Principles and Practice of Accelerated Radical Innovation

Two opposing trends characterize the dilemma for radical innovation in the 21st century: the continued explosion of the science and technology base, and the necessarily short-term, profit-driven outlook of the technology sector. Responding to this dilemma, a team of researchers, since 2004, has been developing a methodology for accelerating radical innovation through the industrial technology life cycle. This paper asks what factors drag radical innovation out to the point where momentum and initiative are lost. It then describes the accelerated radical innovation methodology, which addresses the three grand challenge areas responsible for delaying radical innovation: technological/scientific, market/societal, and business/organizational. The methodology is supported by three sets of tools. The first is a systemic approach linking the innovation to underlying market and technological drivers, reframes the problem at higher levels, and develops explicit linkages to interdependent external systems. The second, an interacting triad of information technology tools to support information retrieval, pattern recognition, and knowledge management, helps the innovator manage the overwhelming amount of relevant information. The third consists of a systematic process for developing the communities of practice, clusters, and supply chains necessary to support the radical innovation process. The second and third tool sets are described in companion papers.