New Products Management 11e / Crawford & Di Benedetto Part II Concept Generation
Case Teaching Notes for Part II
PILLSBURY GRANDS! BISCUIT SANDWICHES
Chapter 4
This case illustrates the process of open innovation at General Mills. We learn that the firm has
its own open innovation platform, G-WIN, and that it not only pursues open innovation partners,
It is interesting to note that General Mills could have produced Grands! in house, without
an open innovation partner, but decided not to. The case notes that baking capacity might have
General Mills went through its files and discovered a previous partner, Better Baked
Foods, whose joint project (a Totino’s pizza product) was never launched. The link probably
The partnership was perfectly complementary, as the case notes that Better Baked Foods
Mr. Maheshwari can be identified as a person playing the role of the connected innovator.
This person should cast a wide net, and use his/her connections inside and outside the firm to
find potential partners. This is a special kind of expertise, and indeed requires an ability to stand
up to the inevitable “We’ve tried that before and it doesn’t work” comments. In this case, Mr.
To generalize, the connected innovator always casts the net wide, but where they look
might differ from one industry to another. The case mentions B2B products, medical services,
and automobiles. In each case, an external partner might have to have specific technology
capabilities, some of which might be very high-tech or specialized. It is possible that one might
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New Products Management 11e / Crawford & Di Benedetto Part II Concept Generation
Personality traits would certainly include perseverance, and the Grands! case implies that
strong awareness of the firm’s own strengths and weaknesses is important. The ability to “think
P&G CARPET FLICK
Chapter 4
Quite clearly, what IDEO did was to bring their particular brand of idea generation to P&G to
assist them in the development of the CarpetFlick, with remarkable results. As chaotic as the
process sounds, the number of resulting ideas was astounding, and as noted in the case, the IDEO
folks, working with P&G employees, actually developed several crude working prototypes – the
competitive format might have encouraged the development of more prototypes than would
otherwise have emerged. Once the crude prototypes were made, then the logical next step was to
What’s next for the CarpetFlick? Here’s where students can be encouraged to begin with
the CarpetFlick product (form, need, and technology), take away one of the building blocks, and
Same form, same technology, new need (cleaning up and down stairs, yard or other
Same form, same need, new technology (what else could pick up dust from carpets? Is
Same need, same technology, different form (hand-held would be a simple brand
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New Products Management 11e / Crawford & Di Benedetto Part II Concept Generation
AQUA FRESH WHITE TRAYS
Chapter 4
This case is about open innovation, and in particular the open relationship between Oratech LLC
Oratech, of course, has developed the products, owns the patents, and can do some
manufacturing. GSK sees the potential in the tooth whitening industry, and believes there is
room for a new competitor that has a product which avoids the weaknesses of the current
Oratech was actually the firm that initiated the relationship. They were already making
tooth whitening products, but selling only to the professional market such as dentists. What they
The case seems to indicate that the relationship was relatively smooth. Both firms need
each other, in a sense. Their skills are very much complementary. The biggest hurdle to the
relationship seems to have been the significant difference between the two firms’ corporate
In sum, the case is very typical of what happens in the pharmaceutical business, either in
consumer products (like here), over-the-counter medications, or prescription drugs. A large
producer, like GSK, may have significant financial and human resources invested in drug
discovery, but even so will still be lacking the knowhow to get into other, unrelated fields. In
As a final word, the outside partner could truly be small. Imagine a two-person startup that
has a patent on a new prescription pharmaceutical. They have the knowhow, but certainly lack
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New Products Management 11e / Crawford & Di Benedetto Part II Concept Generation
CAMPBELL’S IQ MEALS
Chapter 5
As was noted in the Wall Street Journal article that was the source of this case, Campbell
certainly learned some critical facts about the marketplace, and its behaviors with respect to
“functional foods” like IQ Meals. Firstly, while the products did test well in early taste tests, the
concept of a long-term health plan was apparently not adequately tested. The test market results
seemed to indicate that the U.S. buying public for the most part doesn’t want to commit to a
It is hard to say, however, that the product was “doomed.” IQ Meals certainly did well in
the clinical trials, and though adding new items to the line (such as an IQ Meal pizza) is not a
trivial matter, it also doesn’t seem like an insurmountable obstacle for a firm like Campbell. It
seems that the major problem was the resistance to the long-term meal plan. Advocates of health
programs like Herbalife do go on long-term plans that can be costly (though not unreasonably
so), so way was Campbell not able to convince its target market to do the same? Perhaps they
could have done a better job communicating the idea that IQ Meals was actually a plan, and not a
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New Products Management 11e / Crawford & Di Benedetto Part II Concept Generation
EARNING ORGANIZATIONAL RESPECT
Chapter 5
This case has been run in “beta” version frequently using a forced-relationships technique (in
which pictures from a magazine are used as stimuli). As you might imagine, every class arrives
at its own unique solutions. The key here is to get the students motivated and excited about the
challenge, which generally is not a problem. One technique that works is to have students write
Another way to use this technique is to do a follow-up on the toy industry case (end of
Chapter 4). Once they have done the creative thinking about idea generation required in that
case, you can put up an appropriate problem such as “What kinds of toys/games are actually fun
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New Products Management 11e / Crawford & Di Benedetto Part II Concept Generation
COMPARING SMARTPHONES (A)
Chapter 6
The numbers presented in the table in this case are realistic and were derived from online
smartphone ratings websites. These numbers can be used to generate both regular positioning
maps and per-dollar maps, as described in the case. Students are given a lot of flexibility in
answering this case. They need to design two positioning maps, each using two different
As sample solutions, two positioning maps are shown below. The first map positions the
phones in terms of screen size and quality of rear camera, while the second uses CPU speed and
talk time. These seem to be dimensions that make sense paired in this fashion. The first map
3.8 4 4.2 4.4 4.6 4.8 5 5.2
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
8.7
13
4
Scre en Size
Rear Cam
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New Products Management 11e / Crawford & Di Benedetto Part II Concept Generation
1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 1.8
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
16
18
20
CPU Speed
Talk T ime
And below are the same two sets of attributes, but this time depicted as per-dollar maps
(the actual scale used is attribute rating divided by price in hundreds of dollars).
