Structuring front-end innovation activities throughout strategic product planning

Abstract

Strategic product planning (SPP) for new product development (NPD) in the front-end of innovation (FEI) is a great challenge for managers and practitioners. This article analyzes the structuring process of FEI activities during SPP. A research was carried out with 78 industries from both food and furniture in Brazil. Our study revealed that FEI activities are structured in an intricate network with a high level of complexity and interdependence. The large amount of activities and the complexity in structuring them denote that companies are concerned to reduce uncertainties and risks intensifying the planning phase. KeywordsNew product development. Fuzzy front-end. Strategic planning. Although literature has presented several studies on the front-end stage, structuring activities still is a managerial challenge in NPD, as highlighted by Frishammar et al. (2012). The authors Cooper (1988) and Kurkkio et al. (2011) proposes a model with steps in linear sequence with activities being developed in each step. The model proposed by Khurana & Rosenthal (1998) recommends the activities on the pre-phase zero being developed in parallel and the other phases in the series. Koen et al. (2014) have proposed a circular model to develop activities. Besides these concepts, the technical innovation is viewed from an evolutionary perspective. In this direction, Clark (1985) analyzes the sequence of technological changes and argues that the formation of concepts on problem design and market requires a hierarchical structure, due to the nature of the object. According to the author, it is a matter of logic.In general, models do not present the structure or the sequence of activities in FEI or the relationship among then; therefore, there is a huge gap to exploit this subject. On this issue, important questions are raised: How managers deal with FEI activities during SPP? What sequence are the activities developed in? How do such activities relate to each other? Is there a formalization process? The answers to these questions can help us to understand the relationship among activities as well as to assist managers and practitioners in structuring activities in the front-end. The paper initially presents a theoretical foundation and hypothesis and then it presents a survey conducted with Brazilian industries from both food and furniture. Finally, the paper provides pertinent analysis, discussion and conclusions. Theoretical foundation and hypothesisLiterature has highlighted several activities in NPD (Moeckel, 2009;Rozenfeld et al., 2006; Song & MontoyaWeiss, 1998). A significant literature review is presented in the sequence. In this work, FEI activities are divided into the following groups: strategic scope, market scope and product portfolio scope, as follows. Strategic scopeStrategic business plan (SBP) is a way to think the future of the firm's business in a competitive market. Competitive advantage can be created by means of business strategy, which describes how an organization decides to compete in the market in relati...

Capability building in fuzzy front end management in a high technology services company

“…The FFE can be considered as a crossroad of complex information to be obtained and processed, as well as a tacit knowledge that brings along organizational pressures and conflicts and, therefore, a considerable degree of uncertainty (Hyypiä & Parjanen, 2013). There are three types of uncertainty present in the FFE: technological, market and managerial (Stevens, 2014, Rodrigues, Braghini Junior & Sola 2017. Technological uncertainty is generally defined as the use of new technology versus a mature technology.…”