Technology adoption, dominant design, and new product development: A model of technological lock out and empirical test

Technological trajectories are characterized by path dependency; random events may dramatically influence final outcomes. However, these events influence technology selection indirectly, by impacting a set of factors which have predictable effects on technology adoption. Furthermore, these factors are also influenced by firm strategy, therefore technology adoption is neither wholly random nor beyond the firm's control. A model of these factors is built by integrating economics, strategy and marketing research. This model is then subjected to empirical test by means of both survey and archival data. In sum, the quantitative results indicate that certain factors (a firm's investment in learning, installed base, availability of complementary goods, and timing of entry) do have a significant impact on a firm's probability of technological lock out. The stories that emerged from this investigation reaffirm the conclusions drawn from the quantitative analysis, but also add insight into other key issues that impact technology selection and rejection. Both sets of results have important implications for how technologies should be chosen, developed and managed.