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After it introduced the extremely successful Droid smartphone into the market in 2009, Motorola quickly moved to develop the next-generation Droid 2 before the next wave of smartphones (including the rumored iPhone 4) flooded the market. The development process was moving smoothly for the company when Verizon, its biggest partner, dropped a bombshell. It wasn't happy with the mechanical camera button on the Droid 2 (citing customer feedback) and wanted it to be changed to a software button like the iPhone's. This request immediately placed Motorola in the proverbial horns of a dilemma. On the one hand, it couldn't brush away the request of its biggest and most important partner. On the other hand, changing the camera button now would mean delaying the Droid 2's entry into the market. Should the Droid 2 team remove the camera's hardware button in favor of a software button per Verizon's request, or not? John Smith, the product manager, leads the cross-functional Droid 2 team. The case setting is an emergency "war room" meeting to address this critical issue, just weeks prior to launch. John's objective is to obtain the salient facts and opinions of team members quickly so he can make an informed recommendation to his boss by the end of the day. He is concerned that this last-minute request for a design change will not only threaten to delay the launch, which would have significant financial implications, but could potentially create deep fissures in a hitherto effective team that had been running like a well-oiled machine. The case puts students in a situation that simulates a real-world discussion and allows them to experience what it is like, as a product manager, to orchestrate a meeting with cross-functional teams that have conflicting priorities and agendas. It illustrates the challenges a product manager faces while striving to make important decisions with little or no direct authority over the various teams.

This case is intended to illustrate to readers the challenges faced in 2011-2013 by Amazon's CEO, Jeff Bezos, as he guided his company into the exploding tablet market. Faced with the tough decision between focusing on the e-reader market-which Amazon had come to dominate with its Kindle product line-and making a foray into tablets-for which it had no expertise-Bezos chose the latter. Amazon sought to combine platform assets to create an end-to-end experience that would let users find a "sweet spot" in the mix of features and services. This strategy involved critical decisions such as selecting a customer segment to target and a positioning for the new product, dubbed the Kindle Fire, as the tablet market rapidly evolved. The Kindle Fire was designed to put the full Amazon experience right into the laps of customers, and Bezos was betting that his customers would see the Kindle Fire as the physical manifestation of all things Amazon. To achieve this, Amazon was willing to heavily subsidize the Kindle Fire hardware device. The key assumption was that the superior end-to-end experience Amazon had carefully created would lead to incremental purchases of content as well as physical products and services, and the margins thus gained would outweigh the hardware subsidy.

Ontela, a technology start-up company, has introduced an innovative service called PicDeck that improves the mobile imaging experience for wireless subscribers. Ontela sells PicDeck to wireless carriers, who in turn private-label the service to their subscribers. Ontela must decide which customer segments it should target for the service and how to create a positioning strategy and a marketing communication plan to promote it. It must also consider the value proposition of the PicDeck service for wireless carriers (its direct customers), who need to be convinced that the service will lead to higher monthly average revenue per user (ARPU) and/or increased subscriber loyalty. Part A of the case provides qualitative information on customer personae that represent different customer segments. Students are asked to develop a targeting and positioning strategy based on this qualitative information. Part B provides quantitative data on customer preferences that can be used to identify response-based customer segments, as well as demographic and media habits information that can be used to profile the segments. Students are asked to revise their recommendations based on the additional quantitative data.

Ontela, a technology start-up company, has introduced an innovative service called PicDeck that improves the mobile imaging experience for wireless subscribers. Ontela sells PicDeck to wireless carriers, who in turn private-label the service to their subscribers. Ontela must decide which customer segments it should target for the service and how to create a positioning strategy and a marketing communication plan to promote it. It must also consider the value proposition of the PicDeck service for wireless carriers (its direct customers), who need to be convinced that the service will lead to higher monthly average revenue per user (ARPU) and/or increased subscriber loyalty. Part A of the case provides qualitative information on customer personae that represent different customer segments. Students are asked to develop a targeting and positioning strategy based on this qualitative information. Part B provides quantitative data on customer preferences that can be used to identify response-based customer segments, as well as demographic and media habits information that can be used to profile the segments. Students are asked to revise their recommendations based on the additional quantitative data.

