(No direct mention of Microsoft or Linux, but the parallels
are hard to miss. – LT ed.)
“The fall of market leading companies is not linked to bad
management as is widely thought, but to disruptive
technology that comes in at the low end and pulls the rug out from
under their feet.
According to Clayton Christiansen, a Harvard professor and
author of ‘The Innovator’s Dilemma’, each market becomes involved
in ‘a trajectory of improvement’ with their offerings, which
panders to the needs of very demanding users at the high end rather
than those with simpler needs at the low end.”
“…’managers that are taught to make products and services
appeal to higher tier customers because they can sell them at
higher margins. But this causes most companies to overshoot what
customers at the low end can use,’ he continued.”
” ‘This always happens – a vacuum is created at the low end,
which sucks in cheaper and easier to use technology, and success
stories are those companies that are good at introducing products
at the right time into the mainstream. Taking lower margins and
offering products at lower prices kills other
companies.’ “