Using Technologically Related Products From Other Domains as Inspirations for Technology-Push Product Concept Generation

Abstract

This study presents a novel ideation aid termed technologically-related products from other domains (TeRPODs) for addressing technology-push product concept generation problems. A technology-push product concept generation problem is specified in terms of a new technology and a target product/industry/business domain for which the technology is to be utilized to create novel products/applications. TeRPODs are example applications of the technology collected from domains other than the target domain and serve as brainstorming stimuli during the new product concept generation. An experiment was conducted to empirically evaluate the utility of TeRPODs. The technology-push product concept generation problem considered was that of developing new applications of the augmented reality head-up display (AR HUD) technology for the automotive domain. Two groups of participants, one utilizing a relevant set of TeRPODs (the TeRPODs group) for ideation and the other (the control group) without any ideation aids, performed individual brainstorming to generate new automotive AR HUD application concepts. The TeRPODs group produced a significantly better ideation outcome than the control group in the quantity and diversity of ideation outcome. Also, the use of TeRPODs significantly improved usefulness, novelty, preference and profitability ratings of generated ideas. TeRPODs may serve as a useful ideation tool for technology-push inventions.