New Product Development Speed Research Articles

How competitive intensity drives firms to speed up new product development? The mediating effect of knowledge integration and the moderating effect of market orientation

While industry conventions underscore the imperative for firms to accelerate their new product development (NPD) speed in order to maintain competitive advantage, especially when they face intense competition, extant literature has afforded relatively scant attention to the phenomenon of competitive intensity as a driver of NPD speed. Equally underexplored are the operational mechanisms and the boundary conditions of the effects of competitive intensity on NPD speed. Drawing on the knowledge‐based view, this paper reveals how competitive intensity shapes firms' NPD speed through knowledge integration and the contingency of both the direct effects and the mediating effect on market orientation. Data collected from a sample of Chinese manufacturing firms support the hypotheses of these multifaceted effects. The research findings contribute to the NPD literature in multiple ways and provide useful recommendations to managers.

The Impact Of Knowledge Management Capability On New Product Development In Bamboo Painting Enterprises In Vietnam

New product development (NPD) is both an opportunity and a great challenge for all enterprises, especially those in traditional industries. Enterprises must coordinate well with knowledge from both internal and external, such as marketing, sales, research and development. This study was conducted with the aim of clarifying the impact of knowledge management capability on new product development of bamboo painting enterprises in Vietnam. In addition, this study also explores the moderating role of green transformational leadership (GTL) styles on this relationship. Based on data obtained from 203 NPD teams at bamboo painting enterprises in Vietnam, this study conducted a quantitative analysis and obtained some new results. First, both internal KMC and external KMC have a positive impact on the NPD speed and success of bamboo painting enterprises, in which the impact of internal KMC is stronger. Besides, although it did not find a positive impact of GTL on NPD, this study found a moderating role of GTL on the impact of both internal KMC and external KMC on NPD. Based on these results, this study has made suitable recommendations for bamboo painting enterprises in Vietnam in improving NPD speed and success.

How Does CEO Decision Style Influence Firm Performance? The Mediating Role of Speed and Innovativeness in New Product Development

AbstractAlthough chief executive officers (CEOs) are the primary decision‐makers in their firms, there has been little research on how CEOs' decision styles affect firm performance. This study explores the relationships between firm performance and two key dimensions of CEO decision style, namely the use of heuristics and decision standards. We conceptualize the speed and innovativeness of new product development (NPD) as mediators in these relationships. An empirical analysis of 1046 German firms indicates that CEOs' use of heuristics may lead to higher NPD speed and stronger firm performance. In addition, higher decision standards, i.e., a stronger tendency to make the best decisions possible, among CEOs may promote higher NPD speed, NPD innovativeness, and firm performance but may also lead to less use of heuristics. Our findings underscore the relevance of CEO decision styles for firm performance and NPD, contribute to the debate on the rationality of heuristics, and conceptually broaden the role of decision standards in decision‐making.

Competitive intensity and new product development outcomes: The roles of knowledge integration and organizational unlearning

New product development (NPD) is essential for the growth and success of firms facing intense competition. The pathways through which competitive intensity affects NPD have not been adequately examined. This study addresses the gaps by developing a research model investigating the relationships between competitive intensity, knowledge integration, organizational unlearning, and NPD outcomes (innovativeness and speed) and the contingency effect of firm size. Survey data from 242 Chinese firms reveal that competitive intensity is positively associated with knowledge integration and organizational unlearning, and these relationships are moderated by firm size. Firm size strengthens the competitive intensity and knowledge integration relationship and weakens the competitive intensity and organizational unlearning relationship. Comparing the relative effects of knowledge integration and organizational unlearning on NPD outcomes shows that knowledge integration has a stronger relationship with NPD speed than with NPD innovativeness. Organizational unlearning has a stronger relationship with NPD innovativeness than with NPD speed.

