Profound change in the competitive environment has produced a Cambrian explosion of new organizational forms, institutional relationships, and value-creating possibilities. Schumpeter’s gale has become a hurricane. Whether you call it the “digital” economy, the “knowledge” economy, or just the “new” economy, it seems clear that we are on the cusp of an industrial revolution as profound as that which gave birth to the modern age. But, of course, we already know this. We’ve all read Alvin Toffler, Nicholas Negroponte, and Wired. The deeper question is, who will profit from this sea change? Which companies will sail on the new winds of change and which will be driven onto the rocks of irrelevance? I believe that only those companies that are capable of reinventing themselves and their industry in a profound way will be around a decade hence. The question today is not whether you can reengineer your processes; the question is whether you can reinvent the entire industry model — as Amazon.com has been attempting to do in book selling, as Enron has done in the energy business, or as (TC)2 hopes to do in the clothing industry.
In industry after industry, it is the revolutionaries — usually newcomers — who are creating the new wealth. Of course, there are examples of incumbents like... To read the complete article, login or sign-up using the form below.
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