“Technology inside the long-run is beside the point”. That is what a purchaser of mine told me after I made a presentation to him about a new product. I have been speak me approximately the product’s features and blessings and indexed “modern-day generation” or something to that impact, as one of them. That is whilst he made his statement. I realized later that he became correct, at least inside the context of the way I used “Technology” in my presentation. But I started considering whether or not he can be right in different contexts as well.
What is Technology?
Merriam-Webster defines it as:
a: the practical utility of knowledge particularly in a specific location: engineering 2 <medical technology>
b: a capability given by the sensible software of knowledge <a car’s fuel-saving technology>
2 : a manner of undertaking a project mainly using technical approaches, strategies, or information
3 : the specialised components of a particular discipline of endeavor <educational technology>
Wikipedia defines it as:
Technology (from Greek τÎχνη, techne, “art, talent, cunning of hand”; and -λογία, -logia[1]) is the making, amendment, usage, and knowledge of tools, machines, strategies, crafts, systems, and techniques of agency, as a way to solve a hassle, enhance a preexisting option to a problem, reap a purpose, manage an applied enter/output relation or carry out a particular feature. It can also discuss with the gathering of such tools, which includes equipment, adjustments, preparations and approaches. Technologies significantly have an effect on human in addition to different animal species’ ability to control and adapt to their herbal environments. The time period can either be carried out usually or to unique regions: examples encompass construction era, clinical era, and statistics generation.
Both definitions revolve around the identical factor – software and usage.
Technology is an enabler
Many human beings mistakenly trust it’s far technology which drives innovation. Yet from the definitions above, that is honestly no longer the case. It is opportunity which defines innovation and technology which permits innovation. Think of the classic “Build a higher mousetrap” instance taught in most commercial enterprise schools. You may have the era to construct a higher mousetrap, but if you have no mice or the old mousetrap works properly, there’s no possibility and then the technology to build a higher one becomes inappropriate. On the alternative hand, if you are overrun with mice then the opportunity exists to innovate a product the use of your technology.
Another example, one with which I am intimately acquainted, are customer electronics startup groups. I’ve been associated with both those who succeeded and people that failed. Each possessed particular leading part technology. The distinction turned into possibility. Those that failed couldn’t locate the possibility to increase a meaningful innovation the use of their era. In fact to live to tell the tale, these organizations needed to morph frequently into something completely exceptional and in the event that they have been fortunate they could take advantage of derivatives of their unique era. More frequently than no longer, the original generation wound up in the scrap heap. Technology, consequently, is an enabler whose last value proposition is to make improvements to our lives. In order to be applicable, it wishes to be used to create innovations which might be driven by possibility.
Technology as a competitive advantage?
Many businesses list a generation as one in all their competitive blessings. Is this legitimate? In a few cases yes, however In most instances no. Technology develops alongside two paths – an evolutionary route and a modern direction.
A innovative technology is one that permits new industries or permits solutions to troubles that have been formerly not viable. Semiconductor generation is a great instance. Not handiest did it spawn new industries and products, however it spawned other modern technology – transistor technology, incorporated circuit technology, microprocessor technology. All which offer lots of the goods and offerings we consume today. But is semiconductor technology a competitive benefit? Looking at the number of semiconductor corporations that exist these days (with new ones forming every day), I’d say not. How about microprocessor era? Again, no. Lots of microprocessor agencies available. How about quad center microprocessor era? Not as many corporations, however you have got Intel, AMD, ARM, and a bunch of businesses constructing custom quad center processors (Apple, Samsung, Qualcomm, etc). So once more, no longer a good deal of a aggressive gain. Competition from competing technologies and smooth get right of entry to to IP mitigates the perceived aggressive benefit of any unique generation. Android vs iOS is a great instance of ways this works. Both operating systems are derivatives of UNIX. Apple used their technology to introduce iOS and gained an early market advantage. However, Google, making use of their version of Unix (a competing generation), caught up quite fast. The motives for this lie no longer in the underlying technology, but in how the goods made possible via those technology have been introduced to marketplace (free vs. Walled lawn, etc.) and the variations inside the strategic visions of each employer.
Evolutionary generation is one that incrementally builds upon the base modern era. But with the aid of it is very nature, the incremental alternate is simpler for a competitor to suit or leapfrog. Take as an instance wireless mobile phone era. Company V introduced 4G products previous to Company A and while it can have had a brief time period gain, as quickly as Company A delivered their 4G products, the benefit because of era disappeared. The patron went returned to deciding on Company A or Company V primarily based on fee, carrier, coverage, anything, but now not primarily based on era. Thus generation could have been applicable inside the brief term, however inside the long term, have become irrelevant. In latest world, technology generally tend to fast turn out to be commoditized, and inside any precise generation lies the seeds of its own dying.
Technology’s Relevance
This article was written from the possible of an quit purchaser. From a developer/clothier viewpoint things get murkier. The similarly one is removed from the era, the less applicable it becomes. To a developer, the era can appear like a product. An allowing product, but a product despite the fact that, and therefore it’s miles fairly applicable. Bose uses a proprietary signal processing technology to permit merchandise that meet a hard and fast of market requirements and therefore the generation and what it allows is applicable to them. Their clients are extra involved with how it sounds, what’s the fee, what is the nice, and so forth., and no longer so much with how it is done, for that reason the generation used is a lot less applicable to them.
Recently, I changed into involved in a dialogue on Google+ about the brand new Motorola X phone. A lot of the humans on the ones posts slammed the smartphone for diverse motives – price, locked boot loader, and many others. There were additionally plenty of knocks at the fact that it didn’t have a quad-core processor just like the S4 or HTC One which have been priced similarly. What they didn’t draw close is that whether or not the manufacturer used 1, 2, four, or eight cores ultimately makes no difference so long as the phone can supply a competitive (or even excellent of sophistication) function set, capability, fee, and person enjoy. The iPhone is one of the most successful phones ever produced, and yet it runs on a dual-middle processor. It still promises one of the exceptional person studies available on the market. The capabilities which are enabled with the aid of the era are what are relevant to the purchaser, not the technology itself. The relevance of technology consequently, is as an enabler, now not as a product function or a aggressive gain, or any myriad of other things – an enabler. Looking at the Android working system, it’s far an excellent piece of software program generation, and yet Google gives it away. Why? Because standalone, it does not anything for Google. Giving it away lets in different organizations to use their knowledge to construct services and products which then act as enablers for Google’s services and products. To Google, it’s wherein the actual fee is. The possession of or get entry to to a era is simplest vital for what it enables you to do – create improvements which resolve troubles. That is the real relevance of technology.
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