An Exploration Of The Punctuated Equilbrium Paradigm: The Case Of Indian Low Cost Airlines

Abstract

Over any resonable length of time, in any industry competition can be viewed as a process driven by innovation. By lowering the entry barriers, innovation allows new enterprises to compete with relatively established organizations. Thus the number of competitors in any industry keeps rising and falling as a function of innovation. This phenomenon, which finds its roots in evolutionary biological sciences, can be explained by ‘model of punctuated equilibrium’. In the past explosive growths of many companies, at the expense of established players, endorse the dynamic nature of change process proposed by this model. The Indian domestic civil aviation industry is undergoing a similar change process. Thanks to an innovative strategy: Low Cost Flying. In this paper we have analyzed the defreezing of competitive structure of Indian domestic civil aviation industry to highlight how innovation affects the degree and nature of competition in an industry