Frugal innovation and design changes expanding the cost-performance frontier: A Schumpeterian approach

Chaisung Lim and Takahiro Fujimoto

Research Policy, 2019, vol. 48, issue 4, 1016-1029

Abstract: This paper redefines “frugal innovations”, particularly for physical products with relatively complex designs, by using a multidimensional framework that covers design, technological, and economic aspects of innovations, refining and broadening its initial definition as “low-cost innovations” for the unserved lower end of the mass market (ULM). By applying our framework, this paper clarifies and broadens the concept of frugal innovation. The applicability of this broadened concept is demonstrated by using this framework to illustrate two cases of radical frugal innovations in the automobile industry, Tata Motors Nano and Citroën 2CV, from an emerging country and an advanced country respectively.

Keywords: Frugal innovation; Design change; Schumpeter; Automobile industry; Architectural change; Product innovation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (15)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048733318302464
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:respol:v:48:y:2019:i:4:p:1016-1029

DOI: 10.1016/j.respol.2018.10.014

Access Statistics for this article

Research Policy is currently edited by M. Bell, B. Martin, W.E. Steinmueller, A. Arora, M. Callon, M. Kenney, S. Kuhlmann, Keun Lee and F. Murray

More articles in Research Policy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().