Extending the Stage-Gate Model to Radical Innovation - the Accelerated Radical Innovation Model

Many firms have mastered new product development and sustaining innovation by applying well-established methodologies such as the Stage-Gate model. But radical innovations may possess distinctive characteristics that overwhelm the capabilities of Stage-Gate: dependence on unpredictable technological breakthroughs, disruption of established firms’ business models and strategies, initiation of entire new industries, need for a full innovation life cycle to realize their full impact, and deep interconnectedness with global ecologies of innovation, putting them outside any firm’s control. In this paper, we embed Stage-Gate in a more generalized framework, the Accelerated Radical Innovation (ARI) Model, which addresses the unique business logic of radical innovation. To accommodate its extended time frame, the ARI model builds in additional pre- and post-development stages including concept origination, strategy development, organizational design, and post-launch development. To address its more complex environment, the model partitions the product–market focus of Stage-Gate into four concurrent, interwoven tracks—market/societal, scientific/technological, business/organizational, and innovation ecosystem. To facilitate entry and exit of the multiple parties involved in radical innovation, the model proposes a technique (discrete real options analysis) that enables each party to assess the financial value of the innovation as it unfolds. Results of the application of the ARI model to historical and ongoing innovations, and to university curriculum development are summarized. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media New York 2014