To go beyond the limits of the top of a predecessor s S-Curve, a new alternative must be created. This new alternative will have its own S-curve and will eventually require yet another new approach to surpass its performance limits. The breakthrough event , is when the new method demonstrates its viability to exceed past the limits of its predecessor. Paradoxically, it is at the point of diminishing returns of an existing technology when it is most difficult to consider alternatives. Institutions that grow up with a technology become too established, too uniquely adept at their technology to consider alternatives.
Alternatives are outside their area of expertise.
Established institutions prefer to modify, augment or find new applications for their technology rather than to search for ways to go beyond their technology. If an existing organization wants to avoid its own obsolescence, it must be willing to explore alternatives. Steam ships were not created by mastering the technologies of sails and riggings. Jet aircraft did not result from mastering piston-propeller aircraft. Transistors were not invented by mastering vacuum tubes.