Contingency fit between open innovation and product market strategy: Evidence from Japanese firms

This research shows the contingency fit between open innovation and product market strategy. Prior research studies these two managerial concepts separately. This study combines these research streams and shows the contingency fit between them. To investigate open innovation in detail, this study analyzes open innovation from two aspects: external search breadth and depth. This study investigates the effects of these concepts on three research and development (R&D) outcomes: innovation performance, new product development (NPD) speed, and firm performance. This study uses questionnaires and archival data from Japanese firms. The results show that cost leadership strategy has a positive effect on firm profitability. Differentiation strategy has a positive effect on all three R&D outcomes. External search breadth barely has a positive effect on any of the R&D outcomes. External search depth has a positive effect on firm performance. When firms implement a cost leadership strategy, external search breadth has a positive and significant effect on both innovation performance and NPD speed. Under the same conditions, external search depth negatively correlates with innovation performance and firm performance. These results show that narrow and deep collaboration enhances R&D outcomes. Last, neither external search breadth nor depth has a significant effect on any of the R&D outcomes when firms implement a differentiation strategy. This study shows that open innovation by firms improves their R&D outcomes especially when firms select a cost leadership strategy. This research complements two prior research streams and indicates the possibilities and limitations of open innovation

Learning from Failure, Collective Efficacy and New Product Performance

Although the virtues of the learning from failure in breeding innovation have been widely promoted, teams are still an under-researched objective when it comes to learning from failure. Moreover, much less is known about how team learning from failure affects innovation performance especially under the influence of collective cognition. Incorporating social learning theory and social cognitive theory, our study examines how experiential learning from failure (ELFF) and vicarious learning from failure (VLFF) affect new product performance (NPP) in new product development (NPD) teams. We further explore the moderating role of collective efficacy. Survey data from 152 paired NPD project teams in high-tech firms illustrates that both ELFF and VLFF facilitate NPP in terms of NPD speed to market and new product creativity. Further, a high level of collective efficacy intensifies the positive relationship between ELFF and NPD speed to market, but attenuates the positive relationship between VLFF and new product creativity. Our results illustrate that both ELFF and VLFF should be encouraged to promote innovation performance in the NPD team. However, the NPD team should hold a fine-grained view regarding the double-edged sword effect of collective efficacy on the relationship between learning from failure and NPP at the team level.

Determinants of new product development speed in China: A strategy tripod perspective

This research considers an increasingly critical strategy in business success – new product development (NPD) speed. While the determinants of NPD speed have received prior attention in the context of developed countries, we consider the important role of institutional factors that are unique to an emerging economy. Based on the strategy tripod perspective, we develop a conceptual model that examines the influences of institutions (legal inefficiency and government support), and the interplay of institutions, firm capability (absorptive capacity), and task environment (technological turbulence). An empirical study among 249 manufacturing firms in the largest emerging economy (China) provides strong support for the conceptual model. We find that both legal inefficiency and government support increase NPD speed, whereas absorptive capacity weakens the effect of legal inefficiency but enhances the effect of government support. Furthermore, technological turbulence reduces the negative interaction effect and the positive interaction effect of absorptive capacity with legal inefficiency and government support, respectively. This paper extends several research streams and offers useful recommendations to both managers and policy makers in an emerging economy.

266 Fuzzy front-end studies: current state and future directions for new product development

266 fuzzy front-end (FFE) studies in the new product development (NPD) sector were examined. The studies were selected using a bibliometrics method, and chronologically and statistically examined with ten criteria divided into two dimensions. The first dimension is associated with overall attributes of the FFE, consisting of six criteria: the study taxonomy, model type, NPD speed, NPD attributes, model characteristic, and model structure. The second dimension is relevant to the FFE performance structure related to process parameters, comprised of four criteria: the FFE task, activity, performance method, and toolkit. In terms of those two dimensions, the paper looks at previous FFE studies to gain an understanding of features of each FFE study along with related knowledge and theories, as well as identification of evolution trends of FFE studies. Based on the identification, an FFE model development strategy for each criterion is formulated, and this paper proposes possible options for executing those strategies which exert influence on the form of the cluster network. The intention is for the database to be utilised as an overview of all existing FFE studies and allow specific FFE studies to be selected to examine FFE approaches.This paper provides FFE model development guidance on how to deal with the overall attributes and outcomes of the FFE which affect the entirety of the innovation process, and how to manage the performance structure related to process parameters.

