Experimentation Works

PREFACE

A Tribute to the Scientific Method

When I published Experimentation Matters: Unlocking the Potential of New Technologies of Innovation in 2003, I made a prediction: digital experimentation tools not only had the potential to revolutionize a company’s R&D, but they could also transform entire industries by shifting experimentation—and thus innovation—to users and customers. Five years later, Apple opened its App Store, which empowered anyone, anywhere, to design and distribute novel applications. By early 2017, about 2.2 million apps had become available to iOS users. During the same year, the App Store generated about $10 billion of revenue for Apple, presumably at a very high gross margin. By mid-2017, Apple had paid out more than $70 ...