The Role and Meaning of the Digital Transformation As a Disruptive Innovation on Small and Medium Manufacturing Enterprises

Abstract

The research reported in this paper explores the impact of digital transformation as a disruptive innovation on manufacturing SMEs. The research is based on a qualitative Delphi study encompassing 49 experts from eleven EU countries. The paper aims to demonstrate how disruptive innovations affect organizational changes and determine critical factors in organizations that impact the initiating and promoting R&D of disruptive innovation. We discovered that disruptive innovations impact product/process development methods, new production concepts, new materials for products, and new organization plans. Additionally, we identified organizational changes related to the development and use of disruptive innovations in the future. We also indicate how disruptive innovations influence social and technological changes in the organizational environment. The analysis also disclosed three main groups of disruptive innovations and their impact on future smart factory development, namely the following: technological changes, the emergence of innovative products, business models and solutions and organizational culture as one of the crucial key success factors. The analysis also examined the enablers of the successful development/introduction of disruptive innovations, wherein internal and external factors were determined. Additionally, we presented obstacles and the approaches necessary to mitigate them. We can conclude from the findings that in the timeframe of 5–10 years, only the SME that uses/develops disruptive innovations will survive in the market. However, the companies do not always have a clear idea of the meaning of disruptive innovations. Therefore, it is important to set clear goals regarding the achievement of disruptive innovations in companies. It is also necessary to creatively apply presented instruments enabling improvement of organizational changes and apply some additional concepts, which we have suggested.

41 st International Conference on Organizational Science Development

“…Med številnimi strateškimi spremenljivkami, ki določajo družbeno-ekonomske razmere na globalni in lokalni ravni, danes izstopata dva procesa: digitalizacija in pandemija, ki imata časovno in prostorsko sovpadanje in konvergenten pomen. V samo nekaj letih je hiter in pospešen razvoj digitalnih tehnologij in disruptivnih inovacij popolnoma spremenil naše poglede in možnosti družbeno-ekonomskega razvoja ter zaradi lahke dostopnosti in množične proizvodnje tehnoloških naprav drastično spremenil način produkcije, dela, poslovanja, zabave, kulture, informiranja itd.. Spremembe so vidne do mere, ki je bila do nedavnega težko razumljiva in praktično nedosegljiva (Roblek, Meško, Pušavec & Likar, 2021).…”

Start-Up’s Road to Disruptive Innovation in the Digital Era: The Interplay Between Dynamic Capabilities and Business Model Innovation

“…The first stream focused on the different types of innovation activities to fulfill disruptive innovation. Particularly, they mainly involve disruptive technology innovation ( Chen et al, 2020 ), disruptive product or service innovation ( Govindarajan et al, 2011 ), and disruptive business model innovation ( Roblek et al, 2021 ). The second stream adopts the process perspective to understand disruptive innovation.…”

“…Digitalization is becoming a societal necessity, as well as a challenge ( Zhang et al, 2022 ). Both threats and opportunities are, respectively, brought to established companies and newcomers from the lens of disruptive innovation ( Roblek et al, 2021 ). Especially for the agile but resource-constraint start-ups, they are usually considered with obvious disadvantages in traditional competition mode.…”

The Impact of Specialized Knowledge Search on Enterprise Innovation

“…The products newly introduced to the market do not show favorable results in terms of the key performance attributes emphasized by consumers in the mainstream market. However, these products are able to present specific attributes or a combination of attributes, including prices, emphasized by non-consumers, or key performance attributes for overservice customers (Christensen et al, 2018;Roblek et al, 2021), including but not limited to relative simplicity, cheapness, ease of use, or convenience. Such features could help enterprises draw attention from specific consumers to form the niche market, where enterprises could acquire a living space and enhance the capabilities of products to further create sustainable and competitive advantages.…”