who conceive useful ideas and reduce them
to practice. In this context, conception refers
to the act of coming up with the innovation,
whereas reducing the innovation to practice
means describing how the innovation is made.
Identification of the innovators who contribute
to the product is particularly important for
technology transfer or licensing.
6 Technology transfer or licensing: This is
the stage whereby innovators liaise with the
Technology Transfer Office (in universities,
this office may also be the Research
Commercialisation Unit or Intellectual Property
Office), which handles the paperwork and
agreement to potential organisation(s) that are
interested in licensing a product. An agreement
is made whereby the organisation obtains the
license to manufacture, modify and/or sell the
product by a paying a certain amount of royalty
to the innovators. It is for this reason that it is
important to identify the key players who have
contributed to the innovative product and to
determine the proportion of royalties to be
received by each co-innovator. Shares can also
be distributed equally amongst all co-inventors
if it is appropriate to do so.
7 Preliminar y marke t an d te c hnic al
assessment: This stage onwards is carried out
by the organisation(s), which have obtained
the license for the innovative product. Based
on the key points given by Sanders [8] in a
“New Product Development Workshop”, an
initial market study is performed to assess the
marketplace, customer requirements, possible
market acceptance and competitive situations.
A technical appraisal of the product is also
carried out to address questions such as “Can
the product be manufactured?” and “How will
the product be manufactured?” based largely
on discussions and in-house sources.
8 Detailed market study, pre-development
business and financial analysis: Marketing
research is conducted in detail such as userneeds-and-wants studies, concept tests,
positioning studies and competitor analyses
and involves lots of field work and in-depth
interviews with consumers. Decision to go into
a full-development programme is made and
involves financial analysis, risk assessment,
qualitative business assessment, looking at
market attractiveness, competitive advantage,
et cetera.
9 Product development and in-house product
tests: Although the product has been tested,
verified and validated by the innovators, it is
important to realise that the product at the
research stage is merely a prototype, and
therefore it cannot be ascertained whether
the product will perform well in an actual
production environment. In this stage, the
physical product is developed and tested
under controlled conditions. Modifications may
still be made in order to optimize the product
in terms of manufacturability, which reduces
time-to-market, operating and production
costs by utilising standardized parts available
off-the shelf. Again, this stage is a repetitive
process. Technical feasibility issues of the
product should be ironed out before full-scale
production.
10 Customer product tests and trial sale: In
this stage, the product is tested on potential
customers during field trials and preference
tests. Customer feedback is gathered in order
to improve and modify the product in terms
of functionality, aesthetics and ease-of-use. A
trial sale is carried out in an attempt to sell the
product to a limited number of customers in
a limited geographical area in order to obtain
feedback on market acceptance.
11 Pre-Commercialisation business analysis: In
this stage, the organisation conducts the final
business and financial analysis prior to launch.
12 Production start-up and market launch: In
this stage, the organisation begins a full-scale
or commercial production of the innovative
product, following a successful trial sale.
The final product is then launched into the
market by implementing the marketing plan.
Hence, it is vital that the sales and marketing
department know how to position the product
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