Evan A Chiao

I think this is a great example of a disruptive innovation, and I definitely agree that the transistor radio was a huge new market disruption. Another old disruptive innovation that comes to my mind is the CDs because before then you had records. The CDs took audio technology to another level by allowing multiple songs to be placed on one disk, and give the ability to electronically change songs. This basically disrupted the record player industry, and the masses switched to the CD industry. Non-transistor radio manufacturers could’ve introduced cheaper versions of their products to stay relevant in the market. If they didn’t have the technology to persevere in this new market, then lowering the price might’ve kept customers purchasing their products. Also, I think that the non-transistor radio manufactures could have introduced bonus features in their large radios, and this would’ve given customers another reason to stay with the company.

I agree that the Transistor radio is a great example of a disruptive technology. It truly changed the game in terms of radio and future devise regarding price and portability. These two parameters are continued in today’s market which shows the magnitude of this innovation. Additionally, in the music industry, I’d argue that allowing songs to be stored digitally as MP3s and played on the go was just as innovative.

A similar innovation with disruptive characteristics would be the wireless phone. Instead of having a phone attached to the wall with a long cord attached, phones were now judged on range and battery life rather than look. Now, instead of having a phone act like décor, the phone could be almost hidden and seen/used when necessary. Having wall attached phones became more obsolete with the emergence of cell phones, but this could not have came without the cordless phone.

When I started to read this post my mind went immediately to Kodak. Much like the transistor radio, digital photography totally upset a market, causing the leading incumbent to squirm. This disruptive innovation was far less expensive and vastly more convenient for consumers as well. In terms of survivability for radios, I don’t think there was much for non-t radio manufacturers to react to. In that time period, information traveled far slower, making reactions to this type of disruption even worse. When they discovered this new competition, I think any companies best move would be to adapt to this new demand.

An older disruptive innovation I always think of in the music industry is the Mp3 player/iPod that digitized music listening for the first time. This revolutionized the way we consume music and set the path for the way we consume music today. The industry of tapes, records, and CD’s was disrupted by storing music with nano-technology, allowing more music to be held in a small space.

During my internship at QVC I noticed that all the different parts of IT keeps the company on its toes. I think cutting out management and giving employees the power to develop and innovate on their own would be catastrophic to QVC. QVC runs 24/7 and there is someone monitoring around the clock, and this is critical to make sure that our customers around the world have access to the website and mobile applications. Removing management would cause chaos in IT because managers are often what keeps teams in communication with each other. In order to reach out and work with another team the managers usually communicate and collaborate on a project. With a flat business organization, IT at QVC would just have multiple projects going on the same time with zero communication between IT teams. This would end up costing QVC a lot of money, and in the end it would show very little progress.

While this technique may be successful at Valve, I find it very risky. Valve is lucky enough to be in a situation where they can allow their employees to do as they want. The creative aspect of Valve warrants such flexibility. Over the summer I interned at Crayola where employees were given a certain amount of flexibility. I found that because employees had these freedoms, there were issues with keeping everyone on the same page. I wonder if there are similar issues at Valve due to the lack of management.

I believe this flat organizational structure is ideal for streamlining a business. The only problem is what you’ve mentioned, decisions are made quickly but everyone must know what they’re doing. Each individual has a much greater responsibility because their decisions make a huge impact. Valve has approximately 360 employees which likely contributes to their success in using a flat organizational structure. I can’t see how a structure like this would work for a majority of businesses. Although, part of this structure is cutting out unnecessary middle managers out so I understand why they may have so little employees. At the same time, many companies need that hierarchical structure to make sure people can be held accountable and decisions are verified before they are approved.

The flat business model at valve will only continue to create more and more issue as the company expands. As others have mentioned, Valve is in a very unique situation that has allowed them to be successful. This type of organization would quickly fail at my old workplace at AZ. Within the Pharmaceutical industry, there are so many checks and balances because of the numerous regulations and safety of the patients. Valve was able to make this successful because of the nature of their work and by striking gold with a couple of their games coupled with innovative ideas to continue profits from those games. As the company grows and creates new games there could be major issues with release dates and bugs in the games.

Having used AWS first hand, I can personally attest to its simplicity on all fronts. I believe that just by having their name on the service, Amazon has attracted many more customers. Many companies don’t specialize in IT and for most it can be expensive and stressful. Having the option to mitigate potential risk to a reputable company like Amazon makes this service very attractive.

As you stated, if something goes wrong with any aspect of the service, Amazon has 24/7 specialists to assist with your issues. I feel as though this is a contributing factor to outsourcing IT. As with outsourcing anything, there are risks you must consider, such as accessibility and security.

An interesting aspect of AWS was that Amazon originally set out to create a cloud-base infrastructure for their own use. When they ended up creating a really good solution, they decided to sell it to other companies.
This speaks to the deeper point of outsourcing which is to focus on what you’re good at. In other words, do whats unique to your business in-house and outsource everything else. For that reason, we can expect IT Infrastructure as a Service become more and more common in the business world.