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Disruptive innovation is a phenomenon and a term which was coined by Harvard professor Clayton Christensen in connection with his book “The Innovator’s dilemma”.
Disruptive innovation is a new technology and new business models that break down existing markets and value networks, while creating new ones. The meaning of disruptive innovation has been changing since the book was published in 1997 and many people have a wider perspective on disruptive innovation than Christensen. We use it to refer to all innovation that drastically changes a market or creates a new one through new business models and technology. Christensen means that lower prices are also needed, combined with an offer of lower quality according to the customers of current competitors. We consider a company like Uber to be a disruptive innovator, but according to Chirstensen’s definition this is not the case, as the current market considers services offered by Uber to be of higher quality compared to the competitors. An example of disruptive innovation (also according to Christensen) was the Ford Model T. It was the first car to be produced by assembly line, which drastically lowered the price to the consumer, making it possible for more people to purchase a car. This in turn meant a big change in transportation habits and alternative transportation forms such as horse and carriage are no longer popular. Compare incremental and structural innovation.
