bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Perspective: Changing Product Development Strategy—A Managerial Challenge
Authors: Karlsson Christer , Åhlstrom Pär 
Published: October 2003

By changing its product development strategies to match more closely the wants and needs of the marketplace, a firm can transform product development into a formidable competitive weapon. Just as formidible, however, is the effort that this transformation requires. Established organizational structures and corporate politics present significant barriers to acheiving fundamental changes in product development strategy.Christer Karlsson and Pär Åhlstrom present a case study of one firm's efforts to build capabilities for creating new products quickly and efficiently. Rather than focus on the content of the firm's product development strategies, however, they emphasize the process this electromechanical manufacturing firm used for changing its product development strategy. Drawing on their experiences as clinical researchers in this effort, they describe key lessons learned during the change process, and they offer suggestions for managing the process of changing product development strategy.They highlight five key lessons learned during the strategy development process. First, rather than viewing product development as a line function, a firm should view product development as a key executive area with responsibility for the company's competitive position. Second, market issues are the responsibility, not only of marketing, but also of product development and production. Third, to avoid corporate myopia, management control systems must consider not only time and money, but also acheivement of goals. Fourth, strategic planning flows more smoothly if the participants start by mapping the firm's past and present position before attempting to define the desired position. Finally, formulation of a product development strategy is the responsibility of a multifunctional team of executives.Managers should keep a few rules in mind when devising a process for formulating a product development strategy. First, adopt a learning strategy throughout the change process. Formulation of a product development strategy involves many abstract concepts, and a successful strategy requires cross‐functional consensus. Second, combine tangible, direct activities with long‐term strategic aims. Third, avoid the pitfall of best practice. The form that the product development organization takes depends, to a great extent, on the type of development work. Finally, before discussing future strategies, the strategy formulation process should focus on analyzing the current situation.
Critical Development Activities for Really New versus Incremental Products
Authors: Song X. Michael , Montoya‐Weiss Mitzi M. 
Published: October 2003

Does the development of really new products require a different approach from that of incremental new products? Current research and management practice seem to suggest that any successful new product development (NPD) process comprises a set of key activities, regardless of a product's innovativeness. It seems almost foolhardy to suggest that NPD could proceed without proficiency in all of the following tasks: strategic planning, idea development and screening, business and market opportunity analysis, technical development, product testing, and product commercialization.Suggesting that the difference may be in the details, X. Michael Song and Mitzi Montoya‐Weiss present the results of a study that examines the development of 163 really new products and 169 incremental new products. The study's objective is to compare the NPD processes and performance outcomes of really new and incremental products. In other words, the study examines the interplay between a product's innovativeness, the NPD process, and the product's performance in the marketplace.For the firms in the study, four sets of NPD activities—strategic planning, market analysis, technical development, and product commercialization—are key determinants of new product success for both really new products and incremental products. However, strategic planning and business and market opportunity analysis activities play contrasting roles for the two types of products. Working to improve proficiency in business and market opportunity analysis may be counterproductive for really new products, but it can increase the profitability of incremental products. Conversely, improving the proficiency of strategic planning activities has a positive effect on the profitability of the really new products, but it has a negative effect for the incremental products. Overall, the really new products in the study surpass the incremental products in meeting profit objectives.Comparing current practice to best practice, the firms in the study have room for improvement. For both really new and incremental products, the firms in the study do not place sufficient emphasis on product commercialization activities. The participants also need to reassess the relative emphasis they place on strategic planning activities. The projects involving really new products do not place sufficient emphasis on strategic planning, while the incremental projects exhibit a relatively high level of proficiency in this area—exactly the opposite of the order that this study recommends.
Market Learning and Radical Innovation: A Cross Case Comparison of Eight Radical Innovation Projects
Authors: O'Connor Gina Colarelli 
Published: October 2003

