Managing Radical Innovation in SMEs: the Evolutionary Approach.

From the bow and arrow to the turbojet, from the microwave oven to the Tesla Roadster, many cases of radical innovation have been triggered by the transfer of key components from different industries. Indeed, 'Woesian' evolutionary processes of technological change considering horizontal transfer across industries can provide robust interpretations of technological radical innovation. At the same time, they explain the engineering rationale beyond seemingly unpredictable technological revolutions. Can these evolutionary models provide the basis for novel methodologies of radical innovation management? The question is particularly significant for technological SMEs, because they are often threatened by radical innovations disrupting the supply chains they are part of, but at the same time they control the engineering knowledge necessary to manage critical components in new emerging industries. This paper discusses a path for developing a new methodology of radical innovation management explicitly based on these 'Woesian' novel evolutionary models of technological change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]