Disruptive technology

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Disruptive technologies (often also "disruptive innovations"; English to disrupt "interrupt" or "disturb") are innovations that replace the successful series of an existing technology, an existing product or an existing service or completely displace them from the market and make investments make the previously dominant market participants obsolete. Disruption often describes the process of a resource-poor company that challenges large and established companies.

principle

The theory of disruptive technology was developed by Clayton M. Christensen , who taught at Harvard Business School ; he was the first to use the term “disruptive technology”. In the title of the German translation of Christensen's main work "The Innovator's Dilemma", the process is called "groundbreaking innovations", which makes it clear that the book is not just about the consequences of technical progress in the narrower sense of the word.

According to Christensen, disruptive innovations are mostly found at the lower end of the market and in new markets. The new markets usually emerge unexpectedly for the established providers and are of no interest to them, especially because of their initially small volume or customer segment. They can show strong growth over time and completely or partially displace existing markets or products and services.

Disruptive technologies are initially inferior to established products. For example, the new flash memories initially offered hardly any advantages over traditional hard drives in terms of capacity, reliability and price; therefore, hard drives were still built into PCs. However, because flash memories are very small, fast and require little energy, they were initially used in new areas of application, such as USB sticks , in digital cameras and in MP3 players . They are now also being used to replace traditional hard drives in laptops and other mobile devices. Due to the great success in the new markets, two developments are set in favor of disruptive technology: The sales figures for flash memories are increasing, which means that prices are falling. This can further improve the memories.

According to the paradox of disruptive innovation, disruption loses its conceptual classification as such, provided that established market participants recognize the potential disruption early on and successfully integrate it into their own structures.

Examples

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  • VoIP : Initially, VoIP technology had many disadvantages: the voice quality was initially poor, and not all phone numbers could be reached. The technology developed further through the expansion of the infrastructure of the Internet, including the development of the "ADSL" enabler, the voice quality was improved. After standardization in the SIP protocol , providers enabled uncomplicated access to normal landline numbers. The prices were initially even higher, but with increasing popularity, more and more free connections could be offered (see WhatsApp ).
  • Digital camera : At first, digital cameras could not convince in terms of quality. Resolutions below a megapixel represented a major disadvantage compared to classic 35mm photography. In contrast, many advantages of this technology became clear over time: The image result could be checked immediately, the images could be processed or copied immediately without having to do so significant costs were incurred. The image quality improved so much that digital cameras have almost displaced analog cameras.
  • Semiconductor electronics : In the early years, semiconductors were still inferior to heated tubes. But when it became possible to build semiconductor components for higher powers and higher frequencies, these replaced the electron tubes more and more, because semiconductor electronics are smaller , more reliable and more energy efficient.
  • Desktop publishing (computer typesetting) replaced classic prepress: paper assembly, analog repro technology and metal typesetting .
  • CAD replaced technical drawing .
  • The compact disc replaced vinyl records from the mid-1980s .
  • The DVD supplanted VHS videotapes in the 2000s .
  • Flat screens replaced tube monitors and televisions in the 2000s .
  • After 2007, smartphones with touch screens will replace cell phones with keyboards (see Nokia ).
  • Renewable energies such as solar and wind power plants have the potential to replace traditional electricity generators such as coal power plants , nuclear power plants , gas power plants (see also fossil energy ). This is due, on the one hand, to the sharp drop in the price of renewable energies and, on the other hand, to the desire to avoid climate damage.

criticism

Jill Lepore, a professor of history at Harvard University, rates Christensen's theory of disruption as "founded on panic, anxiety, and shaky evidence". She points to the fact that in large parts of the case studies presented by Christensen in shortened form, in reality the long-term companies that rely on continuous innovation would have maintained or expanded their market share over a longer period of time, while most of them would have done so In order to change the economy in a disruptive way, founded startups could have achieved success at the beginning, but in the medium term became insolvent or were bought up. Apart from that, many “disrupter” are not startups at all, but rather established companies that were previously active in other markets and therefore had sufficient equity capital. Lepore accuses Clayton Christensen that he only investigated the reasons why established companies fail when disruptive innovations take effect and why startups occasionally develop disruptive effects. Established companies that assert themselves in the market and their successful defense methods are not his topic, nor are the reasons that lead to startups not being able to develop disruptive effects. She sums up her criticism with the words: " Disruptive innovation is a theory about why businesses fail. It's not more than that. It doesn't explain change. It's not a law of nature. It's an artifact of history, an idea , forged in time; it's the manufacture of a moment of upsetting and edgy uncertainty. Transfixed by change, it's blind to continuity. It makes a very poor prophet. "(" The theory of 'Disruptive Innovation' is a theory about why business models fail. Nothing more. It is incapable of explaining change. It is not a law of nature. It is a construct of history, an idea that was forged for the time of its creation. It is the product of a moment of excitement and nervous uncertainty. Because of her fixation on change she is blind to continuity. Her predictive power is very low. ")

Christensen is also accused of not understanding how business platforms work. He couldn't explain the success of companies like airbnb and Uber . Christensen stated several times that Uber was not an example of disruption. He ignores the fact that Uber is not only a competition for taxi companies, but also for professional drivers in large numbers. He could not do anything with a taxi company that had no taxis and a room agency that did not have its own accommodations. Christensen's main flaw is that he systematically ignores the producers of goods and services in his theory.

literature

  • Joseph L. Bower, Clayton M. Christensen: Disruptive Technologies. Catching the wave . In: Harvard Business Review , Vol. 69 (1995), pp. 19-45, ISSN  0007-6805 .
  • Clayton M. Christensen: The Innovator's Dilemma. Why established companies lose competition for groundbreaking innovations (The innovator's dilemma, 1997). Vahlen, Munich 2011, ISBN 978-3-8006-3791-1 .
  • Persistent Forecasting of Disruptive Technologies. The National Academies Press, Washington, DC 2009, ISBN 978-0-309-11660-2 ( online ; Report 2 ; accessed July 13, 2010).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Danneels, Erwin (2004) Disruptive Technology Reconsidered. A Critique and Research Agenda. In: Journal of Product Innovation Management 21 (4), pp. 246-258. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.0737-6782.2004.00076.x
  2. ^ A b c Clayton Christensen: The Innovator's Dilemma . Ed .: Harvard Business School Press. Boston, S. 1997 .
  3. ↑ Gans, Joshua: The disruption dilemma . The MIT Press, Cambridge, MA 2016, ISBN 978-0-262-03448-7 .
  4. ↑ Helmut Reuter: Analog photography: The photo film is slowly dying out. In: Spiegel Online. August 31, 2015, accessed September 7, 2015 .
  5. ↑ Keynote - 100% electric transportation and 100% solar by 2030 - AltCars Expo. August 31, 2014, accessed January 29, 2017 .
  6. ^ Jill Lepore: What the gospel of innovation gets wrong. In: The New Yorker . June 23, 2014, accessed January 31, 2018
  7. ↑ a b Alex Moazed / Nicholas L. Johnson: Why Clayton Christensen Is Wrong About Uber And Disruptive Innovation . Crunch Network. February 27, 2016, accessed January 31, 2018
  8. ↑ Bärbel Schwertfeger: Disruptive Innovation: "Many have misunderstood the concept" . haufe.de. December 7, 2016, accessed January 31, 2018
  9. ↑ Michael Horn: Uber, disruptive innovation, and regulated markets . christenseninstitute.org. June 16, 2016, accessed January 31, 2018