Lead User Analyses for the Development of New Industrial Products

TLDR

The lead‑user concept proposes that users at the forefront of change can generate novel product ideas, a strategy increasingly applied in rapidly evolving industries. This study aims to integrate market research into the lead‑user methodology and evaluate its effectiveness in the computer‑aided design of printed circuit boards. The authors conducted an empirical test by identifying lead users in the PC‑CAD domain, collecting their data on product needs and solutions, and using it to generate new product concepts. The test confirmed that lead users could be identified, provided unique and actionable data, and that concepts derived from their input were strongly preferred by a representative sample of PC‑CAD users, while also highlighting methodological strengths and limitations.

Abstract

Recently, a “lead user” concept has been proposed for new product development in fields subject to rapid change (von Hippel [von Hippel, E. 1986. Lead users: A source of novel product concepts. Management Sci. 32 791–805.]). In this paper we integrate market research within this lead user methodology and report a test of it in the rapidly evolving field of computer-aided systems for the design of printed circuit boards (PC-CAD). In the test, lead users were successfully identified and proved to have unique and useful data regarding both new product needs and solutions responsive to those needs. New product concepts generated on the basis of lead user data were found to be strongly preferred by a representative sample of PC-CAD users. We discuss strengths and weaknesses of this first empirical test of the lead user methodology, and suggest directions for future research.