries in the UK using both formative and reflective scales to measure the constructs. Analysis of the data using LISREL supports our contention that compatibility standards and customer interface standards are distinct constructs and that appropriability regime influences compatibility standards and customer interface standards differently. We also find that pursuit of compatibility standards helps a firm to create direct externalities pursuit of customer interface standards helps firms to develop indirect network externalities and technological advantage in the market. Our findings have the following implications. First, managers need to account explicitly for the difference between compatibility and customer interface standards, as resource allocation decisions during the NPD process will determine where a firm puts more focus. The choices made by the firm,as to whether it pursues compatibility standards or customer interface standards,will determine the type of advantage that it can gain in the market. Given a firm's situation at a point in time, a greater focus on one standard type rather than the other may be the right approach. Such choices will influence resource allocation in the product development process. [source] Commercial Innovations from Consulting Engineering Firms: An Empirical Exploration of a Novel Source of New Product IdeasTHE JOURNAL OF PRODUCT INNOVATION MANAGEMENT, Issue 4 2003Ian Alam Industrial firms interact with many outside organizations such as the customers, suppliers, competitors, and universities to obtain input for their new product development (NPD) programs. The importance of interfirm interactions is reflected in a large number of interdisciplinary studies reported in a wide variety of literature bases. As a result, several sources of new product ideas have been investigated in the extant literature. Yet given the growing complexity and risks in new product development, there seems to be a need for managers to obtain input from new and unutilized sources. Apparently, one source that industry has not tapped adequately for its NPD efforts is the consulting engineering firms (CEFs). To fill the aforementioned gap in the literature, this article explores the roles and suitability of CEFs in new product development by conducting a rigorous in-depth case research of new product idea generation in a large Australian firm manufacturing a variety of industrial products. To generate ideas for the sponsoring firm, longitudinal field interviews with 64 managers and engineers from 32 large CEFs were conducted over a one-and-one-half year period. The findings of the field interviews were combined with the documentary evidences and the archival data. This longitudinal data collection enabled the author to generate new product ideas over real time and to gain access to the information that otherwise might have been difficult to obtain. The results suggest that CEFs are a rich source of new product ideas of potential commercial value. However, industry is making little use of CEFs, which underscores the need for industrial firms to collaborate and to establish an effective idea transfer relationship with them. Moreover, the services of CEFs are not restricted to idea generation but can stretch across the entire NPD process. These findings of the study encourage product managers to conceptualize NPD as a highly synergistic mutually interdependent process between CEFs and industrial firms rather than simply an arm's-length consulting transactions. Given the dearth of research on idea generation with CEFs, this study highlights the findings that are novel and that go beyond the techniques of new product idea generation established in the extant literature. [source] Usefulness of the discrete choice methodology for marketing decision-making in new product development: an example from the European functional foods marketAGRIBUSINESS : AN INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL, Issue 1 2010Athanasios Krystallis Understanding consumer needs should be a high-priority strategic objective in new product development (NPD). Despite their importance, however, NPD processes do not take full advantage of the consumer survey methodologies available. The authors investigate+ parents" preferences for three new functional children's snacks marketed in Greece. Using a very simple discrete choice experimental design, the authors aim (a) to provide an example of consumer research implementation in food-related NPD and to assess its marketing value, and (b) to evaluate the quality of the acquired consumer-related information for marketing decision-making in food consumer-led NPD processes against a number of criteria set in the relevant literature. "Functionality" is found to be a statistically significant attribute for all three children's snacks of the research design compared to other attributes such as flavor and price. Parents seem to perceive the functional snack alternative as offering greater utility as compared to its conventional (i.e., nonfunctional) counterpart. Overall, the authors conclude that, despite some inherent weaknesses, the advantage of the discrete choice methodology in connection with consumer-led food NPD lies in its ability to describe current consumer needs and desires realistically and to contribute to the optimization of existing products. [EconLit Classification: M310, C920, C930, D100]. