Innovation Radical Innovation

Chapter 2 Types of Innovation

LEARNING OBJECTIVES When you have completed this chapter you will be able to:

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Distinguish the different forms that innovation can take, such as product, process and service innovation

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Differentiate and distinguish between the different types of innovation, such as radical and incremental innovation

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Describe each type of innovation Analyse different types of innovation in terms of their impact on human behaviour, business activity and society as a whole.

INTRODUCTION

The notion that innovation is essentially about the commercialisation of ideas and inventions suggests that it is relatively straightforward and simple. Far from it, not only is the step from invention to commercially successful innovation often a large one that takes much effort and time, innovations can and do vary enormously. In addition the term ‘innovation’ is widely used, probably because it frequently has very positive associations, and is often applied to things that really have little to do with innovation, certainly in the sense of technological innovation. The purpose of this

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chapter is to try and produce some sort of order from the apparent chaos and confusion surrounding innovation.

MAKING SENSE OF INNOVATION

If innovation comes in a variety of shapes and sizes and is used by different people to mean different things then making coherent sense of the subject is not an easy task. Grouping innovations into categories can help. Essentially by putting innovations in groups it should make it easier to make sense of innovation as a whole simply because one can then take each group in turn and subject it to detailed scrutiny. If it is easier to make sense of a small group than large one then we should be on the way to making sense of innovation.

Two kinds of categorization are attempted. The first centres on different forms of innovation. Form in the sense in which the term is used here applies to the use or

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