Top management service commitment and new product development in manufacturing firms: the moderating role of dysfunctional competition

PurposeThis paper aims to investigate how top management service commitment (TSC) affects two dimensions of new product development (NPD), speed and product innovativeness, and to examine how dysfunctional competition moderates the effects in emerging economies.Design/methodology/approachData were collected from 151 high-tech manufacturing firms in China. In one firm, two different top managers were surveyed to reduce the common method variance. The authors used the seemingly unrelated regression approach to test the hypotheses.FindingsFirst, TSC negatively influences product innovativeness, an effect that dysfunctional competition attenuates. Second, despite not being significantly positive as hypothesized, the direct effect of TSC on NPD speed remains positive when dysfunctional competition is high rather than low. Third, the findings reveal that product innovativeness increases firm performance, but NPD speed shows no similar effect.Practical implicationsFirst, top managers should pay attention to the synergistic effect between industrial services and product businesses. Second, manufacturing firms in developing countries need to implement servitization when facing unlawful competitive behaviors.Originality/valueIn literature, the effect of industrial services on NPD is unclear. The present study enriches literature by connecting servitization with NPD and by focusing on the importance of top managers to the implementation of servitization. In addition, the authors extend the servitization literature to emerging economies and thereby provide significant insights into this context.

The influence of leadership styles on new product development performance: the moderating effect of product innovativeness

PurposeThis article aims to examine the impact of leadership styles on new product development (NPD) and how product innovativeness of NPD projects moderates this impact. The results reveal the implications of different product innovativeness for leaders of NPD projects in achieving successful outcomes.Design/methodology/approachData were collected through a questionnaire survey of NPD team members who were involved in NPD. Participants were employees from different departments, including research and development (R&D), quality control (QC), production and marketing. These individuals worked in innovative manufacturing industries such as automotive and auto parts and electronics.FindingsResults show that transformational leadership has a significantly positive effect on new product success and NPD speed, whereas transactional leadership has a significantly negative effect on both outcomes. Furthermore, the positive impact of transformational leadership on new product success for high innovativeness is stronger than for low innovativeness. In addition, the negative impact of transactional leadership on both new product success and speed for high innovativeness is stronger than for low innovativeness.Research limitations/implicationsFirst, the sample size was fairly small because of limited access to middle-level management and low willingness to share information involving the firms' production. Second, since both transformational and transactional leaderships are multidimensional, each dimension may affect performance in different ways. Third, the respondents were mainly from a single department which could omit varying perspectives.Practical implicationsThe research findings provide recommendations on how different leadership styles support team members to effectively perform NPD tasks in either high or low innovativeness.Originality/valueThis study extends the theory of leadership by providing a holistic understanding of how leadership styles affect NPD performance. It also extends the understanding of how the impact of two different leadership styles on NPD performance is moderated by product innovativeness.

How Competitive Intensity Affects the New Product Development Outcomes

New product development (NPD) is essential for securing firms’ growth and success when faced with intense competition. However, the issues of the pathways through which competitive intensity affects NPD, and how firm size can play a moderating role in achieving specific NPD outcomes in competitive markets have not been adequately examined. To fill these gaps, the study proposes a research model based on the environment–behavior–performance theoretical framework, and empirically tests relationships among competitive intensity, knowledge integration, organizational unlearning, and NPD outcomes (i.e. NPD innovativeness, NPD speed), as well as the moderating role of firm size. Survey data from 242 Chinese manufacturing firms reveal that competitive intensity is positively associated with both knowledge integration and organizational unlearning. These relationships are moderated by firm size. Specifically, firm size strengthens the relationship between competitive intensity and knowledge integration, and weakens the relationship between competitive intensity and organizational unlearning. Further, by comparing the relative effects of knowledge integration and organizational unlearning on NPD outcomes, knowledge integration is found to have a stronger relationship with NPD speed than with NPD innovativeness. In contrast, organizational unlearning has a stronger relationship with NPD innovativeness than with NPD speed. This study provides a better understanding of how firms can choose appropriate strategic behaviors to achieve the expected NPD outcomes under intense competition.

