What are you developing and

why?
 Growing Your Business: Market
Expansion, Acquisition, or Innovation?
 Assessing the Importance of New
Products in Your Growth Plans

 They set targets and have metrics to predict and measure how many
new products they’ll develop each year, and they take them seriously

 They manage their products as portfolios by focusing on the aggregate of

products in development and in the market when they assess how well
their companies are meeting their strategic goals. For example, they
make sure that their portfolios include some radical and risky projects
as well as lower risk, incremental
 They implement new product development processes and practices, and
they have individuals who are accountable for managing and improving
these processes and practices
 Over the course of several years, they introduce a stream of successful
new products that range from incremental to radical (see the later section
“Defining the Types of New Products” for more on product types).
 Identifying the Role of NPD
for Your Company

 If you work in the food industry, you probably come out with “new-and
improved” versions frequently but radical innovations relatively rarely.
 The pharmaceutical industry tends to have long lead times (it often takes
ten or more years to develop a new product), but competition and
advancing science and technology apply consistent pressure to innovate.
 Financial companies always are looking to differentiate through new
product development.
 Many of the large commodity businesses (including oil companies and
waste management companies) are beginning to use their vast wealth to
innovate and develop new products.
 In fad and fashion industries, you measure product development cycles in
months, not years. How different is NPD in these companies than it is in
the pharmaceutical industry, for example?
 Where does your company fit in the “value
chain”
 Who are your customers
 What’s your industry’s “clockspeed”
 How you get profits
 Types of products

 Breakthrough products
 Platform Products
 Derivative and support products
 Making the Most of Products, Services,
Solutions, and Experiences

 The product includes the experience.

 The solution includes specialized knowledge
 The product developer takes over some of your work.
 Other great things support the product or service
 You get the service plus more
 The brand/cause influences the purchase