Knowledge Perspectives of New Product Development

Presenting industrial case studies from semiconductors, software development and toy safety, and drawing on knowledge management, sociology, and organizational behavior, this book highlights critical success and failure factors in new product development.

New Product Development (NPD) is about the ideation, formulation, and implementation of new and superior solutions in the market. Beyond the obvious need for organizations to innovate in order to compete, embedded in any NPD program are knowledge, technological expertise, and the social networks that convert these capabilities into offerings that create value at every levelfor customers, industries, communities, and regions.

This volume provides an array of knowledge perspective in NPD across multiple levels of analysis and geographic regions, including Europe, the United States, China, Japan, and India, to explore the dynamics of NPD in today's global environment. Presenting case studies from such industries as ICT services, semiconductors, software development, bio-technology, higher education, and even safety for children's toys, and drawing from a variety of theoretical perspectives, including technology and knowledge management, sociology, economic geography, and organizational behavior, the authors highlight critical success and failure factors in NPD.

Among the topics covered:

• New product development teams, including multi-functional and multi-site teams
• De-localization and off-shoring of tasks and processes
• Individual competencies and organizational capabilities
• University-industry interactions, high-tech clusters, and technology transfer
• Technology policy

Showcases cutting-edge research on new product development in a globalized environment, with implications for business competitiveness, technology management, and economic policy Considers the impact of outsourcing and offshoring on NPD, R&D and knowledge management Global research team, with coverage of US, Europe, and Asia; features cases studies from biotech, nanotech, IT, and semiconductor industries

Inhalt

How Path Dependency Affects Innovative Behavior of Firms.- Factors Affecting the Performance of New Product Development Teams: Some European Evidence.- Knowledge Flows in an NPD Team from the Semiconductor Industry.- Strategies for Fostering Local New Service Development Teams in CapGemini and the MINALOGIC Cluster in Grenoble.- Regional Embeddedness of Multinational Enterprises in European Regions.- Competencies for the Technological Europe of Tomorrow:
A New Model and an Emerging Concept of Inter-organizational Competence.- The Leader-Member Relationship at the Core of Innovation Development: Member Perceptions, Positions and Expectations.- A Stepwise, Actor-based Approach to the Establishment of Science-Industry Co-operations.- Turning from Laggard to Leader in National Radical Innovation and Beyond.- Japanese Firms' Innovation Strategies in the 21 st Century: An Institutional View.- Preparing India's Workforce for the Knowledge Economy...