How Can Resource Bundling Affect NPD Speed? The Moderating Role of Business Model Designs

Incessant improvements in technology and fast changes in customer needs make it imperative for firms to constantly development new products. How quickly a firm can develop new products affects its competitiveness and thus performance. Prior research has explored how specific firm resources such technological resources can influence new product development (NPD) speed. However, scant research has considered how the ability to bundle and recombine different resources affects NPD speed. Based on resource management theory, this study explores the effects of stabilizing bundling, enriching bundling and pioneering bundling capabilities on NPD speed. Furthermore, it examines how strategy, captured through business model designs moderated this relationship. With a sample of 189 firms, our results show that stabilizing bundling, enriching bundling, and pioneering bundling all can increase NPD speed. Besides, NPD speed increases firm’s performance. Efficiency-centered business model design (EBMD) can strengthen both the positive effects of stabilizing bundling and enriching bundling on NPD speed while weakening the positive effects of pioneering bundling. Novelty- centered business model design (NBMD) can decrease the positive effects of stabilizing bundling on NPD speed while increasing the positive effects of enriching bundling.

Firm collaborative capability and new product development performance: the mediating role of heterogeneous knowledge acquisition

PurposeFrom the dynamic capability perspective, the aim of this paper is to develop a conceptual framework for collaborative capability, including scanning, relational skills and adaptation and to test the impact of each dimension on the acquisition of technological and marketing knowledge from partners. The conceptual framework also suggests that these two types of knowledge acquisition have different impacts on new product development (NPD) creativity and speed.Design/methodology/approachThis study builds a theoretical framework and tests it with survey data from 289 Chinese manufacturing firms.FindingsFirms with strong collaborative capability are identified to gain better knowledge acquisition from their partners and achieve higher NPD performance. While acquired technological knowledge has a greater effect on NPD creativity than acquired marketing knowledge, the latter has a greater effect on NPD speed. In addition, these two types of knowledge acquisition form different mediating paths between collaborative capability and NPD performance.Practical implicationsThis study not only underlines the important role of collaborative capability in facilitating knowledge acquisition, which in turn improves NPD performance, but also suggests that decision-makers should note the different roles of technological knowledge and market knowledge in influencing NPD performance.Originality/valueThese findings enrich the understanding of how firms enhance NPD performance by developing collaborative capability in a major emerging economy (i.e. China). In addition to demonstrating the differential effects of heterogeneous knowledge acquisition on NPD performance, different pathways of mediation through knowledge acquisition are also identified in the relationship between collaborative capability and NPD outcomes.

Exploring the need for (extreme) speed: motivations for and outcomes of discontinuous NPD acceleration

ABSTRACT New product development (NPD) speed is an important concern for firms in today’s fast-paced economy. While existing literature has focused on continuous NPD speed improvements, this paper explores discontinuous NPD acceleration, or dramatic reductions in development time relative to firms’ normal NPD cycles. Across two studies, the authors interview managers to develop a typology of strategic motivations for discontinuous NPD acceleration, followed by a survey of 218 NPD managers to validate the typology and identify important differences across firm types, including those in new product performance, innovation levels, and configurations of organisational characteristics. The results suggest that discontinuous NPD acceleration is most profitable when firms are proactive and have specific configurations of culture, capabilities, and structure. The authors also discuss implications for theory, practice, and future research.

In search of optimal management of the purchasing–marketing interface for new product development

Growing dependence on suppliers for production and innovation, together with increasing consumer demands, has prompted recent discussions of the importance of purchasing–marketing functional integration. However, empirical studies are needed to understand how to manage this interface within a new product development (NPD) context. This study, grounded in information processing theory, proposes a new model to classify integrating mechanisms as either information-sharing forums or optimizers. This model further postulates the greater capacity of optimizer mechanisms for improving NPD commercial and financial performance, as well as speed. The empirical results, obtained from a sample of 141 firms, show that forums only improve NPD speed, whereas optimizer mechanisms evoke better commercial and financial performance. This study therefore highlights the potential of different integrating mechanisms and contributes to the on-going debate about the very concept of functional integration itself.

THE NPD SPEED-MARKET SUCCESS RELATIONSHIP: A META-ANALYSIS

This study explores the relationship between new product development (NPD) process speed, as an independent variable, and the perceived market success of products resulting from these NPD processes, as a dependent variable. This is the first meta-analysis that examines the impact of NPD speed on NPD success/performance. This study extends existing research by analysing NPD speed and NPD success correlations found in papers published between 1980 and 2017. The primary research question examined in this study is “Is there a consistent, linear relationship between NPD speed and NPD success/performance across studies?”. To address this question, correlation coefficients related to the relationship between NPD speed and NPD success/performance were gathered from published journal papers. The meta-analytic data gathered during this study resulted in a total of 2,840 individual, correlational relationships. Based on a meta-analytical examination of this data, it was found that the sample data for this study did not represent a single population of correlational relationships. Research implications, limitations, and research directions are provided in this study.

