Marketing Research

Hypothesis 1: The use of sport celebrities for marketing innovation generate greater attention for a given product or service lead to higher sales and profit which create higher competitive advantages to overcome imitation.

Technological Innovation

Technological innovation is the process by which industry generates new and improved products and production processes (Simone I. Flynn). Technological innovation includes activities ranging from the generation of an idea, research, development and commercialization to the diffusion throughout the economy of new and improved products, processes and services. Effective technological innovation includes either the diffusion process or the spread of the innovation commercially (Zairi, 1992). After technological innovation new technology exploitation follows. New technology exploitation (NTE) refers to the utilization of new technology or scientific developments to improve the performance of products or manufacturing processes. The failure of management to recognize and manage breakthrough technology innovation often results in organizational inefficiencies and frustration (Bigwood, 2004).

Technological innovation starts off by acquiring of knowledge flow. Knowledge flow begins with new technologies being introduced into an enterprise. After which, the technologies are transformed into practical knowledge through technological disintegration, and then the practical knowledge is stored in the forms of ideas, files, drawings, data and so on(Impact on technological innovation, SIM). Knowledge flow is an upward spiral process, and can be explained in three aspects. One aspect is that it must be conceived in a dynamic sense (Rosenberg, 1976), because there is an important learning and applying process which includes the acquisition and diffusion of new skills and techniques. The second aspect is the technological resources in an enterprise are enlarged in quantities and improved in qualities in the process. The third is that new technologies may be accepted or resisted because of technological disequilibrium. Any important improvement in components of a product is likely to create an obstacle or an impetus imposed by another component as well as human power and organisational institutions (Rosenberg, 1976), so knowledge flow may be impeded or accelerated and have different changes at different moments(Impact on technological innovation, SIM).

When a new product platform substituted an existent product platform that is, product upgrading, it indicates that new technologies have been translated into new skills and techniques, and then became core technologies to underpin the product platform. Moreover, these new skills and techniques have mingled with accumulated organisational technological experience (Meyer and Utterback, 1993). Product upgrading as the external characteristic can be recognised according to all sorts of information feedback and appraised from enterprises outside, while knowledge flow as the internal characteristic is represented by product upgrading. If knowledge engendered by a technology cannot be employed during the process of product upgrading, it is unlikely that the enterprise will invest in relevant resources to develop the technology

Competitive technologies are substitutive, so existent technologies are often replaced by new technologies. For example, candle technology and bulb technology are competitive. The latter brings competitive threats to existent candle manufacturers because it destroys the application of existent competencies comprising applications of architecture knowledge and component knowledge (Tushman and Anderson, 1986). In technology innovation, new and improved products and production processes can be an incremental or disruptive innovation.

Incremental technological innovation often introduces relatively minor changes to the existing product through exploiting the potential of the established design (Dewar and Dutton, 1986). Incremental technological innovation only improve components technologies and slightly changes existent products by improving, enhancing, and complementing their functions without dominant technologies being changed or replaced and do not break through established dominant technology. For example, when an antilock braking system is added to automobile design, new component technologies are introduced into essentially unchanged product architecture, the whole functions of automobile are optimised in the established market and the degree of recognition of established demand is enhanced. However, it is not easy for incremental technological innovation to sustain long term competitive advantages. (Impact on technological innovation, SIM)

On the other hand, disruptive technological innovation is a successfully exploited product, service or business model through