Technology is an enabler
Many individuals mistakenly believe it is technology which drives innovation. Yet from the definitions above, that is clearly not the case. It is opportunity which defines innovation and technology which enables innovation. Consider the classic "Build a better mousetrap" example taught in most business schools. You might have the technology to create a better mousetrap, but when you have no mice or the old mousetrap works well, there's no opportunity and then the technology to create a better one becomes irrelevant. On the other hand, if you are overrun with mice then the opportunity exists to innovate a product making use of your technology.
Another example, one with which I'm intimately familiar, are gadgets startup companies. I've been associated with both those that succeeded and those that failed. Each possessed unique leading edge technologies. The difference was opportunity. Those that failed couldn't find the chance to produce a meaningful innovation utilizing their technology. In reality to survive, these companies had to morph oftentimes into something totally different and if they certainly were lucky they could make the most of derivatives of these original technology. http://yourtechcrunch.com/ More regularly than not, the first technology wound up in the scrap heap. Technology, thus, is an enabler whose ultimate value proposition is to make improvements to our lives. In order to be relevant, it needs to be utilized to produce innovations that are driven by opportunity.
Technology as a competitive advantage?
Many companies list a technology as you of these competitive advantages. Is this valid? Sometimes yes, but Generally no.
Technology develops along two paths - an evolutionary path and a revolutionary path.
A revolutionary technology is the one which enables new industries or enables solutions to problems that were previously not possible. Semiconductor technology is a great example. Not merely achieved it spawn new industries and products, nonetheless it spawned other revolutionary technologies - transistor technology, integrated circuit technology, microprocessor technology. All which provide lots of the products and services we consume today. But is semiconductor technology a competitive advantage? Taking a look at the amount of semiconductor companies that exist today (with new ones forming every day), I'd say not. What about microprocessor technology? Again, no. Lots of microprocessor companies out there. What about quad core microprocessor technology? Not as many companies, but you have Intel, AMD, ARM, and a number of companies building custom quad core processors (Apple, Samsung, Qualcomm, etc). So again, little of a competitive advantage. Competition from competing technologies and easy access to IP mitigates the perceived competitive advantageous asset of any particular technology. Android vs iOS is a great exemplory case of how this works. Both systems are derivatives of UNIX. Apple used their technology to introduce iOS and gained an early market advantage. However, Google, utilizing their variant of Unix (a competing technology), trapped relatively quickly. The reason why because of this lie not in the underlying technology, however in how the products made possible by those technologies were brought to market (free vs. walled garden, etc.) and the differences in the strategic visions of every company.https://arstechnician.com/
Evolutionary technology is the one which incrementally builds upon the base revolutionary technology. But by it's very nature, the incremental change is simpler for a competitor to fit or leapfrog. Take for instance wireless cellphone technology. Company V introduced 4G products prior to Company A and while it might experienced a quick term advantage, the moment Company A introduced their 4G products, the advantage as a result of technology disappeared. The buyer went back to choosing Company A or Company V predicated on price, service, coverage, whatever, but not predicated on technology. Thus technology may have been relevant in the short-term, however in the long term, became irrelevant.https://techwaa.com/
In today's world, technologies often ver quickly become commoditized, and within any particular technology lies the seeds of its own death.
Technology's Relevance
This information was written from the prospective of a conclusion customer. From a developer/designer standpoint things get murkier. The further one is taken from the technology, the less relevant it becomes. To a developer, the technology will look such as a product. An enabling product, but a product nonetheless, and thus it's highly relevant. Bose runs on the proprietary signal processing technology to enable products that meet a set of market requirements and thus the technology and what it enables is highly relevant to them. https://techsitting.com/ Their clients are more focused on how it sounds, what's the cost, what's the quality, etc., and less with how it's achieved, thus the technology used is significantly less highly relevant to them.