How to Improve the Quality and Speed of Green New Product Development?

With the deep integration of supply chain with Internet and Internet of things, it is an important way for enterprises to win market competition and seek sustainable development to develop green new products through external green supply chain integration (GSCI). This study established a unified research framework of external GSCI, knowledge spiral (KS), green new product development (NPD), and top management’s environmental awareness (TMEA). Structural equation modeling and analytic hierarchy process are used to explore the mechanism of the established research framework. The research results of this paper are as follows: (i) Green supplier integration (SI) and green consumer integration (CI) have significant positive effects on green NPD speed (GS), green NPD quality (GQ), and KS, and KS has a significant positive effect on GS and GS, respectively. Compared with green CI, green SI has a greater impact on KS, GS, and GQ. In addition, compared with GS, KS has a greater impact on GQ; (ii) KS has a significant partial mediating effect in the relationship between green CI, GS, and GQ. Compared with GS, KS has stronger mediating effect between green CI and GQ. Compared with green SI, the equivalent KS capability is more significant in integrating green customer information; (iii) TMEA has a significant moderating effect on the relationship between KS, and GQ and has no significant moderating effect on the relationship between KS and GS. Future research will analyze the mediating effect of the four dimensions of KS in the relationship between external GSCM and the green NPD speed and green NPD quality.

The fit between firms’ open innovation and business model for new product development speed: A contingent perspective

Recent studies suggest that the effectiveness of open innovation (OI) can significantly differ among firms. One possible reason is the different ways of implementing OI strategies. Another is the ignorance of the explicit role of business model (BM). In this study, we integrate the two plausible explanations by exploring the impact of the interplay between different OI implementations and BM on firms’ new product development (NPD) speed. Empirical results from a survey of 265 Chinese firms show that both OI breadth and OI depth positively affect NPD speed. More importantly, we find that an efficient BM strengthens the positive effect of OI depth while it weakens the positive effect of OI breadth. We also find that a novel BM strengthens the positive effect of OI breadth while it weakens the positive effect of OI depth. This research contributes to OI literature by underscoring the importance of matching the BMs to the OI strategies to facilitate NPD.

Creative process engagement and new product performance: The role of new product development speed and leadership encouragement of creativity

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the processes underlying the relationship between creativity processes and new product performance. Drawing on the literature of new product development (NPD) and organizational creativity, we hypothesize that NPD speed mediates the relationship between creativity processes and new product performance and that encouragement by leadership moderates this mediating model. Using a sample of 245 companies in China, we found that (1) not all components of creativity processes related positively to new product performance. Specifically, information search and encoding (ISE) and idea and alternative generation (IG) are respectively and positively related to new product performance, but problem identification (PI) is not. (2) NPD speed fully mediates the influence of PI and ISE on new product performance, but it only partially mediates the relationship between IG and new product performance. (3) Encouragement by leadership positively moderates the relationship of PI and NPD speed, as well as the relationship of ISE and NPD speed; however, it does not significantly moderate the relationship between IG and NPD speed. The implications of these findings and directions for future research in NPD performance are discussed.

The role of customer participation in building new product development speed capabilities in turbulent environments

In a sample of 204 SMEs, this study investigates how customer co-creation impacts firms’ ability to increase new product development (NPD) speed. The results show firms that collaborate with customers in the NPD process at greater levels are able to increase NPD speed capabilities and commercialize products at a faster rate. In addition, environmental turbulence is investigated as to how it may impact the relationship between customer participation and NPD speed. The results show that customer participation in NPD allows firms to better manage turbulent environments by enhancing the speed at which new products are brought to market. Finally, the results show that NPD speed mediates the relationship between customer participation and the performance of new products, thus highlighting the importance of developing new products faster. The principle contribution of the study is the examination of an additional moderating factor in regard to customer participation and NPD speed. The second contribution of this research is that while previous studies have examined the individual impacts of customer participation on NPD speed and NPD speed on NPD performance, this research statistically demonstrates the mediating process among the three constructs.