ABSTRACT
Not surprisingly, the car industry focuses extensively on innovation and creativity, as innovative products and services enable car manufacturers to gain significant advantage over their competitors. For example, Ford’s recent $182 million investment in the Cloud Foundry, a platform that enables drivers to get remote assistance and find parking (Darrow, 2016), represents just an example of the company’s reliance on innovation. Similarly, General Motors (GM) was the first car manufacturer to introduce the 4G LTE service that provides high-speed internet access and is considered superior to similar services provided by telecom companies (Colias, 2014). Car manufacturers stress the paramount importance of innovation in their mission statements and aim to place it at the center of their operations. For example, Ford’s chief information officer, Marcy Klevorn, emphasized the company’s commitment to innovation when asked to comment on Ford’s implementation of the Cloud Foundry: “From our perspective, we have a rich history as a 113-year-old company that changed the world once and want to do that again” (Colias, 2014, para. 4). Further, General Motors’ CEO, Mary Barra, stressed her team’s commitment to innovation in several interviews, a commitment that materialized in the tests performed on self-driven electric cars (Ramsey & Nagesh, 2016).
