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Topic outline

 

  • Time: 55 hours
    Level: Advanced

 
 

Introduction

  • Introduction Resource
  • This unit aims to provide an understanding of invention, design, innovation and diffusion as ongoing processes with a range of factors affecting success at each stage. You will gain an understanding of...
 

Part 1 Investigating the innovation process

 

Part 1: 1 Living with innovation

  • 1.1 Everyday life Resource
  • Picture an everyday scene. You're in a high street coffee shop. All around you people are drinking coffee. Some people are chatting with friends, others are using their mobile phone. A few individuals...
  • 1.2 The inventive drive Resource
  • What events and ideas spurred people to come up with thousands of inventions in the last 100 years?
 

Part 1: 2 Exploring innovation

 

Part 1: 3 Inventing the telephone and living with the innovation

 

Part 1: 4 Key concepts

  • 4.1 Introduction to key concepts Resource
  • Before I go any further I will establish the meaning of some of the key concepts that you will encounter throughout this unit.
  • 4.2 Inventors and inventions Resource
  • An inventor is an individual or group able to generate an idea for a new or improved device, product or process. The idea must then be transformed into concrete information in the form of a description,...
  • 4.3 Designs Resource
  • A design comprises drawings, instructions or models that contain all the information for the manufacture of a product or the introduction of a process or system.
  • 4.4 Product champion Resource
  • Throughout the development of this innovation Edison endeavoured, by means of persuasive argument and demonstrations of progress, to convince those people who were in a position to help further the success...
  • 4.5 Entrepreneur Resource
  • From this it is clear that money is a key requirement for transforming an invention into an innovation. Money pays for the people and equipment needed to refine the invention into a practical working prototype,...
  • 4.6 Improver Resource
  • At different stages of the process of invention, design and innovation there's a role that can be played by improvers. The improver is an individual or group whose concern is to do things better by making...
  • 4.7 Innovation Resource
  • The point at which the electric light first became available on the market was the moment the invention became an innovation. So an innovation is a new or improved product, process or system that has reached...
  • 4.8 Dominant design Resource
  • In most examples of evolving technological innovation there is a period when rival designs are competing to outperform each other, both in what they do and how well they appeal to the consumer. Certain...
  • 4.9 Robust design and lean design Resource
  • In the case of the incandescent lamp the first dominant design had emerged by 1884, only 4 years after the first lamps had gone on public display around Menlo Park. It consisted of a screw-in metal base,...
  • 4.10 Radical innovation and incremental innovation Resource
  • The electric light might be said to be an example of a radical innovation – a new product, process or system resulting from a technological breakthrough, or an application of a technology having a far-reaching...
  • 4.11 Sustaining innovation and disruptive innovation Resource
  • As it's sometimes difficult to say whether a particular innovation is radical or incremental, a useful distinction made recently is between sustaining innovations and those that are disruptive. You'll...
  • 4.12 Process innovation Resource
  • Once a product innovation is well established creative energies tend to turn towards incremental improvements and process innovation, which is an improvement in the organisation and/or method of manufacture...
  • 4.13 Diffusion and suppression Resource
  • As an innovation becomes accepted by an increasing number of individual and organisational users it goes through the process of diffusion, which is the process of adoption of an innovation over time from...
  • 4.14 Compact fluorescents and new developments Resource
  • In the case of the electric light there were a series of incremental product innovations (metal filaments, gas filled bulbs, frosted bulbs) as well as process innovations (some of which were mentioned...
  • 4.15 Intellectual property and patents Resource
  • At any stage of the innovation process, from invention to diffusion, a bright idea with market potential can be a target for unscrupulous copying. Or, as you've seen with simultaneous invention, people...
 

Part 1: 5 Dead certs and dead ends

  • 5.1 Evolutionary development Resource
  • Most of us have some experience of the evolutionary development and the success of new technology. The Walkman personal stereo cassette player has evolved into the Discman CD player and more recently into...
  • 5.2 Are cylinder ships a dead-end invention? Resource
  • In 1924 Anton Flettner, a German physicist, tested a prototype of one of his inventions, a rotor ship. An expert in hydrodynamics and aerodynamics, Flettner had already experimented with metal sails, which...
 

