Analysis of Research Project Launching at Industrial R&D

工业研究机构在全球竞争环境中面临着挑战。管理者倾向于将资源转移到具有明确市场目标的研究上。然而，这种方法破坏了研究机构创造新能力和产品的使命。本研究通过对美国和日本两家公司的案例研究发现，研究人员从技术研究的开始和整个过程中都在调查和构建市场机会，并根据对市场机会的不断发展的理解灵活地改变研究过程。这种方法有助于克服典型的市场导向（例如，应用研究和需求拉动）和技术导向（例如，基础研究和技术推动）的二分法。我们可以鼓励研究人员在整个研究过程中同时考虑市场和技术的角度，而不是使用投资组合方法将资源分成两种相反的研究类型来平衡风险。

Industrial research organizations are facing challenges in the global competitive environment. Managers tend to shift resources to research with a clear market objective. This approach, however, undermines the research organization's mission to create new capabilities and offerings. This study revealed from case studies at two companies in the U.S. and in Japan that researchers investigated and constructed market opportunities from the very beginning and throughout the technological research and flexibly altered the course of research based on their evolving understanding of market opportunities. This approach helps overcome the typical dichotomy of market- (e.g., applied research and demand-pull) and technology-orientation (e.g., basic research and technology-push). Instead of using a portfolio approach to separate resources into two opposing types of research to balance risks, we can encourage researchers to take both market and technological perspective throughout their research.