Bringing new high-technology products to market: Six perils awaiting marketers

In fewer than ten days during the summer of 2016, millions of smartphone users around the world went crazy over Pokemon Go, an augmented reality videogame app. If only all new high-technology products—and their investors—could enjoy such runaway success! Alas, the road to new technologies can be bumpy, and marketers of new high-tech products face numerous obstacles. Six perils await these marketers: significant market uncertainty, significant technological uncertainty, issues of compatibility within a product's complex multi-component system, struggles to orchestrate self-reinforcing network effects, challenges of navigating ecosystem complexities and competition, and inherent risks of making hard choices among multiple product-market options with significant path dependency. This article discusses these dangers and concludes with advice regarding steps marketers can and should take to make the journey to market less perilous.