Lead user

Abstract: Recently, a "lead user" concept has been proposed for new product development in fields subject to rapid change von Hippel [von Hippel, E. 1986. Lead users: A source of novel product concepts. Management Sci.32 791-805.]. In this paper we integrate market research within this lead user methodology and report a test of it in the rapidly evolving field of computer-aided systems for the design of printed circuit boards PC-CAD. In the test, lead users were successfully identified and proved to have unique and useful data regarding both new product needs and solutions responsive to those needs. New product concepts generated on the basis of lead user data were found to be strongly preferred by a representative sample of PC-CAD users. We discuss strengths and weaknesses of this first empirical test of the lead user methodology, and suggest directions for future research.

Abstract: Traditional idea generation techniques based on customer input usually collect information on new product needs from a random or typical set of customers. The "lead user process" takes a different approach. It collects information about both needs and solutions from users at the leading edges of the target market, as well as from users in other markets that face similar problems in a more extreme form. This paper reports on a natural experiment conducted within the 3M Company on the effect of the lead user (LU) idea-generation process relative to more traditional methods. 3M is known for its innovation capabilities-- and we find that the LU process appears to improve upon those capabilities. Annual sales of LU product ideas generated by the average LU project at 3M are conservatively projected to be $146 million after five years--more than eight times higher than forecast sales for the average contemporaneously conducted "traditional" project. Each funded LU project is projected to create a new major product line for a 3M division. As a direct result, divisions funding LU project ideas are projecting their highest rate of major product line generation in the past 50 years.

Abstract: Firms and governments are increasingly interested in learning to exploit the value of lead user innovations for commercial advantage. Improvements to lead user theory are needed to inform and guide these efforts. In this paper we empirically test and confirm the basic tenants of lead user theory. We also discover some new refinements and related practical applications.Using a sample of users and user-innovators drawn from the extreme sport of kite surfing, we analyze the relationship between the commercial attractiveness of innovations developed by users and the intensity of the lead user characteristics those users display. We provide a first empirical analysis of the independent effects of its two key component variables. In our empirical study of user modifications to kite surfing equipment, we find that both components independently contribute to identifying commercially attractive user innovations. Component 1 (the "high expected benefits" dimension) predicts innovation likelihood, and component 2 (the "ahead of the trend" dimension) predicts both the commercial attractiveness of a given set of user-developed innovations and innovation likelihood due to a newly-proposed innovation supply side effect. We conclude that the component variables in the lead user definition are indeed independent dimensions and so neither can be dropped without loss of information - an important matter for lead user theory. We also find that adding measures of users' local resources can improve the ability of the lead user construct to identify commercially-attractive innovations under some conditions.The findings we report have practical as well as theoretical import. Product modification and development has been found to be a relatively common user behavior in many fields. Thus, from 10% to nearly 40% of users report having modified or developed a product for in-house use in the case of industrial products, or for personal use in the case of consumer products, in fields sampled to date. As a practical matter, therefore, it is important to find ways to selectively identify the user innovations that manufacturers will find to be the basis for commercially attractive products in the collectivity of user-developed innovations. We discuss the implications of these findings for theory and also for practical applications of the lead user construct, i.e. how variables used in lead user studies can profitably be adapted to fit specific study contexts and purposes.