In many cases, the technology that revolutionized an industry was invented by the market leader and was then ceded to its competitors. Similarly, strategy is not the driving factor. Many companies have succeeded without the best strategy, and many companies have failed with the greatest. Strategy alone cannot account for the patterns of rise and fall. Instead, Tushman's research suggests that the pattern is the result of organizational architecture, and of course, a little bit of luck.
Opportunities arise from changes in the environment.
It could be a new technology, a new regulation, a new customer need, or any other external shift. A smart company might recognize the shift as a threat, but it needs an organizational revolution to take advantage of it. Some leading thinkers in the field of organizational management believe that you arrive at the future through continuous incremental improvement. Tushman argues that in addition to this process, companies must periodically undergo quantum leaps to seize new opportunities. In the process, the companies completely reinvent themselves and are not the same company that they were before.