Chapter 4 - Assessing Technologies

The first thing that came to mind when reading this chapter about technology assessment was the Flight of the Kittyhawk paper Clayton Christensen published in the Harvard Business Review. It specifically applies to scope and strategic intent.

HP began development of the Kittyhawk microdrive without targeting a specific marketing segment. "If you don't have a target, you'll miss it every time". That doesn't ring more true than with HP's Kittyhawk.

HP developed the 1.3" microdrive capable of withstanding a 3 foot drop onto a concrete floor, and then began investigating and pursuing potential customers. One of their biggest potential customers was Nintendo who was very interested in the compact size of the drive for their gaming systems, but had no need for the capability of a product that could sustain a 3 foot drop, rather they wanted a cheaper, stripped down version at a lower price. Because the product was engineered to such high standards, the price was too high for potential customers like Nintendo and other companies who were just about to enter the handheld device market.

HP did a great job of assessing that compact harddrives could be a very profitable emerging technology with potential in several horizontal and vertical markets. They also had the resources in place to begin R&D immediately and be the first to market. However, they failed to assess the market for this emerging technology, and subsequently were first to market for a product that really had no market due to overengineering and a high price.