0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1 1.1
0
0.5
1
1.5
2
2.5
1.98
2.37
1.23
Scree n Size
Re ar Cam
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New Products Management 11e / Crawford & Di Benedetto Part II Concept Generation
0.15 0.2 0.25 0.3 0.35
0
0.5
1
1.5
2
2.5
3
3.5
4
4.5
CPU Speed
Talk T ime
A couple of things to notice in these maps: First, in both maps, the iPhone appears to be
dominated by Samsung, Nokia, and other manufacturers, though this may be just because of the
particular attributes we selected as examples. Second, when comparing the regular with the
So why does the iPhone sell so well, if it is actually dominated by Samsung and others in
these maps? A complex question. Certainly the brand name and equity of Apple cannot be denied
What should Apple do? The attributes where it is less competitive with its competitors
are: screen (it has the smallest), pixel density (it has the lowest), and talk time (it has the
shortest). The differences on other attributes are not that great. Of course, it is also the most
expensive of the five phones presented, so that is another opportunity for improvement.
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New Products Management 11e / Crawford & Di Benedetto Part II Concept Generation
100 110 120 130 140 150 160 170 180 190
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
5
4
Weight
Scre n Size
15 20 25 30 35 40 45
0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1
1.2
0.91
0.62
Weight
Scre n Size
What additional information might we want to obtain at this point? We would want to
understand how important the threat is from Samsung and others. Though apparently
outpositioned on some important factors, the iPhone maintains a market lead. Can brand equity
erode if, for example, future generations of iPhones are disappointing, or conversely if future
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New Products Management 11e / Crawford & Di Benedetto Part II Concept Generation
RUBBERMAID, INC.
Chapter 7
Most students will readily accept the idea that Rubbermaid has done a fabulous job, and will tend
to accept their summary of feelings on the various tools. So they may ask how they are supposed
to find other methods when Rubbermaid has not. The answer lies in the statement by
So, they now need new ideas, they admit they have not tried all of the techniques, and there
may be better ways to use their favorite method of ideation (problem-find-solve, Chapter 5), and
However, coming as it does at the end of Part II, the Rubbermaid case gives the instructor
an opportunity to integrate and summarize the entire concept generation topic in any manner
Therefore, the approach taken varies a great deal. You can attack the basic questions given
in the last paragraph of the case. Probably the first question is to ask why finding and solving
problems has worked so well. Most activities around the house and shop are not such that people
What about scenario analysis? Does the student agree that it does not fit Rubbermaid? Or
is it possible that the firm is just seeking incremental innovation, and not really out to solve
On the matter of fortuitous scan methods, it would appear that dimensional analysis,
checklists, gap analysis, and morphological matrix (among others) would be useful. What does
Gap analysis may be difficult, given the customers’ less than excited involvement with
Additional matters from Chapters 4-7 can be brought out in the discussion. For example,
1 Lee Smith, “Rubbermaid Goes Thump,” Fortune, October 2, 1995, pp. 91-118.
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New Products Management 11e / Crawford & Di Benedetto Part II Concept Generation
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New Products Management 11e / Crawford & Di Benedetto Part II Concept Generation
Course Concepts for Part II
These are the primary concepts that students should take from Part II. As stated before, the
choice of concepts is personal, and each instructor is encouraged to develop his/her own list.
1. A re-look at the idea of an evolving product.
2. Two general approaches: finding ideas already created, or creating them ourselves.
3. How do we best identify creative people?
4. Roadblocks to creativity.
5. Lead users and open innovation.
6. Problem-based ideation versus the more fortuitous analytical attribute approaches.
7. The sources of problems/needs, especially problem analysis.
8. Scenario extend: be able to extend one; scenario leap: be able to paint one.
9. How to make brainstorming work right.
10. Open innovation.
11. Online communities.
12. Disciplines panel.
13. Dimensional analysis.
14. Checklist.
15. Determinant attribute.
16. Gap analysis: determinant gap map, perceptual gap map.
17. AR versus OS perceptual gap maps.
18. Trade-off and conjoint analysis.
19. Two-dimensional matrix.
20. Morphological matrix, using 3 or 4 dimensions.
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