Microsoft Office was facing an uphill task in engaging the undergraduate student community. Attracting this audience-the most tech-savvy generation ever-was critical to the future of the Microsoft Office franchise. Microsoft's past advertising efforts to reach this audience had proven lackluster, while its key competitors were gradually entrenching themselves among this demographic. Microsoft's challenge was to determine the best tactics that could successfully connect with this audience. The (A) case describes Microsoft's dilemma and briefly addresses what college students mostly care about: managing homework, creating great-looking schoolwork, preparing for the workplace, and collaborating with friends and classmates. It also provides competitive information, chiefly Google's increasing presence in universities and its focus on the higher education market and the growing influence of Facebook among students and its evolution into a productivity tool. The (B) case describes the qualitative research tools that Microsoft used to get a better understanding of college students: day diaries using Twitter, technology diaries using the Internet and smartphones, focus groups, and one-on-one interviews with students. The case helps students understand the value of ethnographic and qualitative research techniques, draw inferences from the data, and subsequently make recommendations. It illustrates how ethnographic and observational studies enrich research by generating deeper consumer insight than traditional methods.

It supplements case KEL651,KEL652

Microsoft Office was facing an uphill task in engaging the undergraduate student community. Attracting this audience-the most tech-savvy generation ever-was critical to the future of the Microsoft Office franchise. Microsoft's past advertising efforts to reach this audience had proven lackluster, while its key competitors were gradually entrenching themselves among this demographic. Microsoft's challenge was to determine the best tactics that could successfully connect with this audience. The (A) case describes Microsoft's dilemma and briefly addresses what college students mostly care about: managing homework, creating great-looking schoolwork, preparing for the workplace, and collaborating with friends and classmates. It also provides competitive information, chiefly Google's increasing presence in universities and its focus on the higher education market and the growing influence of Facebook among students and its evolution into a productivity tool. The (B) case describes the qualitative research tools that Microsoft used to get a better understanding of college students: day diaries using Twitter, technology diaries using the Internet and smartphones, focus groups, and one-on-one interviews with students. The case helps students understand the value of ethnographic and qualitative research techniques, draw inferences from the data, and subsequently make recommendations. It illustrates how ethnographic and observational studies enrich research by generating deeper consumer insight than traditional methods.

Israeli entrepreneur and inventor Dov Moran envisioned the creation of a mobile device that was a small, stand-alone, fully functional mobile phone that could be slipped into a variety of enclosures, or "jackets," that would provide added functionality and better reflect the personalities of its users. As the development of the Modu phone began to take shape, Moran and his team decided that to ensure the success of the new phone's much anticipated launch, Modu would develop and market the accessory jackets itself. The question now was which of the eight jackets to develop and what factors should be considered in making that decision. The case is about how to estimate optimal product-line extensions after accounting for experience curve and cannibalization effects of products that share similar features, cost, and price. This will require quantitative analysis that estimates the effect of the experience curve and cannibalization on cost, revenues, and ultimately profit. The issue is how to optimize profits by choosing an ideal set of products.

This case focuses on Cisco Systems' innovative probe-and-learn approach to using social media to launch its ASR 1000 Series Edge Router. The company had decided to eschew traditional print and TV media in marketing the new product and had decided instead to focus its efforts entirely on digital marketing and social media to attract the attention of its target market. The case discusses Cisco's bold plan to launch the ASR 1000 Series "virtually, visually, and virally" and the digital tactics employed by the Cisco Systems marketing team to accomplish this ambitious goal. Business marketers normally adopt a more serious and traditional approach to marketing its products but in this case Cisco had decided to buck that trend by exploring digital tools and social gaming avenues which its target client - the technical community - were increasingly frequenting. Cisco's challenge lay in whether this new approach and resultant value proposition would resonate with its technical audience and give the ASR 1000 Router the kind of publicity it needed to have. The case is set at a time when social media was burgeoning as a promising way to engage consumers more deeply with brands and products, but marketers were still experimenting with the tools and tactics of social media for marketing.

Ontela, a technology start-up company, has introduced an innovative service called PicDeck that improves the mobile imaging experience for wireless subscribers. Ontela sells PicDeck to wireless carriers, who in turn private-label the service to their subscribers. Ontela must decide which customer segments it should target for the service and how to create a positioning strategy and a marketing communication plan to promote it. It must also consider the value proposition of the PicDeck service for wireless carriers (its direct customers), who need to be convinced that the service will lead to higher monthly average revenue per user (ARPU) and/or increased subscriber loyalty. Part A of the case provides qualitative information on customer personae that represent different customer segments. Students are asked to develop a targeting and positioning strategy based on this qualitative information. Part B provides quantitative data on customer preferences that can be used to identify response-based customer segments, as well as demographic and media habits information that can be used to profile the segments. Students are asked to revise their recommendations based on the additional quantitative data.