Does customer input play the same key role in every successful new‐product development (NPD) project? For incremental NPD projects, market information keeps the project team focused on customer wants and needs. Well‐documented methods exist for obtaining and using market information throughout the stages of an incremental NPD project. However, the role of market learning seems less apparent if the NPD project involves a really new product—that is, a radical innovation that creates a line of business that is new not only for the firm but also for the marketplace. In all likelihood, customers will not be able to describe their requirements for a product that opens up entirely new markets and applications.To provide insight into the role that market learning plays in NPD projects involving really new products, Gina Colarelli O'Connor describes findings from case studies of eight radical innovation projects. Participants in the study come from member companies of the Industrial Research Institute, a consortium of large company R&D managers. With a focus on exploring how market learning for radical innovations differs from that of incremental NPD projects, the case studies examine the following issues: the nature and the timing of market‐related inquiry; market learning methods and processes; and the scope of responsibility for market learning, and confidence in the results.Observations from the case studies suggest that the market‐related questions that are asked during a radical innovation project differ by stage of development, and they differ from the questions that project teams typically ask during an incremental NPD effort. For example, assessments of market potential, size, and growth were not at issue during the early stages of the projects in this study. Such issues came into play after the innovations were proven to work under controlled conditions and attention turned to finding applications for the technology.For several projects in the study, internal data and informal networks of people throughout relevant business units provide the means for learning about the hurdles the innovation faces and about markets that are unfamiliar to the development group. The projects in this study employ various techniques for reducing market uncertainty, including offering the product to the most familiar market and using a strategic ally who is familiar with the market to act as an intermediary between the project team and the marketplace.
From Experience: Why Bad Things Happen to Good New Products
Authors: Rackham Neil 
Published: October 2003

The rollout of a new product can be an exhilarating time for everyone involved in the development and launch effort. Just as a construction crew may meet at a local gathering place to hail the “topping‐off” of a new home or office building, the development team—or possibly the entire company—may gather to celebrate a new product's release. Launch meetings generate enthusiasm among the salespeople, and favorable reviews lead to an influx of inquiries from prospective customers. Despite this initial wave of enthusiasm, however, customer desire for the innovative new product may soon wane. Does this mean that everyone was wrong about the new product's potential?Citing three examples of launches that followed this pattern, Neil Rackham addresses a key question for product development professionals: “Why should promising products from highly respected companies fail despite clear evidence of market need, strong marketing support, and real enthusiasm and energy from salespeople?” Based on his own experience in these three cases, as well as research investigations into elements of these and other launches, he rejects the conventional wisdom that the problem stems from resistance to change on the part of either the customers or the salespeople.He suggests that the problem rests with the way in which highly innovative products are launched to the salesforce, which in turn influences the manner in which the products are sold. He notes that the launch of an innovative product typically focuses on all the great new features the product offers. However, the new features that make the product so exciting may draw the salesperson's attention away from the most important issue in the selling process: the customer's needs. In other words, he suggests that the launch and the selling of innovative products tend to be product‐centered instead of customer‐centered, causing customer interest to fade as the selling process progresses.Rather than fill the salesforce with details about a product's “bells and whistles,” he suggests that the launch should focus on describing the product in terms of the problems it solves for the customer. Similarly, rather than bombard customers with details about product features, he suggests that the salesperson should focus on asking questions. In this customer‐centered approach, the product's features are considered only in terms of the manner in which they meet the customer's needs.
The Augmented Service Offering: A Conceptualization and Study of Its Impact on New Service Success
Authors: Storey Chris , Easingwood Christopher J. 
Published: October 2003

Unlike companies that produce tangible goods, service firms typically cannot rely on product advantage as a means for ensuring the success of a new service. Developing a competitive response to a tangible product may require significant investments of time and effort. In many cases, however, competitors can easily duplicate the core elements of a firm's new service. This fundamental difference between new products and new services means that managers who hope to find the keys to new‐service success must look to factors other than sustainable product advantage.Chris Storey and Christopher Easingwood suggest that managers must understand the totality of the service offering from the customer's perspective. They explain that the purchase of a service is influenced not only by the service itself, but also by such factors as the service firm's reputation and the quality of the customer's interaction with the firm's systems and staff—in other words, by the augmented service offering (ASO). Using the results of a study they conducted in the consumer financial services industry in the U.K., they identify the components of the ASO, and they examine the relative contributions of these components to the success of new services.In their model, the ASO comprises three elements: the service product, service augmentation, and marketing support. The core of the ASO—the service product—includes such dimensions as product quality, product distinctiveness, and perceived risk. The study's results suggest that improvements in the service product open up new opportunities for the firm, but have only modest effects on sales and profitability.Rounding out the ASO model are service augmentation and marketing support. Service augmentation encompasses such dimensions as distribution strength, staff‐customer interactions, and reputation. The customer recognizes and responds to these elements of the ASO, but they are not part of the product core. Marketing support involves those marketing and management actions that affect the quality of the product and its augmentation, even though customers typically are not aware of them. These elements include knowledge of the marketplace, training of contact staff, and internal marketing. Enhanced service augmentation has significant effects on profitability and sales for the firms in this study, but it does not offer enhanced opportunities. The marketing support elements contribute significantly to all aspects of performance for the firms in this study.
The Breakfast of Champions: Associations Between Champions and Product Development Environments, Practices and Performance
Authors: Markham Stephen K. , Griffin Abbie 
Published: October 2003

