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Finally, someone else who agrees that the iPhone was a disruptive product. It had all of the hallmarks of a disruptive product except for the low price. It appe

Finally, someone else who agrees that the iPhone was a disruptive product. It had all of the hallmarks of a disruptive product except for the low price. It appealed to a different set of values (i.e. usability and interface), ignored features that were seen as critical in the existing market of smartphone users (No third-party apps at launch? No copy/paste? No editing of Word documents?!), and it blindsided the incumbents (who focused on business users rather than the new market of everyday consumers). Nowadays you'd have trouble convincing people that existing smartphone users mocked the iPhone when it first came out. It's worth noting that even Christensen didn't think the iPhone would be a success.[0] [0] http://stratechery.com/2013/clayton-christensen-got-wrong/ http://stratechery.com/2013/clayton-christensen-got-wrong/

silvestrov 13y ago
It HAD lower price: it disrupted the portable computers which were more expensive at that time. You already needed to pay for a phone, so the real price compared to a portable was just how much more expensive the iPhone was compared to a standard mobile phone. Due to the system with 2 year phone contracts in USA, that extra price was low.
- josh2600 13y ago
  This was state of the art around the time the iPhone hit: HTC8525 [0]. That is not a phone, that is a ridiculously small screen welded to a slow computer with terrible battery life; and it was $299 on contract at the time. The disruption in the iPhone was technical, social, political and economic. [0] http://reviews.cnet.com/smartphones/at-t-8525/4505-6452_7-32133413.html http://reviews.cnet.com/smartphones/at-t-8525/4505-6452_7-32...
  - pekk 13y ago
    Nah, the old Windows phones were just fine. Did many of the things we now pretend that Apple invented. But they were for nerds. And huge phones sell reasonably well today. The functionality was really already there. The "disruption" was aesthetics, marketing and ease-of-use. And in the end, it's a phone, not a cultural revolution.
    - chipotle_coyote 13y ago
      The functionality was really already there. While I think this is mostly true (Nokia fans love to point out that every possible smartphone feature appeared on at least one Nokia product which may have shipped in the 1800s), there is one way in which this simply is not true, and it's a way which really did change everything. The browser. The difference in 2007 between browsing on the iPhone and browsing on any other phone was kind of like, well, comparing desktop Safari in 2007 to trying to browse in 2007 with Netscape 4. Maybe not quite that good. Phones often had only one font available to them, had very limited CSS support, often had no Javascript support. Windows Phone and the Nokia Communicator were the best of what had been out before then, and to say "they were for nerds" is an understatement. Only nerds would tolerate them. Look at articles after the iPhone's introduction about data usage -- it absolutely skyrocketed, and it was all being driven by the browser. For the first time people actually had a real web browser in their pocket, and it really did make all the difference. It wasn't just a phone by any stretch -- what made it disruptive was that browser in combination with the touch UI (by far the best way to use a browser on a pocket-sized screen). Revolutionary, or evolutionary? You can make a case either way, but the iPhone didn't upend the smartphone market just because it was pretty and had great advertisements.
      - ekianjo 13y ago
        Yeah, this is probably the only thing Apple really introduced with the iPhone - a capable browser making it possible to use the internet just like you would on a regular computer, more or less (no flash). But apart from that, all other functions already existed, and while on Windows Phone you had tons of free applications and most people didn't really pay for software, Apple made it a habit to ad-support or sell apps for a fee. I don't see this as a positive trend, but that's just me.
        seanmcdirmid 13y ago
        I think the iPhone being first with capacitive multitouch that didn't suck like resistive screens being used in all other phones at the time had something to do with its success also. But feel free to add that and another 10 or so "yeah, this is probably the only other thing introduced with the iPhone...."
peterhunt 13y ago
I wonder what differentiates a disruptive product from a better product? It seems like the qualities you listed are hallmarks of all good products, right?
- r00fus 13y ago
  Example: Series2 TiVo - couldn't do HD like some of the cable set-top boxes, but was the first mainstream DVR and I much preferred watching a 30m show in 20m over "HD".
- josh2600 13y ago
  A better product is one the public can imagine. A disruptive product is one that the public cannot conceive of, such that its introduction alters the standards in an industry. A better product is the HTC8525[0] over the HTC8500. A disruptive product is the HTC8525 versus the iPhone. [0]http://reviews.cnet.com/smartphones/at-t-8525/4505-6452_7-32133413.html http://reviews.cnet.com/smartphones/at-t-8525/4505-6452_7-32... - The leading WinMo smartphone in Q4 2006, pre-iPhone.
  - invalidOrTaken 13y ago
    This does not seem in line with the understanding of the word used in The Innovator's Dilemma, the book that popularized the word in a business sense. Guyzero's response above matches much more closely to it.
    - josh2600 13y ago
