C. Merle Crawford

The technological innovation controversy

C. Merle Crawford is a professor of marketing at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor; Gerard J. Tellis, formerly a sales development manager for Johnson & Johnson, is a research assistant and Ph.D. candidate at Michigan. This exhaustive listing and classification of the literature and arguments on technological innovation contributes toward the discussion of an issue vital to the United States.

Strategies for new product development

Abstract In spite of much evidence of its success, many managers hesitate to establish a policy for new product development. Their indecision often arises from two reasons: they fear that a defined strategy may discourage innovation and they are uncertain how to formulate a new product strategy. The author of this article discredits the former notion and, in reply to the latter, proposes the guidelines for developing such a statement. As new products are essential to the continued success of most firms, the strategy must exist and must be operant if the firm is to avoid wasted time, effort, and money as well as employee confusion and discouragement.

A shotgun marriage of mathematics and marketing

T oP corporate management is dedicated to the continuing search for better ways of doing business. Over the years this search has uncovered many new and valuable tools -scientific factory management, budgeting, marketing research, data processing, and many others. Today, much attention is being given to mathematical tools, variously called operations research, management science, or business mathematics. All indications are that this approach is rapidly finding a p/ace in

Special section on product development: Introduction

Early in 1980 a general call for research papers on the subject of product development was widely dlstnbuted m the appropnate academic dlsclplmes and m selected busmess firms Over the followmg year we received a flow of manuscripts from which were selected the ones appearmg m this issue Customary blind reviewing procedures were used These papers represent research on important topics related to new product development and marketmg Geese and Welsenberger address the career paths of product managers-how they enter the marketing profession and advance through the orgamzatlon They develop profiles of product managers’ educational background, training, and personal skills Moore’s article classifies what IS typically covered m concept tests and notes dlssatlsfactlons with concept testing He suggests different research approaches for concept generatlon, screening, and concept evaluation Rabmo and Moskowltz on a more detailed level address the issue of optlmlzmg the product development process by usmg systematic vanatlons of product ingredients through fractional factonal designs and nonlinear quadratic equations What these papers do not reveal, however, 1s a potentially dangerous and costly mlsdlrectlon of new product research While new product development and management has been practiced as an active busmess dlsclplme smce late m the eighteenth century, it has been taught m umversmes only m the very recent past Engmeenng courses have existed for many years Speclahzed centers m such subspecialties as mdustnal design exist of various schools, but the management of the task first evolved m the 195Os, and even today we find courses on new product marketing management at fewer than one hundred schools