According to conventional wisdom, if an innovative new product development (NPD) effort is to stand any chance for success, the project must have a champion. The role of the champion has taken on almost mythic proportions, through oft‐told tales of the development of such disparate products as instant cameras, automobiles, and microprocessors. Notwithstanding the purportedly essential role that champions play, however, we have only anecdotal evidence of the manner in which effective champions operate and the benefits that they offer.Stephen K. Markham and Abbie Griffin suggest that before we can explore questions about how champions affect product development performance, we must address an even more fundamental issue: whether champions actually influence performance. Using data from the 1995 PDMA study of best practices in product development, they test various widely held assumptions about champions and NDP performance. Specifically, they investigate the association between championing and the following variables: NPD performance at the program, firm, and project levels; industry characteristics; and project‐ and firm‐related NPD characteristics.In several respects, the results of their study run counter to current beliefs about product development champions. For example, the study suggests that champions are just as likely to be found in large firms as they are in small firms. Similarly, the results indicate that the likelihood of finding a champion does not differ significantly between technology‐driven firms and marketing‐driven firms. For the firms in this study, champions are no more likely to support radical innovations than they are to back incremental innovations or product line extensions.The results of the study suggest that champions do not directly affect firm‐level NPD performance. Instead, the results of this study associate increased championing with higher levels of NPD program performance, which positively affects firm‐level performance. The results of this study also do not support the notion that a champion can directly improve the market success of a particular project.
The Implications of Demand Instability for the Behavior of Firms: The Case of Residential Construction
Authors: Manski Charles F. , Rosen Kenneth T. 
Published: October 2003

The position of the new residential construction sector as a large but very volatile component of total investment has provoked much study of the causes of that volatility and of its relation to the stability of the economy as a whole. There has never been, however, serious analysis of the assertion that this same volatility of housing starts, by creating an unstable environment for firms operating in the industry, serves to increase the cost of producing and marketing housing.This paper will focus on the phenomenon of demand instability as it affects firm behavior. It approaches the demand instability problem from two distinct but complementary perspectives. The first part sets forth a theoretical conception of the manner in which demand instability should influence any firm's organization and operations. The second part presents an analysis of interviews conducted with representatives of a number of firms which supply materials for residential construction. This analysis provides a partial test of the theory and offers insights into areas on which theory alone sheds little light.
Hedging Forward Mortgage Loan Commitments: The Option of Futures and a Future for Options
Authors: Thygerson Kenneth J. 
Published: October 2003

The purpose of this paper is to analyze theoretically the problem of how mortgage lending institutions assume the interest rate risks inherent in the granting of fixed‐rate mortgage loan commitments.Two approaches to hedge this risk are analyzed. First, the use of the GNMA futures market is evaluated from the standpoint of how it might be used to hedge against mortgage commitment risks. Secondly, the use of an appropriate pricing model—the Black‐Scholes option pricing model—is offered as a proxy for establishing the market value of a fixed‐rate mortgage commitment. This model is extended and empirically estimated for several hypothetical environments.The paper demonstrates a basic flaw in the GNMA futures market as a hedge against mortgage commitments. Once this is established, the use of the options pricing approach is offered as a more rational approach for hedging these risks.
Protein 4.2 is critical to CD47-membrane skeleton attachment in human red cells
Authors: Dahl Kris Noel , Parthasarathy Ranganath , Westhoff Connie M. , Layton D. Mark , Discher Dennis E. 
Published: October 2003

AbstractThe reduction in expression of the integral membrane protein CD47 in human red blood cells (RBCs) deficient in protein 4.2 suggests that protein 4.2 may mediate a linkage of CD47 to the membrane skeleton. We compared the fractions of membrane skeleton-attached CD47, Rh-associated glycoprotein (RhAG), Rh, and band 3 in normal and protein 4.2-deficient cells using fluorescence-imaged microdeformation. We found that CD47 attachment decreases from 55% in normal cells to 25% to 35% in 4.2-deficient cells. RhAG, which has been shown to have no significant variation in expression among the cells studied, shows a significant decrease in membrane skeleton attachment in 4.2-deficient cells from 60% to 40%. Both Rh and band 3, which have also been shown to have no change in expression, show a smaller decrease from 75% attached in normal RBCs to 55% attached in 4.2-deficient cells. In normal cells, Rh phenotype influences CD47 expression but not the level of membrane skeleton attachment of CD47. In contrast, the results indicate that protein 4.2 strongly influences CD47 levels as well as the extent of membrane skeleton attachment in the RBC, whereas protein 4.2 affects membrane skeletal attachment of RhAG, Rh, and band 3 to a lesser extent. (Blood. 2004;103:1131-1136)
5-Hydroxytryptamine-induced vasodilator responses in the hindquarters of the anaesthetized rat, involve β2-adrenoceptors
Authors: Calama E , García M , Jarque M J , Morán A , Martín M L , Román L San 
Published: October 2003