      Normally, I'd agree, but in the case of the iPhone, the disruption was more profound than simple off-the-shelf components. I can go into detail, but the standard ideas for Disruption tend to be technical in nature whereas the iPhone was a profound multi-faceted assault on the world. There are so many elements of this attack, it's hard to know where to begin, but it was certainly more than just a newfound set of components (a lot of the iPhones physical technology was not new). But, I hear and agree with your point. Guyzero makes a great post above and it's certainly worth reading :).
neighsayer 13y ago
The first iPhone was barely a success. Apple had to give a price drop merely two months after it went on sale. The second iPhone, the iPhone 3G, was the breakout hit. Then Apple changed the rollout process and used a 'cheap' price[1] to accelerate sales. [1]'cheap' initial payment with an expensive mobile contract.
- gmac 13y ago
  Apple had to give a price drop merely two months after it went on sale. I speak as someone whose first iPhone was a 3G, but I think it's possible that the price drop was part of the plan all along. It was be a smart price segmentation move: get everyone who's unbearably keen to pay a whole lot, then move on to people who are bit less unbearably keen at a slightly lower price.
  - smackfu 13y ago
    That wouldn't explain the store credit they gave to the people who paid the original price.
    - gmac 13y ago
      (facepalm) Good point.
r00fus 13y ago
The unlimited (even tho 2G) data plan was price-disruptive. Verizon wanted to charge me $45/mo for data for my Treo (again 2G/1xRTT). The iPhone (mandated) plan from AT&T was $20/mo for data, including 200 texts. Even if I didn't prefer the iPhone, that cost differential was a no-brainer to me.
- brudgers 13y ago
  Data plans were the disruption that made the iPhone more than "a faster horse." They allowed the iPhone's architecture to be feasible and the idea of the app store to be viable. Yes, touch screens are an improvement over pens, but the change that sunk RIM was logistical.
- joseph_cooney 13y ago
  This is how it played out in Australia too. Pre-iPhone data was expensive. My pre-iphone "smart" phones were hobbled by a lack of data which the iphone didn't suffer from.
jseliger 13y ago
From the article: While BlackBerry was guided to omit consumer features from its enterprise buyers, Nokia never secured enterprise buyers of any significance I wonder if BlackBerry would've prospered by doubling down on enterprise buyers, maintaining their keyboards, and ignoring the consumer market. From what I can tell, BlackBerry haphazardly attacked the consumer market where Apple was the strongest.
- w1ntermute 13y ago
  In my opinion, this is exactly what they should have done. They should have focused on providing value to businesses that the iPhone couldn't, and then incessantly emphasized those features to their enterprise customers.
  - poolpool 13y ago
    Yes and then with the improvements to activesync in 2007/2010 the iPhone and Android devices had good enough security and monitoring for most organizations.
- seanalltogether 13y ago
  I can only speak anecdotally here, but in my experience as an IOS contractor if blackberry had doubled down on enterprise buyers, it wouldn't have mattered. Top executives were buying iphones despite the enterprise features, and they were forcing their internal IT departments to make room for them. It's also the reason that so many enterprise apps are made for iphone while android is ignored, the top brass want to see their companies app on their smartphone.
  - wallflower 13y ago
    This. Not to mention anecdotally the ego contests involved (e.g. my friend is on the board of Big Name Cultural Institution and they have a really nice iOS app). Of course, Big Name Cultural Institution has a budget 10x yours. But really having an iPhone app was a status symbol. It has since become a critical business need but back in 2010 it was mostly about board member's egos.
guyzero 13y ago
If you stick to a very literal reading of Christensen, the iPhone was disruptive to the PC market, but was simply a much better smartphone that its competitors. A product can be both better and worse depending on what you compare it to.
ceejayoz 13y ago
> It had all of the hallmarks of a disruptive product except for the low price. The essentially feature-free RAZR flip-phone was $600 without a contract and sold like hotcakes.
- nnnnni 13y ago
  and a really ugly design with horrible keypad!
roberthahn 13y ago
I also felt that the iPhone was a disruptive product. But it took this article to help me articulate the reasons why. In all of Christensen's examples cited in “The Innovator’s Solution”, the incumbents tended to move upmarket at the time the disruption was introduced. In the case of the cellphone industry, the incumbents were moving downmarket. This is important because it shows that a company wanting to disrupt an industry needs to position themselves at the opposite end of the prevailing market direction. But simply zagging while the industry is zigging isn't enough - the disrupting company also needs to employ the appropriate strategy at the same time. Hence, if your disruption is targeted to the cheap end of the market, then Christensen's "good enough" strategy is absolutely the correct one. But, if your disruption is targeted to the high end of the market, as Apple's iPhone was, then you better be offering a degree of quality that no one dreamed of offering. This kind of deflates Christensen's compelling rhetoric somewhat. Before Christensen's books, conventional marketing was that in order to succeed, you should see where the industry is headed, and track in the opposite direction. Position yourself against your competitors, not be like them.

