The Role of Dominant Design in a Product-Developing Firm’s Digital Innovation

Journal article, 2012

Digital technology offers new options for product-developing firms. However, to reap the benefits of digital technology, firms need to handle the tensions between these options and the institutionalized practices established over long periods of incremental innovation. We report a 20-month intensive case study of a global automaker’s efforts to innovate instrument clusters and explore the influencing role of established innovation practices. We develop a conceptual model for understanding how digital technology shapes, and is conditioned by, the dominant design of a product class. Our research contributes to the emerging literature of digital innovation and offers lessons learned for established firms dealing with the contradictory logics of digitized products.