Abstract
These studies were conducted to examine the role of the vasoactive mediators nitric oxide (NO) and adrenaline (epinephrine) in the serotonin (5-hydroxytryptamine; 5-HT)-induced vasodilator response in the hindquarter vascular bed of anaesthetized rats. Intra-arterial administration of doses of 5-HT in the range 0.12–25 ng kg−1 produced a dose-independent vasodilator effect in the hindquarters. The selective 5-HT1D/1B receptor agonist, L-694,247 at intra-arterial doses of 0.0012–1000 ng kg−1, as well as adrenaline (at doses of 0.05–50 ng kg−1 i.a.), mimicked the dose-independent vasodilator effect induced by intra-arterial administration of 5-HT. Intravenous pre-treatment with the selective β2-receptor antagonist ICI 118,551 (0.5 mg kg−1) blocked the vasodilator effect of 5-HT, adrenaline and L-694,247. Additionally, the inhibitor of NO synthase NG-nitro-L-arginine (L-NAME) (at a dose of 10 mg kg−1 i.v.) blocked the vasodilator action of acetylcholine 300–3000 ng kg−1) but did not modify 5-HT-induced vasodilatation. The vasodilator effect produced by intra-arterial administration of 5-HT in the hindquarters was significantly inhibited both 30 min after denervation of the lumbar sympathetic chains and 1 h after bilateral adrenalectomy. Our data suggest that in the in-situ autoperfused hindquarters of the rat 5-HT-induced vasodilatation is mediated by a local 5-HT1D or 5-HT1D/1B activation, which in turn mediates the adrenal release of adrenaline, which then produces β2-activation and vasodilatation.
Single oral dose study of two isosorbide-based aspirin prodrugs in the dog
Authors: Gilmer John F , Murphy Michael A , Shannon Jean A , Breen Colm G , Ryder Sheila A , Clancy John M 
Published: October 2003

Abstract
The objective of this study was to compare two aspirin prodrugs, isosorbide diaspirinate (ISDA) and a nitroaspirin (ISMNA), with aspirin in terms of effects on dog platelet function after administration of a single oral dose. Groups of six dogs were administered ISDA (2 mg kg−1), ISMNA (4 mg kg−1) or aspirin (2 mg kg−1). Blood was sampled at 1, 2, 4, 8, 12 and 24 h post-dosing and evaluated for capacity to generate post-clotting thromboxane (TX)B2. The aggregation response to arachidonic acid (AA) (100 μM), ADP (30 μM) or collagen (10 μg mL−1) was estimated at each time-point using the whole blood impedance method. Plasma ISMN following oral administration of ISMNA was also measured and compared with plasma ISMN following administration of a physical mixture of ISMN and aspirin. ISDA administration (2 mg kg−1) was associated with a significant reduction (P&lt; 0.05) in serum TXB2 at 12 and 24 h (&gt;90%) post-dosing and persistent inhibition of AA-induced platelet aggregation. ISDA administration caused a more marked depression of post-clotting TXB2 levels than aspirin in this study, although its ability to inhibit platelet aggregation was less consistent than that of aspirin. The nitroaspirin ISMNA was least effective at inhibiting platelet aggregation response or TXB2 production. The ISMN AUC0–24h for the ISMNA-treated dogs was 77% of that for the physical mix-treated dogs and the tmax was delayed. This study indicates that the two aspirin esters cause aspirin-like effects on platelet function, probably through aspirin release, when administered orally to dogs.
Wavelet thresholding in partially linear models: a computation and simulation
Authors: Qu Leming 
Published: October 2003

AbstractPartially linear models have a linear part as in the linear regression and a non‐linear part similar to that in the non‐parametric regression. The estimates in Partially Linear Models have been studied previously using traditional smoothing methods such as smoothing spline, kernel and piecewise polynomial smoothers. In this paper, a wavelet thresholding method for estimating the corresponding parameters in Partially Linear Models is presented. Extensive simulation results shows that wavelet smoothing approach is comparable to traditional smoothing methods when their assumptions are satisfied. But wavelet smoothing is often superior when assumptions about the smoothness of the underlying function of non‐parametric part are not satisfied. The computational complexity is linear on the sample size. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.