Part 1: 6 Self-assessment questions

 

Part 1: 7 Key points of Part 1

  • Part 1: 7 Key points of Part 1 Resource
  • Invention and innovation are ongoing processes not one-off events. Products have a history of invention, design and improvement, which can be over a surprisingly long period.
 

Part 2: Invention

  • Part 2: Invention Resource
  • Having taken a broad look at the whole innovation process from invention to diffusion, I'll go back and look more closely at what motivates individuals and organisations to invent. Then I'll consider how...
 

Part 2: 1 How invention starts

 

Part 2: 2 How the process of invention works

  • 2.1 Five steps to invention Resource
  • I've looked at what motivates people and organisations to invent. I'll look more closely now at what's actually involved in inventing something.
  • 2.2 Step 1 – identification of the problem Resource
  • The activity of identifying a problem to be solved or a need to be met is a key step for the start of the innovation process. As you saw earlier there's a range of possible starting points. You've already...
  • 2.3 Step 2 – exploration Resource
  • This is the period when, following the identification of the problem, attempts are made to understand it better and to make a stab at designing a solution. This might be a short process or it could take...
  • 2.4 Step 3 – incubation Resource
  • Incubation is a period when the inventor, having been working on the problem for some time during identification and exploration, is no longer giving it conscious attention. The problem and its solution...
  • 2.5 Step 4 – act of insight Resource
  • Suddenly an insight suggests a solution, or the means of achieving a solution, to the inventor. Legendary examples include Newton observing an apple falling from a tree and having his insight into the...
  • 2.6 Step 5 – critical revision Resource
  • Once a solution has been obtained it is then necessary to explore the extent to which it effectively solves the problem and where necessary revise it. Although more attention has been given to the moment...
  • 2.7 Characteristics of inventors Resource
  • In their classic book The Sources of Invention (1969) John Jewkes, David Sawers and Richard Stillerman observe the following about inventors, whether working outside or inside an organisation.
 

Part 2: 3 Technology push and market pull

  • 3.1 Two models Resource
  • So far you've seen that there are two general drivers of invention. One is the scientific and technological knowledge and skills that can be applied to invent a new product or process. The other is the...
  • 3.2 Technology push Resource
  • The technology push model is a simple linear model that suggests that the innovation process starts with an idea or a discovery – it is sometimes called ‘idea push’ (Figure 51). Sometimes this is by a...
  • 3.3 Market pull Resource
  • The alternative market pull model suggests that the stimulus for innovation comes from the needs of society or a particular section of the market (Figure 55). These might be needs perceived by an entrepreneur...
  • 3.4 Coupling model Resource
  • There are examples where either technology or the market appears to be more significant in stimulating invention but the majority of innovations involve a creative coupling of technological and market...
 

Part 2: 4 Preparing for innovation

  • Part 2: 4 Preparing for innovation Resource
  • Many inventors have said that having the idea for an invention is the easy part. This is often demonstrated by the frequency of examples of simultaneous invention. At one exhibition of inventions I attended...
 

Part 2: 5 Self-assessment questions

 

Part 2: 6 Key points of Part 2

  • Part 2: 6 Key points of Part 2 Resource
  • Individuals are motivated to invent by one or more factors: curiosity; constructive discontent about a product; a desire to help others; a desire to make money.
 

Part 3: Innovation

  • Part 3: Innovation Resource
  • As you've seen above, many inventors have discovered that innovation – getting their ideas made and sold – is harder than invention. To bring an invention to the market there are a number of obstacles...
 

Part 3: 1 Overcoming obstacles to innovation

 

Part 3: 2 Diffusion of innovations

 

Part 3: 3 Sustaining and disruptive innovation

 

Part 3: 4 Phases and waves of innovation

  • Part 3: 4 Phases and waves of innovation Resource
  • To wrap up this section I'll take a broad look at the innovation process. It's possible to think of innovation at different levels of generalisation. There are individual stages that innovations go through...
 

Part 3: 5 Self-assessment questions

 

Part 3: 6 Key points of Part 3

 

References and Acknowledgements

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