Abstract

Market Vision (MV) and Market Visioning Competence (MVC) are critical concerns when developing successful, radically-innovative products. The inherent risks and rewards associated with such high-stake ventures require that firms create a long-term vision to guide their effort. A clear and compelling vision about the product-market opportunities associated with radically new ventures can help firms achieve a significant competitive advantage, which ultimately can lead to superior financial results. Despite today's increased rate of discontinuous innovation and hence the importance of having effective MV and MVC, there are major gaps in this area of knowledge and research. Thus, the first objective of this dissertation is to develop an in-depth understanding of the concepts that entail MV and MVC for radically new high-tech products. In line with this, the research determines: the specific variables (and associated measures) that comprise these two concepts, to what extent they are distinct, and how they are related. The second objective is to test whether MVC and MV are linked to Early Performance in the development of radically-new, high-tech products. Exploratory and objective empirical research, in addition to a literature review, helped define MV as "a clear and specific mental model/image that organizational members have of a desired and important product-market for a new advanced technology", and MVC as "a set of individual and organizational capabilities that enable the linking of advanced technologies to a future market opportunity". Based on samples of firms involved in early technology development, the measurement study suggests that four factors underly MVC (Networking, Idea Driving, Proactive Market Orientation Market Learning Tools) and five factors comprise MV (Clarity, Magnetism, Specificity, Form, Scope). Structural equation modeling demonstrates that MVC significantly and positively impacts MV and that each of these constructs significantly and positively influences separate elements of Early Performance. In addition, moderators were studied to explore their impact on the main structural relationships. This is the first empirical study to develop scales to measure each of these main constructs and to combine them in a comprehensive model with Early Performance metrics.