4 ms·

Before starting my company, I worked as a product manager for a good 10 years and few other things after that. Truths like the Henry Ford quote: "If I’d have

Before starting my company, I worked as a product manager for a good 10 years and few other things after that. Truths like the Henry Ford quote: "If I’d have asked my customers what they wanted, they would have told me ‘A faster horse.’" are good and true but as this article points out, there is only room for one Apple and one Ford at any one time or any one industry. The rest of us have to be pragmatic and consider product innovation as something that's very central and very interdependent with all other aspects of a company's strategy and tactics (people, technology, customers, capital, competition, etc.).

ladon86 16y ago
Can you elaborate further on why there is only room for one company of this type in any one industry? I am struggling to see why that would be the case.
- yardie 16y ago
  I've actually heard the same for fashion. There is usually one fashion house that basically dictates style for a few years. All other highend designers are basically lockstep behind this and then it trickles down through ready to wear, and finally consumer brands (like H&M). You also see this in consumer electronics where bezels alternate between glossy black, flat black, silver, gold, white. If you go back further you'll find woodgrain, yellows, greens, etc. But it would never be one manufacturer. They all did it around the same time. Today, Apple has decided a keyboard isn't necessary on a smartphone. 3 years ago that wasn't that case. Nintendo has decided that motion was how to play games. 3 years ago that wasn't the case. Ford decided that 4 wheels on a chassis is what makes a car. Why not 3 wheels, 5 wheels, or 6 wheels? The market likes to be given new options, but not too many options. People are willing to take a chance but they won't accomadate everything. For now motion controllers are where it's at. Nintendo decided it, MS and Sony have to follow suit. In a few years it might be brainwave controllers. While those controllers exist they aren't marketable. The public isn't ready for it, yet.
melissamiranda 16y ago
Agree. Article quotes Apple as having just 20 designers who come up with the cool products. Article also says they don't do market research. This makes sense- 20 people come up with amazing ideas on their own (easy to reach consensus), and then I'm sure test prototypes in front of users. (They must get their products in front of users, even if it's a small set of users). Contrast to Microsoft, which has competitive designers and programmers working in silos, vying for their little feature to win real estate on one of their programs. No wonder everything is bloated. (Source: I heard this from MS employees when I worked a consulting project for them while at a well known design firm). Here's an interesting post on how Apple's "benelovent monarchy" stacks against Android's crowdsourced approach. http://blog.p2pfoundation.net/crowdsourced-curation-reputation-systems-and-the-social-graph/2010/08/10 http://blog.p2pfoundation.net/crowdsourced-curation-reputati... Does Apple's innovation win in this case?

ladon86 16y ago

Can you elaborate further on why there is only room for one company of this type in any one industry? I am struggling to see why that would be the case.

yardie 16y ago
I've actually heard the same for fashion. There is usually one fashion house that basically dictates style for a few years. All other highend designers are basically lockstep behind this and then it trickles down through ready to wear, and finally consumer brands (like H&M). You also see this in consumer electronics where bezels alternate between glossy black, flat black, silver, gold, white. If you go back further you'll find woodgrain, yellows, greens, etc. But it would never be one manufacturer. They all did it around the same time. Today, Apple has decided a keyboard isn't necessary on a smartphone. 3 years ago that wasn't that case. Nintendo has decided that motion was how to play games. 3 years ago that wasn't the case. Ford decided that 4 wheels on a chassis is what makes a car. Why not 3 wheels, 5 wheels, or 6 wheels? The market likes to be given new options, but not too many options. People are willing to take a chance but they won't accomadate everything. For now motion controllers are where it's at. Nintendo decided it, MS and Sony have to follow suit. In a few years it might be brainwave controllers. While those controllers exist they aren't marketable. The public isn't ready for it, yet.

melissamiranda 16y ago

Agree. Article quotes Apple as having just 20 designers who come up with the cool products. Article also says they don't do market research. This makes sense- 20 people come up with amazing ideas on their own (easy to reach consensus), and then I'm sure test prototypes in front of users. (They must get their products in front of users, even if it's a small set of users). Contrast to Microsoft, which has competitive designers and programmers working in silos, vying for their little feature to win real estate on one of their programs. No wonder everything is bloated. (Source: I heard this from MS employees when I worked a consulting project for them while at a well known design firm). Here's an interesting post on how Apple's "benelovent monarchy" stacks against Android's crowdsourced approach. http://blog.p2pfoundation.net/crowdsourced-curation-reputation-systems-and-the-social-graph/2010/08/10 http://blog.p2pfoundation.net/crowdsourced-curation-reputati... Does Apple's innovation win in this case?