Innovator's Dilemma

Topic

A business concept where companies are trapped by their own success, making it difficult to adapt to new, disruptive technologies. Google is said to be facing this regarding integrating its Gemini AI into its core search product.


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7/20/2025, 4:21:05 AM

entitydetail.last_updated

7/22/2025, 5:39:00 AM

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7/20/2025, 4:32:25 AM

Summary

The Innovator's Dilemma, a seminal work by Harvard professor Clayton Christensen, was first published in 1997. It explores the paradoxical challenge faced by established, successful companies that, by focusing on their current high-value customers and products, inadvertently become vulnerable to new entrants leveraging less developed, disruptive technologies. These new technologies, initially inferior, improve rapidly and eventually capture market share from incumbents. The book expands on Christensen's earlier concept of "disruptive technologies," which he coined in 1995. This concept remains highly relevant in contemporary discussions, particularly concerning the impact of AI, as exemplified by Google's competition with OpenAI's ChatGPT, a scenario highlighted in a recent All-In Podcast episode. The podcast also notes how broader market dynamics, regulatory actions like M&A restrictions, and venture capital flows can impede a company's ability to innovate and adapt to such disruptive shifts.

Research Data
Extracted Attributes
  • Field

    Management, Business, Innovation

  • Author

    Clayton Christensen

  • Publisher

    Harvard Business Review Press

  • Full Title

    The Innovator's Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail

  • Key Concept

    Disruptive Technologies

  • Publication Date

    1997-XX-XX

Timeline
  • Clayton Christensen coins the term "Disruptive Technologies" in his article "Disruptive Technologies: Catching the Wave". (Source: Wikipedia)

    1995-XX-XX

  • The book "The Innovator's Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail" by Clayton Christensen is first published. (Source: Wikipedia)

    1997-XX-XX

  • The Innovator's Dilemma is discussed on the All-In Podcast in the context of Google facing competition from OpenAI's ChatGPT, illustrating its continued relevance in the era of AI. (Source: Document 6358cabc-860d-4ddd-80ec-d4393b2c9b47)

    XXXX-XX-XX

The Innovator's Dilemma

The Innovator's Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail, first published in 1997, is the best-known work of the Harvard professor and businessman Clayton Christensen. It expands on the concept of disruptive technologies, a term he coined in a 1995 article "Disruptive Technologies: Catching the Wave". It describes how large incumbent companies lose market share by listening to their customers and providing what appears to be the highest-value products, but new companies that serve low-value customers with poorly developed technology can improve that technology incrementally until it is good enough to quickly take market share from established business. Christensen recommends that large companies maintain small, nimble divisions that attempt to replicate this phenomenon internally to avoid being blindsided and overtaken by startup competitors.

Web Search Results
  • Summary of The Innovator's Dilemma | by Duarte M - Medium

    ## Introduction The innovator's dilemma is a management book about innovation written by Clayton M. Christensen, a Harvard Business School professor with a fantastic haircut, in 1997. Its findings are widely considered to be extremely insightful and in contrast to common wisdom at the time of publishing. Due to the importance of innovation in the technology sector, it has since become the quintessential management book in those circles. [...] The innovator’s dilemma is that in every company there is a disincentive to go after new markets. Competent managers in established companies are faced with the question: "Should we make better products to make better profits or make worse profits for people that are not our customers that eat into our own margins?". Paradoxically, this will doom companies in the long run. Evidence shows that the longevity of companies is decreasing as the pace of technological advances increases. [...] The result is quite stunning. The firms that led in launching disruptive products together logged a cumulative total of $62 billion dollars in revenues between 1976 and 1994. Those that followed into the markets later, after those markets had become established, logged only $3.3 billion in total revenue. It is, indeed, an innovator’s dilemma. Firms that sought growth by entering small, emerging markets logged twenty times the revenues of the firms pursuing growth in larger markets

