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We develop hypotheses based on behavioral theory that explain how high technology firms' new product introduction (NPI) performance below aspiration levels impact the number of R&D alliances, and how slack moderates this relationship. Using panel data of U.S. biopharmaceutical firms, we find that as firms' NPI performance below historical aspiration levels increases the number of R&D alliances they form increases and slack intensifies this relationship. We contribute to alliance research by providing theory and empirical evidence that increases in the distance of NPI below aspirations serve as a motivation for increases in R&D alliances, and empirically to behavioral theory by revealing that NPI goals act similarly to financial performance goals in their impact on firms' actions and slack intensifies this relationship.

Scholars identify several benefits of new product introductions (NPI), yet prior literature largely overlooks how the process of NPI generates marketplace insights and influences subsequent products. Building on the concept of absorptive capacity, the authors argue that the influence of products on firm value depends on process characteristics, namely, the pace, irregularity, and scope of NPI. Using data collected from multiple sources for products introduced by pharmaceutical firms between 1991 and 2015 and robust econometric methods that account for endogeneity and unobserved heterogeneity, this study reveals that pace and scope have an inverted U-shaped effect on firm value, whereas irregularity negatively influences firm value. Moreover, strategic emphasis and product complexity negatively moderate the relationship of the irregularity and scope of NPI with firm value. This research documents the importance of adopting a portfolio approach to the sequential introduction of new products and incorporating insights gained from previous product introductions; it cautions managers against evaluating products in isolation. The authors discuss the economic significance of these results and provide actionable guidance for managers.

A technology firm launches newer generations of a given product over time. At any moment, the firm decides whether to release a new version of the product that captures the current technology level at the expense of a fixed launch cost. Consumers are forward-looking and purchase newer models only when it maximizes their own future discounted surpluses. We start by assuming that consumers have a common valuation for the product and consider two product launch settings. In the first setting, the firm does not announce future release technologies and the equilibrium of the game is to release new versions cyclically with a constant level of technology improvement that is optimal for the firm. In the second setting, the firm is able to precommit to a schedule of technology releases and the optimal policy generally consists of alternating minor and major technology launch cycles. We verify that the difference in profits between the commitment and no-commitment scenarios can be significant, varying from 4% to 12%. Finally, we generalize our model to allow for multiple customer classes with different valuations for the product, demonstrating how to compute equilibria in this case and numerically deriving insights for different market compositions. This paper was accepted by Yossi Aviv, operations management.

Firms' boards of directors affect many strategic outcomes. Yet the impact of boards on new products, a key organizational adaptation mechanism, has been overlooked. Addressing this gap, the authors consider the effect of the firm's board interlock centrality, the extent to which board members are connected to boards of other firms, on its new product introductions. They propose that board interlock centrality provides firms access to market intelligence, creating opportunities to introduce incremental new products. Applying the motivation-opportunity-ability theory, the authors propose that two aspects of board leadership moderate this relationship: internal (vs. external) leadership and marketing leadership. They test the hypotheses using a panel of publicly listed U.S. consumer packaged goods firms, in which most new products are incremental innovations. As hypothesized, board interlock centrality increases new product introductions. This effect is stronger when firms have high internal leadership, internal marketing leadership, and a marketing CEO; it is weaker with high intra-industry external leadership. The findings highlight the unexpected role of board interlocks on innovation outcomes and advance the literature on marketing leadership, board interlocks, and social networks.

Many firms use online brand communities to support the launch of their new products. This study proposes a typology of firm-hosted online brand communities and examines whether such a classification system can improve predictions of new product success. A cross-industry analysis of 81 firm-hosted online brand communities shows that these communities reflect three archetypes. A subsequent survey of 170 community-hosting firms in the consumer durable goods industry reveals that the three types of communities are not equally important for new product success. Moreover, one archetype generally underperforms the other two as a new product support mechanism. Overall, the results demonstrate that firm-hosted online brand communities can be a predictor of new product success.

Every new product introduction entails a branding decision: whether to name the product using a direct extension, a sub-brand, or a new brand. While previous research has focused on how consumers evaluate alternatives in lab settings, or, in studies based on secondary data, on the effectiveness of brand extensions in general, a comprehensive framework of the antecedents and consequences of new product branding decisions is lacking from the literature. The authors propose a theoretical framework that organizes product-, category-, and firm-level determinants of firms’ new product branding decisions, and empirically test the framework’s predictions using a large sample of new product introductions, documenting with real world data how managers choose among three branding alternatives. In addition, using both product-specific and firm-specific valuation metrics, the authors quantify the negative impact on firm value of misaligning the new product branding decisions with the conditions facing new products. Conceptually, the authors bridge the branding and new product performance literatures, and present findings that extend knowledge from behavioral research on brand extensions. Empirically, the authors provide evidence to managers on how to choose brand names for new products in a way that enhances the stock market value of firms.

