Drucker’s insights on market orientation and innovation: implications for emerging areas in high-technology marketing

In 1954, Drucker boldly declared that organizations have only two basic functions, marketing and innovation. While true for any organization, this insight is particularly pertinent for technology-based businesses. The complicated environment surrounding high-tech companies creates a great need for sophisticated marketing. Yet these companies continue to have under-developed competencies in marketing and in understanding customer needs. This essay explores Drucker’s insights with respect to two particularly salient issues for high-tech companies: developing and implementing a market orientation and break-through innovations. We review Drucker’s insights and synthesize them with the scholarly research on these issues. Finally, we discuss three emerging areas in high-tech marketing where academics and managers could build on Drucker’s insights to guide future research and practice: market driving, customer co-creation, and corporate social responsibility. These illustrative examples highlight that even today, Drucker’s writings continue to offer remarkable guidance to scholars and managers who are willing to take the time to reflect, understand, and incorporate his insights in the unique context of high-tech industries. Electronic supplementary material  The online version of this article (doi:) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Information and communication technology,co-innovation,and perceived productivity in tourism small and medium enterprises: an exploratory analysis

With the aim of providing new evidence and a practical instrument to measure co-innovative sources of productivity in tourism small and medium enterprises (SMEs), this article presents a newly designed questionnaire that has been validated by exploratory factor analysis. The empirical study was conducted on a representative sample of 500 tourism SMEs in Catalonia (a region in north-eastern Spain). Three factors emerged from the analysis: (1) Internet use; (2) firm innovation; and (3) new forms of work organization. Together, these factors explained 45.4% of cumulative variance. The reliability coefficients obtained for the three factors were high (α_1?=?0.76; α_2?=?0.72; and α_3?=?0.71). The study also identified a specific form of co-innovation in SMEs, which is based on bringing radically innovative products and services to the market, and on Internet use and work organization practices that are clearly orientated towards increasing income and optimizing resources. The combination between economics of the firm and statistical validation tools is a source of originality of the paper. Strategic guidelines to improve SMEs productivity have also been discussed.     

成渝地区双城经济圈产业协同创新测度研究

以成渝地区双城经济圈中的所有市为研究对象,用2010—2020年的面板数据为样本,构建区域协同创新指标体系,建立耦合协同度模型,对其协同创新能力进行测度。计算了经济圈2019年细分产业的区位熵,对产业专业化程度进行分析。实证结果表明,成渝地区协同创新水平逐年升高,但仍然存在一系列问题。最后对当前现状提出建议,一方面立足于传统产业,同时发展新兴产业;另一方面协调好产业协同创新的资源共享机制和转变体制机制。     

Service encounters as bases for innovation

This article examines the factors affecting the innovativeness of service encounters – either as drivers or as barriers. The assumption is that a considerable number of innovations in service industries are initiated in service encounters and that employees are the core factor in connecting customers with the innovating organization. Based on literature studies and pilot case studies, seven propositions are proposed and tested in a qualitative, hermeneutic way in field experiments in nine service organizations. Important new results are that encounter-based innovation requires mutual empathy between employees and customers, employees investing stubbornness and time can be a driver for innovation, and several layers of management can be a barrier. In the field experiments three new factors for encounter-based innovation were found: translation, multitasking, and hyper-professionalism. The two first are drivers; the third a barrier. A model that summarizes the findings is presented.     

The Effects of Co-Innovation on the Value-time Curve: Quantitative Study on Product Level

Quantitative analysis with respect to co-innovation is very scarce. The aim of this paper is to make headway into this terrain by quantitatively analyzing the effect of co-innovation on the value-time curve in terms of indicators from Beelaerts’ 3C model. Analysis of car manufacturer market data shows that co-innovation decreases time-to-market and increases market share. A case analysis of three aerospace products, combined with the previously found relations, leads to further insight into current innovation performance of major aerospace companies.     

基于结构洞理论的用户主导创新成因研究

从用户主导创新的组织特性出发,运用结构洞理论分析了用户主导创新的成因,认为用户主导创新是结构洞弱势方进行平衡运作的结果,用户通过与国内制造商建立共益性关系桥接了在传统创新组织模式下由外商占据的结构洞位置并从中获益。