Article Sidebar
Vol. 18 No. 1 (2014)
October 26, 2013
June 16, 2014
Abstract
The tipping point, the decisive point in time in the competition between old and new, is an interesting phenomenon in physics of today. This aspect in technology acceptance is connected to many business decisions such as technology investments, product releases, resource allocation, sales forecasts and, ultimately, affects the profitability and even survival of a company. The tipping point itself is based on many stochastic and dynamic variables, and the process may at least partly be described as path-dependent. This paper analyses the tipping point from three aspects: (1) product performance, (2) features of the market and infrastructure (including related technologies and human network externalities), and (3) actions of the incumbents (including customer lock-in, systems lock-in, and sustaining innovation). The paper is based on the Bass s-curve idea and the technology trajectory concept proposed by Dosi. Three illustrative cases are presented to make the point of the multiple factors affecting technology acceptance and, thus, the tipping point. The paper also suggests outlines for further research in field of computer simulation.
References
Ball, P. (2004) Critical Mass: How One Thing Leads to Another. New York, NY; Arrow Books.
Bass, F. (1969) A New Product Growth Model for Consumer Durables. Management Science 13(5), 215-227.
Buchanan, Mark (2002). Small Worlds – uncovering nature’s hidden networks. Phoenix, New York, NY.
Christensen, C., Anthony, S. & Roth, E.A., Seeing What's Next . Cambridge, MA; Harvard Business School Press.
Christensen, C. (1997). The Innovator’s Dilemma. Cambridge, MA; Harvard Business School Press.
Dosi, G. (1982). Technological paradigms and technological trajectories. Research Policy Vol. 11, 147 – 162.
Dosi, G (2000) The role of innovation Diffusion in Economic and Social Change. In Dosi, G. (ed.) Innovation, Organization and Economic Dynamics. Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd. Cheltenham, UK; 115-144.
Granovetter, M. (1973). "The Strength of Weak Ties", American Journal of Sociology, 78, 6, May 1360-1380.
Grant, R. (2002) Contemporary Strategy Analysis. Blackwell Publishers, London, UK.
Hax, A.& Wilde, D. (2004). The Delta Project – discovering new sources of profitability in a networked economy. Palgrave, Ebbw Vale, UK.
Kekäle, T., Pirolt, K. & Falter, C. (2002) IT tools in personnel training in small enterprises: results of project "APPLY". Journal of Workplace Learning 14(7), 269-277.
Lane, D. & Huseman, E. (2004) Movie marketing strategy formation with system dynamics: toward a multi-disciplinary adoption-diffusion theory of cinema-going. Proceedings of the International Conference of System Dynamics Society, Oxford, UK (July 2004).
Moore, G. (1995) Inside the Tornado. HarperCollins Publishers, New York, NY.
Pastor-Satorras, R. & Vespignani, A. (2001) Epidemic spreading in scale-free networks. Physical Review Letters 86, 3200-3203.
Rogers, E. (2003) Diffusion of Innovations. The Free Press, New York, NY.
Schwartz, P. (1996) The Art of the Long View. Currency/Doubleday, New York, NY.
Utterback, J. (1996) Mastering the Dynamics of Innovation. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press.
Pastor-Satorras, R. & Vespignani, A. (2001). Epidemic Spreading in Scale-Free Networks. Physical Review Letters 86 (14), 2 APRIL 2001, link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevLett.86.3200
Watts, D. & Strogatz, S. (1998) Collective dynamics of small-world networks, Nature 393, 440-442.
Womack, J., Jones, D. & Roos, D. (1990) The Machine that Changed the World. New York; Free Press.
Authors
This is an open access journal which means that all content is freely available without charge to the user or his/her institution. Users are allowed to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of the articles in this journal without asking prior permission from the publisher or the author. This is in accordance with the BOAI definition of open access. This journal is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License - http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0.
Authors who publish with the Quality Innovation Prosperity agree to the following terms:
- Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work.
