Disruptive technology means the technology which sweeps away the current habits of the customers and replaces it with something completely new. We can see that everywhere these days. Amazon taking online shopping to new heights, food delivery apps revolutionising the hospitality industry, even internet and television were a disruptive technology in their time.
“Businesses are being decimated by others that are adopting disruptive technology and then bringing to market a new business model or a new market niche,” says Kim Stevenson, DMSB’85, corporate vice president and chief information officer for Intel, on the panel of Northeastern University’s Women Who Inspire Speaker Series. There is another business term, known as disruptive innovation. This focuses on giving revolutionary ideas to business models, or company strategies. These disruptive ideas supersede older and traditional ideas or methods.
Start-ups or such newer ventures are usually the ones who focus on disruptive technologies. They focus their assets on finding a new way to get things done. They are more flexible and adventurous in doing so since they are looking for a way to establish them in the market. Already established ventures, however, do not like to take such a big risk in case they lose their market stand. They like to focus on the larger chunk of their customer base and cater to their needs. In doing so, the needs of the minority get overlooked. This gives the newer ventures a niche to explore and work their way up. These corporations then acquire such technologies from the start-ups and give the already tried and tested idea, a boost.
“How cool is it if you leave your home and then 15 minutes later you get a display rendering message in your car that says ‘you have left the perimeter of the geo-fencing location, did you know you left your garage door open?’” ,said Seval Oz, also on the panel, while observing that the automobile is becoming the next generation communication platform because the “Internet of everything” is allowing more platforms to converse with each other.
Anushka Singh