  • The Innovator's Dilemma Summary - Instagantt

    Accepting this challenge is important for firms that have to manage the innovator’s dilemma and foster the uptake of disruptive technology. “The Innovator’s Dilemma” offers a very important conception on leadership in the achievement of the first-mover advantages with disruptive innovation. Leaders are responsible for defining opportunities that could occur from disruptions as innovation is the process of creating new or better solutions. [...] The third crucial finding of ‘The Innovator’s Dilemma’ is that new technology-enabled markets are distinct from those of mainstream industries. They are bench marked against those of the already existing markets by the established firms. [...] The principal discovery of the book titled “The Innovator’s Dilemma” is centered on the fact that it is essential to monitor new customers’ insights. Christensen asserts that large companies usually get too involved with their existing customers and resources. As a result, these overlook the strategies for disruptive technologies that are capable of servicing entirely new markets.Â

  • The Innovator's Dilemma - Wikipedia

    _The Innovator's Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail_, first published in 1997, is the best-known work of the Harvard professor and businessman Clayton Christensen. It expands on the concept of disruptive technologies, a term he coined in a 1995 article "Disruptive Technologies: Catching the Wave".( It describes how large incumbent companies lose market share by listening to their customers and providing what appears to be the highest-value products, but new companies that [...] Subject matter -------------- [edit] Clayton Christensen demonstrates how successful, outstanding companies can do everything "right" and still lose their market leadership – or even fail – as new, unexpected competitors rise and take over the market. There are two key parts to this dilemma. [...] 2. ^Christensen, Clayton M. (15 December 2015). _The Innovator's Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail_. Harvard Business Review Press. ISBN "ISBN (identifier)")9781633691797. Retrieved 19 January 2018 – via Google Books. 3. ^Innosight,(2014). Clayton Christensen-Innosight Co-founder. [online] Available at: [Accessed 15 Oct. 2014]. 4. ^"Aiming high", Jun 30th 2011.

  • The Innovator's Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great ...

    Sharp, cogent, provocative, and one of the most influential business books of all time—The Innovator's Dilemma is the book no manager or entrepreneur should be without. ## Keywords ## Citation ### More from the Author #### Disruptive Innovation: How Can We Beat Our Most Powerful Competitors? (Abridged) #### An Illustration of Resource Allocation in Strategy Making: The Case of Intel #### Managing the Strategy Development Process: Deliberate vs. Emergent Strategy Campus Map [...] Christensen—who recently authored the award-winning Harvard Business Review article "How Will You Measure Your Life"—explains why most companies miss out on new waves of innovation. No matter the industry, he says a successful company with established products WILL get pushed aside unless managers know how and when to abandon traditional business practices. Offering both successes and failures from leading companies as a guide, The Innovator's Dilemma gives you a set of rules for capitalizing [...] # The Innovator's Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail ## Abstract His work is cited by the world's best known thought leaders, from Steve Jobs to Malcolm Gladwell. In this classic bestseller, innovation expert Clayton M. Christensen shows how even the most outstanding companies can do everything right—yet still lose market leadership. Read this revolutionary book and avoid a similar fate.

  • The Innovator's Dilemma by Clayton Christensen - Book Summary

    The Innovator’s Dilemma tries to answer why successful companies often falter when confronted with disruptive changes in technology or market structure. Best business practices – like benchmarking the competition, investing in new technologies, and listening to the customer – can become stumbling blocks. Christensen’s book provides a strategic framework for any company that desires to avoid becoming obsolete in today’s innovative and fast-paced economy. ## 5 Key Takeaways [...] The Innovator’s Dilemma tries to answer why successful companies often falter when confronted with disruptive changes in technology or market structure. Best business practices – like benchmarking the competition, investing in new technologies, and listening to the customer – can become stumbling blocks. Christensen’s book provides a strategic framework for any company that desires to avoid becoming obsolete in today’s innovative and fast-paced economy. ## 5 Key Takeaways [...] Organizations have capabilities that are independent of the people who work there. Managers who face the need to change or innovate need to do more than assign the right resources to the problem. The need to be sure that the organization in which those resources will be working is itself capable of succeeding. Do the organization’s processes and values fit the problem?