Resolving partial-viewpoint paradoxes of innovation strategies: Toward an integrative framework

Authors: Hsin-Min Hung

Journal: Chiao Da Management Review. Dec. 2015, 35(2): 1-29.

Keywords:
Innovation; Selection; Diffusion; Efficiency; Performance/cost

Abstract:
This study follows a systematic literature review procedure of Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI) and Google Scholar databases during 1996-2012. A three-dimensional framework is generated from a knowledge management perspective that integrates relevant studies of innovation creation, selection, and diffusion. The first dimension is innovation and efficiency; the second dimension is uncertain and certain environment; the third dimension is time. This study reviews the previous research concerning knowledge creating/diffusing mechanisms for innovation, autonomous strategic process, induced strategic process in the innovation strategy, the pattern of industrial innovation, and the S-curve in the diffusion of innovations. A method for resolving the current paradox resulting from researchers’ viewpoints of supply-side (e.g., Abernathy and Utterback, 1978) and demand-side strategies (e.g., Adner and Levinthal, 2001) in industrial innovation is offered. Namely, supply-side strategists pursue an innovative product’s performance in the early stage of product innovation process and cost efficiency in the late stage of the process. Contrarily, demand-side strategists advocate reducing product cost to ensure that customers are willing to pay for the product during the early stage of product innovation process; in the late stage of the process, strategists enhance product’s performance to ensure the product’s price stability. In addition, this study legitimates a functional product performance/cost ratio for competitive strategies in practice. Furthermore, this study encourages future studies to resolve innovation paradoxes from a dynamic three-dimensional perspective.