Will & Vision: How Latecomers Grow to Dominate Markets

by Gerard J. Tellis, Peter N. Golder

Winner of the American Marketing Association Berry Prize for The Best Book in Marketing. One of the top 10 business books of 2001, Harvard Business Review. "Engaging stories, empirical analysis, and intelligent commentary make this an impressive book."--excerpt from book review in Harvard Business Review , September 2001 "Engaging stories, empirical analysis, and intelligent commentary make this an impressive book."-- Harvard Business Review Everybody knows that it's the market pioneers who have the best name recognition, the highest market share, and the most enduring market leadership....right? In order to test the truth of the perceived wisdom on being first to market, Gerard Tellis and Peter Golder carried out an in-depth historical analysis of various markets, as they evolved, over the past decade. Among other things, they found that, not only does being first not guarantee anything, but that the current trend of staking everything on getting there first all too often leads companies to embrace a disastrous strategy of rushing to market with incomplete, inferior, and flawed products. With the help of numerous fascinating case histories chronicling the success and failures at industry giants, including Xerox, Gillette, Microsoft, Matsushita, and Intel, Tellis and Golder explore the ways in which being first to market is often more a curse than a blessing. They isolate the 5 key principles that ensure enduring market leadership--vision of the mass market, managerial persistence, relentless innovation, financial commitment, and asset leverage.

Genres: Business, Nonfiction

256 pages, Hardcover

First published September 6, 2001

Reviews

[Shin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Debunking the myth of the so-called First Mover Advantage. Very good read. I wish more of Japanese executives read this book and understand that FMA is largely an illusion.

[John Moore · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the best business books I have ever read. I suggest that it be read in combination with Dealers in Lightning by Michael Hiltzik on Xerox PARC. The story of Haloid Corporation- later renamed Xerox- investing 2x their operating profits over 14 years to invent the copier is one of the examples in the book. Their central research center PARC later invented almost every key component of the modern PC but failed to launch a commercial product to benefit from the VISION because their commercial team lacked the WILL to put the capital in converting a small market into the potential mass market. This is the central theme of Will + Vision. How can business leaders use resources from their existing business (eg copiers) to find their way to a new world (eg the PC).