Radical innovation vs. disruptive innovation

1
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What is the difference between radical innovation and disruptive innovation?

Innovation
Entrepreneurship
Marketing Strategy
Fernando Almeida
67 months ago

4 answers

2

My visceral reaction is that radical innovation is more like a breakthrough (cure for cancer), whereas disruptive is more about but not limited to business model innovation.

Michael Fruhling
67 months ago
2

A lot of the time these two labels are used randomly for effect by people wanting to sell books and blog space. In general I guess you could say that 'radical' means coming up with something very different from the current solution, whereas 'disruptive' means something that disrupts the established market. So, for example, I would argue that Uber has been disruptive in the taxi market, but it wasn't particularly radical - in the UK we already had cars like this we called minicabs, not taxis, and Uber connected that with a smart app. Disruptive but not radical.

But all these terms are subjective - what's radical to one is not radical enough to others. In the end the labels don't matter. What matters is what you can make work.

Alan A
67 months ago
2

I agree with both Alan Arnett and Michael Fruhling.

Disruptive innovation causes disruption to an existing market by creating a faster, better, and smarter model -- just like the classic Uber example to the taxi cab industry, Airbnb to hotels, etc.

On the other hand, while it attempts to sell books and drive eye-balls (just like what Alan Arnett said), radical innovation is set to create new, stand-alone categories -- new ways of doing new things. I think Blockchain has the potential for radical innovation.

Alex Taser
67 months ago
0

These inputs above have laid it out quite well. I would add that these two categories of innovation are NOT mutually exclusive. !

Marco Aurilio
67 months ago

Have some input?