silvestrov 13y ago

It HAD lower price: it disrupted the portable computers which were more expensive at that time. You already needed to pay for a phone, so the real price compared to a portable was just how much more expensive the iPhone was compared to a standard mobile phone. Due to the system with 2 year phone contracts in USA, that extra price was low.

josh2600 13y ago
This was state of the art around the time the iPhone hit: HTC8525 [0]. That is not a phone, that is a ridiculously small screen welded to a slow computer with terrible battery life; and it was $299 on contract at the time. The disruption in the iPhone was technical, social, political and economic. [0] http://reviews.cnet.com/smartphones/at-t-8525/4505-6452_7-32133413.html http://reviews.cnet.com/smartphones/at-t-8525/4505-6452_7-32...
- pekk 13y ago
  Nah, the old Windows phones were just fine. Did many of the things we now pretend that Apple invented. But they were for nerds. And huge phones sell reasonably well today. The functionality was really already there. The "disruption" was aesthetics, marketing and ease-of-use. And in the end, it's a phone, not a cultural revolution.
  - chipotle_coyote 13y ago
    The functionality was really already there. While I think this is mostly true (Nokia fans love to point out that every possible smartphone feature appeared on at least one Nokia product which may have shipped in the 1800s), there is one way in which this simply is not true, and it's a way which really did change everything. The browser. The difference in 2007 between browsing on the iPhone and browsing on any other phone was kind of like, well, comparing desktop Safari in 2007 to trying to browse in 2007 with Netscape 4. Maybe not quite that good. Phones often had only one font available to them, had very limited CSS support, often had no Javascript support. Windows Phone and the Nokia Communicator were the best of what had been out before then, and to say "they were for nerds" is an understatement. Only nerds would tolerate them. Look at articles after the iPhone's introduction about data usage -- it absolutely skyrocketed, and it was all being driven by the browser. For the first time people actually had a real web browser in their pocket, and it really did make all the difference. It wasn't just a phone by any stretch -- what made it disruptive was that browser in combination with the touch UI (by far the best way to use a browser on a pocket-sized screen). Revolutionary, or evolutionary? You can make a case either way, but the iPhone didn't upend the smartphone market just because it was pretty and had great advertisements.
    - ekianjo 13y ago
      Yeah, this is probably the only thing Apple really introduced with the iPhone - a capable browser making it possible to use the internet just like you would on a regular computer, more or less (no flash). But apart from that, all other functions already existed, and while on Windows Phone you had tons of free applications and most people didn't really pay for software, Apple made it a habit to ad-support or sell apps for a fee. I don't see this as a positive trend, but that's just me.
      - seanmcdirmid 13y ago
        I think the iPhone being first with capacitive multitouch that didn't suck like resistive screens being used in all other phones at the time had something to do with its success also. But feel free to add that and another 10 or so "yeah, this is probably the only other thing introduced with the iPhone...."

peterhunt 13y ago

I wonder what differentiates a disruptive product from a better product? It seems like the qualities you listed are hallmarks of all good products, right?

r00fus 13y ago
Example: Series2 TiVo - couldn't do HD like some of the cable set-top boxes, but was the first mainstream DVR and I much preferred watching a 30m show in 20m over "HD".
josh2600 13y ago
A better product is one the public can imagine. A disruptive product is one that the public cannot conceive of, such that its introduction alters the standards in an industry. A better product is the HTC8525[0] over the HTC8500. A disruptive product is the HTC8525 versus the iPhone. [0]http://reviews.cnet.com/smartphones/at-t-8525/4505-6452_7-32133413.html http://reviews.cnet.com/smartphones/at-t-8525/4505-6452_7-32... - The leading WinMo smartphone in Q4 2006, pre-iPhone.
- invalidOrTaken 13y ago
  This does not seem in line with the understanding of the word used in The Innovator's Dilemma, the book that popularized the word in a business sense. Guyzero's response above matches much more closely to it.
  - josh2600 13y ago
    Normally, I'd agree, but in the case of the iPhone, the disruption was more profound than simple off-the-shelf components. I can go into detail, but the standard ideas for Disruption tend to be technical in nature whereas the iPhone was a profound multi-faceted assault on the world. There are so many elements of this attack, it's hard to know where to begin, but it was certainly more than just a newfound set of components (a lot of the iPhones physical technology was not new). But, I hear and agree with your point. Guyzero makes a great post above and it's certainly worth reading :).