Ontela, a technology start-up company, has introduced an innovative service called PicDeck that improves the mobile imaging experience for wireless subscribers. Ontela sells PicDeck to wireless carriers, who in turn private-label the service to their subscribers. Ontela must decide which customer segments it should target for the service and how to create a positioning strategy and a marketing communication plan to promote it. It must also consider the value proposition of the PicDeck service for wireless carriers (its direct customers), who need to be convinced that the service will lead to higher monthly average revenue per user (ARPU) and/or increased subscriber loyalty. Part A of the case provides qualitative information on customer personae that represent different customer segments. Students are asked to develop a targeting and positioning strategy based on this qualitative information. Part B provides quantitative data on customer preferences that can be used to identify response-based customer segments, as well as demographic and media habits information that can be used to profile the segments. Students are asked to revise their recommendations based on the additional quantitative data.

Ontela, a technology start-up company, has introduced an innovative service called PicDeck that improves the mobile imaging experience for wireless subscribers. Ontela sells PicDeck to wireless carriers, who in turn private-label the service to their subscribers. Ontela must decide which customer segments it should target for the service and how to create a positioning strategy and a marketing communication plan to promote it. It must also consider the value proposition of the PicDeck service for wireless carriers (its direct customers), who need to be convinced that the service will lead to higher monthly average revenue per user (ARPU) and/or increased subscriber loyalty. Part A of the case provides qualitative information on customer personae that represent different customer segments. Students are asked to develop a targeting and positioning strategy based on this qualitative information. Part B provides quantitative data on customer preferences that can be used to identify response-based customer segments, as well as demographic and media habits information that can be used to profile the segments. Students are asked to revise their recommendations based on the additional quantitative data.

Microsoft's Office team was developing the marketing communication plan for its new product, Office 2007. Office was a very mature product and several versions of the product had been introduced over more than 20 years. As such, the new version had to overcome the consumer perception that the versions of Microsoft Office that they already have are "good enough" for them. The Office 2007 marketing team has come up with a two-step campaign strategy that sought to first create awareness and intrigue using traditional media, followed by the heavy use of digital media to get consumer to experience the product through different types of "digital experiences." The team needs to decide how much of its advertising spending it should shift from traditional media to digital media, how to design the most effective digital experiences and how to measure the effectiveness of digital experiences. The case is set at a time when digital media were emerging as a promising way to engage consumers more deeply with brands and products, but marketers were uncertain about the relative effectiveness of different digital marketing tactics and the optimal mix of traditional versus digital marketing channels for different product, market and campaign contexts.

Companies seeking new ideas or product concepts from outside sources may find the "innovation bazaar," with its wide array of choices and methods of acquiring them, a confusing, chaotic place. Nambisan and Sawhney have crafted a conceptual guide for managers who understand the importance of going outside their firms for innovation but are uncertain about how to do it. The authors' "external sourcing continuum" shows at a glance how shopping for, say, raw ideas compares with shopping for market-ready products in terms of cost, risk, multiplicity of options, and speed of commercialization. Raw ideas, whether acquired directly from the inventor or through a patent broker, licensing agent, or some other intermediary, tend to be low cost but high risk and take a long time to bring to market. Market-ready products, often acquired as stand-alone businesses through a venture capitalist or business incubator, are more expensive and narrow one's choices, but they can be launched quickly and with less risk. Between these two approaches lies a third, facilitated by the "innovation capitalist." This new kind of intermediary provides client companies with access to a broad range of innovative product or technology ideas that are nearly market ready, thereby mitigating early-stage risks and lowering the time to market without significantly increasing acquisition costs. The authors compare the advantages and disadvantages of using intermediaries associated with the three approaches and provide a checklist of factors to consider when placing your company on the external sourcing continuum. If you've been oriented toward one end of the continuum or the other, you can increase your options and your flexibility by expanding into the middle.

Large firms puzzling over whether to pay for developed technology or take a risk on bleeding-edge concepts now have a third choice--a new kind of "innomediary" that identifies and refines innovations, reducing market risk in return for a share in the potential rewards.

In December 1999 Thomson Financial (TF) began a radical transformation from forty-one divisions toward a more integrated firm organized around customer segments. This required active, coordinated involvement from business, organization, and technology functions, as well as sustained investment and execution through the crises of the technology market crash and September 11, 2001. By 2005 TF had emerged as one of the top three financial information firms globally (with Bloomberg and Reuters).

