There are many definitions of technological innovation but we like this one:
"Innovation is the scientific, technological, organizational, financial and
business activities leading to the commercial introduction of a new (or improved)
product or production process [32]."
The main phases of innovation follow a familiar path or innovation chain as follows
(although considerable parallel activity may take place, depending on the newness of the innovation):
- generation of ideas
- testing the feasibility of ideas
- product design & development
- manufacturing design
- regulatory approval and IP protection
- production
- marketing
- customer use
Just as there are many ways of defining innovation, there are also many ways of
describing innovation. Each path is important because:
- it follows from a specific strategy to pursue that innovation path
- it requires a different focus of management activity in order to be successful.
Learn about achieving competitive advantage from innovation paths
such as radical/incremental and architectural/component below.