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. [source] Your new product development (NPD) is only as good as your process: an exploratory analysis of new NPD process design and implementationR & D MANAGEMENT, Issue 5 2007Nukhet Harmancioglu Given industry competitiveness, how do firms' new product development (NPD) process designs differ when responding to an innovation mandate? How do NPD design elements differ across firms when implementing NPD processes? These design elements are strategic business unit (SBU) senior management involvement, business case content, customer interactions, and cross-functional integration. What are the consequences of different combinations of NPD process design elements for innovation productivity? We explore these questions via a collective case study of newly implemented NPD process designs at three different SBUs of a major US-based international conglomerate, 1 year after receiving the mandate to grow through innovation. Our analysis suggests that industry competitiveness and firm characteristics influence the NPD process design as SBUs employ distinct combinations of NPD design elements. The differential emphasis on design elements leads to variation in process design and divergence in innovation productivity. [source] Which Tangible and Intangible Assets Matter for Innovation Speed in Start-Ups?,THE JOURNAL OF PRODUCT INNOVATION MANAGEMENT, Issue 4 2007Ans Heirman The launch of the first product is an important event for start-ups, because it takes the new venture closer to growth, profitability, and financial independence. The new product development (NPD) literature mainly focuses its attention on NPD processes in large firms. In this article insights on the antecedents on innovation speed in large firms are combined with resource-based theory and insights from the entrepreneurship literature to develop hypotheses concerning the antecedents of innovation speed in start-ups. In particular, tangible assets such as starting capital and the stage of product development at founding and intangible assets such as team tenure, experience of founders, and collaborations with third parties are considered as important antecedents for innovation speed in start-ups. A unique data set on research-based start-ups (RBSUs) was collected, and event-history analyses were used to test the hypotheses. The rich qualitative data on the individual companies are used to explain the statistical findings. This article shows that RBSUs differ significantly in their starting conditions. The impact of starting conditions on innovation speed differs between software and other companies. Although intuition suggests that start-ups that are further in the product development cycle at founding launch their first product faster, our data indicate that software firms starting with a beta version experience slower product launch. The amount of initial financing has no significant effect on innovation speed. Next, it is shown that team tenure and experience of founders leads to faster product launch. Contrary to expectations, alliances with other firms do not significantly affect innovation speed, and collaborations with universities are associated with longer development times. [source] Technological Innovativeness as a Moderator of New Product Design Integration and Top Management SupportTHE JOURNAL OF PRODUCT INNOVATION MANAGEMENT, Issue 3 2000Morgan Swink Many war stories, as well as a number of empirical research studies, point to the value of design integration and top management support in new product development (NPD) efforts, where design integration is conceptualized as the coordination of product and process design activities performed by various organizational groups. However, some emerging evidence suggests that these aspects of program management are not equally valuable in all NPD contexts. Furthermore, the benefits of these approaches may not extend to all dimensions of NPD performance. This article addresses these issues as they relate to technological innovativeness. The author reports the results of a research study designed to (1) assess the direct contributions of design integration and top management support to several dimensions of NPD performance, and (2) identify potential moderating influences of technological innovativeness on these direct effects. A survey of 136 NPD projects drawn from firms representing most of the major U.S. manufacturing industries provides data for the study. The overall goals of the study were to amplify our understanding of management's role in NPD and to further the development of contingency theory explaining new product success. The results indicate that design integration is positively associated with higher design quality in NPD, but it is not significantly linked with better financial performance. In addition, design integration appears to be an important influence on achieving NPD time goals, but only in cases of high technological innovativeness. This result suggests that increased design integration produces its greatest impacts when development processes are full of uncertainty. Top management support is positively associated with better time-based performance, design quality, and financial performance on the whole. However, a significant interaction effect suggests that high levels of top management support are ineffective in securing good financial performance in high technologically innovative environments. Other forces appear to be at work in these circumstances, making top management support less important. The article discusses the implications of these findings for management practice, a contingency-oriented view of NPD processes, and future research. [source] | ||||||||||