neighsayer 13y ago

The first iPhone was barely a success. Apple had to give a price drop merely two months after it went on sale. The second iPhone, the iPhone 3G, was the breakout hit. Then Apple changed the rollout process and used a 'cheap' price[1] to accelerate sales. [1]'cheap' initial payment with an expensive mobile contract.

gmac 13y ago
Apple had to give a price drop merely two months after it went on sale. I speak as someone whose first iPhone was a 3G, but I think it's possible that the price drop was part of the plan all along. It was be a smart price segmentation move: get everyone who's unbearably keen to pay a whole lot, then move on to people who are bit less unbearably keen at a slightly lower price.
- smackfu 13y ago
  That wouldn't explain the store credit they gave to the people who paid the original price.
  - gmac 13y ago
    (facepalm) Good point.

r00fus 13y ago

The unlimited (even tho 2G) data plan was price-disruptive. Verizon wanted to charge me $45/mo for data for my Treo (again 2G/1xRTT). The iPhone (mandated) plan from AT&T was $20/mo for data, including 200 texts. Even if I didn't prefer the iPhone, that cost differential was a no-brainer to me.

brudgers 13y ago
Data plans were the disruption that made the iPhone more than "a faster horse." They allowed the iPhone's architecture to be feasible and the idea of the app store to be viable. Yes, touch screens are an improvement over pens, but the change that sunk RIM was logistical.
joseph_cooney 13y ago
This is how it played out in Australia too. Pre-iPhone data was expensive. My pre-iphone "smart" phones were hobbled by a lack of data which the iphone didn't suffer from.

jseliger 13y ago

From the article: While BlackBerry was guided to omit consumer features from its enterprise buyers, Nokia never secured enterprise buyers of any significance I wonder if BlackBerry would've prospered by doubling down on enterprise buyers, maintaining their keyboards, and ignoring the consumer market. From what I can tell, BlackBerry haphazardly attacked the consumer market where Apple was the strongest.

w1ntermute 13y ago
In my opinion, this is exactly what they should have done. They should have focused on providing value to businesses that the iPhone couldn't, and then incessantly emphasized those features to their enterprise customers.
- poolpool 13y ago
  Yes and then with the improvements to activesync in 2007/2010 the iPhone and Android devices had good enough security and monitoring for most organizations.
seanalltogether 13y ago
I can only speak anecdotally here, but in my experience as an IOS contractor if blackberry had doubled down on enterprise buyers, it wouldn't have mattered. Top executives were buying iphones despite the enterprise features, and they were forcing their internal IT departments to make room for them. It's also the reason that so many enterprise apps are made for iphone while android is ignored, the top brass want to see their companies app on their smartphone.
- wallflower 13y ago
  This. Not to mention anecdotally the ego contests involved (e.g. my friend is on the board of Big Name Cultural Institution and they have a really nice iOS app). Of course, Big Name Cultural Institution has a budget 10x yours. But really having an iPhone app was a status symbol. It has since become a critical business need but back in 2010 it was mostly about board member's egos.

guyzero 13y ago

If you stick to a very literal reading of Christensen, the iPhone was disruptive to the PC market, but was simply a much better smartphone that its competitors. A product can be both better and worse depending on what you compare it to.

ceejayoz 13y ago

> It had all of the hallmarks of a disruptive product except for the low price. The essentially feature-free RAZR flip-phone was $600 without a contract and sold like hotcakes.

nnnnni 13y ago
and a really ugly design with horrible keypad!

roberthahn 13y ago

I also felt that the iPhone was a disruptive product. But it took this article to help me articulate the reasons why. In all of Christensen's examples cited in “The Innovator’s Solution”, the incumbents tended to move upmarket at the time the disruption was introduced. In the case of the cellphone industry, the incumbents were moving downmarket. This is important because it shows that a company wanting to disrupt an industry needs to position themselves at the opposite end of the prevailing market direction. But simply zagging while the industry is zigging isn't enough - the disrupting company also needs to employ the appropriate strategy at the same time. Hence, if your disruption is targeted to the cheap end of the market, then Christensen's "good enough" strategy is absolutely the correct one. But, if your disruption is targeted to the high end of the market, as Apple's iPhone was, then you better be offering a degree of quality that no one dreamed of offering. This kind of deflates Christensen's compelling rhetoric somewhat. Before Christensen's books, conventional marketing was that in order to succeed, you should see where the industry is headed, and track in the opposite direction. Position yourself against your competitors, not be like them.