Wharton chapter 2

Of the 4 pitfalls mentioned in the Wharton book in chapter 2, I'd say the most common pitfall is delayed participation. However, I would argue that it is not always a pitfall, and in many cases the firm to delay participation, for whatever reason ends up being very successful. I think this pitfall needs some additional info to be completely true. The size of the company plays a big part in whether delaying entry is beneficial or disastrous. I would argue that a smaller company would suffer much more than larger company due to delays. Smaller companies are for the most part more agile, but have less resources. They need to take advantage of being small and nimble and jump into emerging technologies early if they plan to at all. They are usually able to make the first moves and get into the market during the early adopter phase which experiences tremendous growth.

A larger firm should be willing to sacrifice early entry and high profit margins to make sure the market is viable before it jumps in. In many cases, the resources available to the larger company allow it to become a market leader after a period of time. Google is a great example of this. Yahoo was the company to beat for years, and Google comes along and gets big enough that it can knock Yahoo off the top spot. In the technology sector more than anywhere, the company that was first to market doesn't tend to lead the market for a long period of time, as long as there are not tremendous barriers to entry as is the case for Microsoft and Cisco for example.