ABSTRACT
With the fundamental elements of defined product strategies, access to technology and dedicated resources in place and all focused on creating and delivering ideas into the local marketplaces, the next step forward for many leading organizations occurred between 1986 and 1994. This was the second wave of improvements to corporate innovation capability, and the associated approaches were, for nearly a decade, seen as leading edge practice. As globalization simultaneously opened new markets and increased the sources of competition, several key advances in approach were implemented. From a market perspective, the ability and the need to embrace a worldwide marketplace meant that the focus for idea delivery had to change. Rather than address just their local needs, organizations had to accommodate a wider diversity of end product and service requirements that differed from area to area. At the same time they had to ensure that sufficient commonality was present in the delivery and support of their products and services to benefit economically from scale. Examples of how companies tackled this dichotomy include the use of common automotive platforms across multiple markets but with local customization to regional needs, and a similar effect in the consumer electronics industry with shared components for multiple products.