Recently, firms have begun to handle the design, manufacturing, and maintenance of capital goods through a consolidated mechanism called the integrated product-service system. This new paradigm enables firms to deliver high-reliability products while lowering the ownership cost. Hence, holistic optimization models must be proposed for jointly allocating reliability, maintenance, and spare parts inventory across the entire value chain. In the existing literature, these decisions are often made fragmentally, thus resulting in local optimality. This study reviews the extant works pertaining to reliability-redundancy allocation, preventative maintenance, and spare parts logistics models. We discuss the challenges and opportunities of consolidating these decisions under an integrated reliability-maintenance-inventory framework for attaining superior system availability. Specific interest is focused on the new product introduction phase in which firms face a variety of uncertainties, including installed base, usage, reliability, and trade policy. The goal is to call for tackling the integrated reliability-maintenance-inventory allocation model under a nonstationary operating condition. Finally, we place the integrated allocation model in the semiconductor equipment industry and show how the firm deploys reliability initiatives and after-sale support logistics to ensure the fleet uptime for its global customers.

To satisfy consumers’ diverse demands for fresh produce, the supplier may introduce competitive fresh produce through the reselling or agency channel of the platform to expand market coverage. Under the uncertain market environment, the supplier faces the problem of how to choose the appropriate product introduction strategy to promote information sharing cooperation, and the platform faces how to implement information sharing strategy under different product introduction strategies. This paper attempts to solve these problems and provide practical guidance for the cooperation between the supplier and the platform. Aiming at a fresh produce supply chain comprised of a supplier providing the freshness-keeping effort and a platform owning private demand information, we model a multistage game under asymmetric information to study the two strategies. Our results indicate that the platform may share information voluntarily, depending on the competition intensity and freshness sensitivity. To promote the information sharing cooperation with the platform, the supplier may choose introduction with agency selling even if a high commission fee is charged. Since information sharing promotes the product introduction strategy and vice versa, we reveal a complementary relationship between the two strategies. Interestingly, we find that introducing competitive fresh produce may increase the demand for original fresh produce when the freshness sensitivity is high. However, the platform may suffer from introduction with agency selling even at a high commission rate in some cases.

This paper investigates the impact of e-waste regulation on new product introduction in a stylized model of the electronics industry. Manufacturers choose the development time and expenditure for each new version of a durable product, which together determine its quality. Consumers purchase the new product and dispose of the last-generation product, which becomes e-waste. The price of a new product strictly increases with its quality and consumers' rational expectation about the time until the next new product will be introduced. \"Fee-upon-sale\" types of e-waste regulation cause manufacturers to increase their equilibrium development time and expenditure, and thus the incremental quality for each new product. As new products are introduced (and disposed of) less frequently, the quantity of e-waste decreases and, even excluding the environmental benefits, social welfare may increase. Consumers pay a higher price for each new product because they anticipate using it for longer, which increases manufacturers' profits. Unfortunately, existing \"fee-upon-sale\" types of e-waste regulation fail to motivate manufacturers to design for recyclability. In contrast, \"fee-upon-disposal\" types of e-waste regulation such as individual extended producer responsibility motivate design for recyclability but, in competitive product categories, fail to reduce the frequency of new product introduction.

The development of novel natural product-derived nano-pesticide systems with loading capacity and sustained releasing performance of bioactive compounds is considered an effective and promising plant protection strategy. In this work, 25 L-carvone-based thiazolinone–hydrazone compounds 4a~4y were synthesized by the multi-step modification of L-carvone and structurally confirmed. Compound 4h was found to show favorable and broad-spectrum antifungal activity through the in vitro antifungal activity evaluation of compounds 4a~4y against eight phytopathogenic fungi. Thus, it could serve as a leading compound for new antifungal agents in agriculture. Moreover, the L-carvone-based nanochitosan carrier 7 bearing the 1,3,4-thiadiazole-amide group was rationally designed for the loading and sustained releasing applications of compound 4h, synthesized, and characterized. It was proven that carrier 7 had good thermal stability below 200 °C, dispersed well in the aqueous phase to form numerous nanoparticles with a size of~20 nm, and exhibited an unconsolidated and multi-aperture micro-structure. Finally, L-carvone-based thiazolinone–hydrazone/nanochitosan complexes were fabricated and investigated for their sustained releasing behaviors. Among them, complex 7/4h-2 with a well-distributed, compact, and columnar micro-structure displayed the highest encapsulation efficiency and desirable sustained releasing property for compound 4h and thus showed great potential as an antifungal nano-pesticide for further studies.