Creating Breakthrough Products: Innovation from Product Planning to Program Approval

Chapter 1. What Drives New Product Development

Breakthrough products result from the appropriate combination of style and technology and help to create experiences that people find both rewarding and valuable. In this chapter, we focus on the first step in developing a breakthrough product: learning to interpret the interconnected factors of Social change, Economic trends, and Technological innovation. Interpreting these SET Factors leads to the identification of Product Opportunity Gaps in the marketplace. Converting product opportunities into breakthrough products requires a combination of vision and sound methodology. As highlighted in the case studies in this chapter, the comprehensive approach introduced in this book applies equally to ...