On November 16th, the MCPC 2011 conference kicks off at the Marriot SFO Airport, San Francisco. In this series of postings, we introduce our speakers at the business seminars of the conference.
Two talks providing a review of these fields to create a common understanding of the latest research and insights for practice.
Joel West, Keck Graduate Institute of Applied Life Sciences
Open Innovation - State of the Art of Research and Practice
Frank T. Piller, RWTH Aachen & MIT Smart Customization Group
Fabrizio Salvador, IE Business School
A Matter of Balance - Building the Successful Mass Customization Enterprise
What makes a successful mass customization enterprise? Previous research has identified three core capabilities that allow companies to profit from mass customization: robust process design, choice navigation and solution space definition. So far, however, we did not have large-sample evidence of the impact of these capabilities on market, operational and financial performance of a company. This presentation will report the latest results of an international study of 130 mass customization consumer companies operating both in Europe and in the U.S. as part of the ongoing MC500 research initiative. We find that these capabilities indeed are important for the performance of the sampled companies. To our surprise, however, focusing on one capability alone does not necessarily lead to superior market, operational and financial performance. Instead, performance differentials are explained in terms of the simultaneous presence of the three capabilities. This means that managers building a mass customization venture have to get a balanced view of investing in the three capabilities. Using empirical data and case studies, our presentation will identify implications of our study for entrepreneurs, managers in established companies, investors and VCs, and for future research.
Please find the complete program at the official MCPC 2011 website.
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