This is an MIT Sloan Management Review article. Faced with the prospects of slow growth, commoditization, and global competition, companies like General Electric Co., Microsoft Corp., and Ford Motor Co. have now emphasized innovation as critical to their future success. But what exactly is innovation? Although the subject has risen to the top of the CEO agenda, many companies have a mistakenly narrow view of it. They might see "innovation" as synonymous with "new product development" or traditional "research and development." But such myopia can lead to the systematic erosion of competitive advantage. As a result, companies in a given industry can come to resemble one another over time. In actuality, business innovation is far broader in scope than product or technological innovation. In fact, a company can innovate along any of 12 different dimensions with respect to its (1) offerings, (2) platform, (3) solutions, (4) customers, (5) customer experience, (6) value capture, (7) processes, (8) organization, (9) supply chain, (10) presence, (11) networking, and (12) brand. Nissan Motor Co., for example, has innovated along the platform dimension, using essentially the same small engine block to power a variety of models, including an upscale mid-size sedan, a large sedan, luxury sedans, a minivan, and a sports coupe. Enterprise Rent-A-Car has innovated along the customers and presence dimensions, placing car rental locations in the neighborhoods where people live and work rather than at airports. Together, the 12 dimensions of innovation can be displayed in a new framework called the "innovation radar," which companies can use to manage the increasingly complex business systems through which they add value.

The List is HBR's annual attempt to capture ideas in the state of becoming--when they're teetering between what one person suspects and what everyone accepts. Roderick M. Kramer says it isn't bad when leaders flip-flop. Julia Kirby describes new efforts to redefine the problem of organizational performance. Joseph L. Bower praises the "Velcro organization," where managerial responsibilities can be rearranged. Jeffrey F. Rayport argues that companies must refocus innovation on the "demand side." Eric Bonabeau describes a future in which computer-generated sound can be used to transmit vast amounts of data. Roger L. Martin says highly reliable corporate systems such as CRM tend to have little validity. Kirthi Kalyanam and Monte Zweben report that marketers are learning to contact customers at just the right moment. Robert C. Merton explains how equity swaps could help developing countries avoid some of the risk of boom and bust. Thomas A. Stewart says companies need champions of the status quo. Mohanbir Sawhney suggests marketing strategies for the blogosphere. Denise Caruso shows how to deal with risks that lack owners. Thomas H. Davenport says personal information management--how well we use our PDAs and PCs--is the next productivity frontier. Leigh Buchanan explores workplace taboos. Henry W. Chesbrough argues that the time is ripe for services science to become an academic field. Kenneth Lieberthal says China may change everyone's approach to intellectual property. Jochen Wirtz and Loizos Heracleous describe customer service apps for biometrics. Mary Catherine Bateson envisions a midlife sabbatical for workers. Jeffrey Rosen explains why one privacy policy won't fit everyone. Tihamer von Ghyczy and Janis Antonovics say firms should embrace parasites. And Jeffrey Pfeffer warns business-book buyers to beware. Additionally, HBR offers a list of intriguing business titles due out in 2005.

Todd Wilson, manager of partner development at Educational Technology Corp., needed to determine the targeting, positioning, and selling strategy for its innovative Interactive Mathematics software for the college market. This required determining what types of colleges to target and which stakeholders to focus on within institutions. His task was complicated by the unclear objectives of nonprofit institutions and the differing motivations of teachers, students, and college administrators in adopting software-based learning technology. Highlights the difficulties in innovation adoption within large nonprofit institutions and the challenges in marketing to institutions with complex decision-making processes, multiple influencers, and conflicting motivations.

Rockwell Automation's Allen-Bradley division was considering how to deal with the threat posed by national distributors in the maintenance, repair, and overhaul (MRO) business for its industrial automation products. National distributors were consolidating the MRO distribution channel, offering national account customers an integrated multichannel solution for their MRO needs. Allen-Bradley had traditionally served its customers through high-touch, high-value-added local distributors, but this channel was inadequate for the demands of large MRO customers. An effort by Allen-Bradley and other manufacturers to create an industry-wide electronic sourcing consortium called SourceAlliance.com had failed. Now the company had to choose between redesigning its traditional channel by creating a virtual network of local distributors, striking an alliance with a national distributor, or withdrawing from the MRO market. It had to contend with difficult channel conflict issues in choosing a channel strategy.