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Recently there has been debate about whether or not academic research and theories in management are ‘relevant’. The discussion has been extended to marketing and we explore whether or not there is a disconnection between marketing practice and the methodologies, theories and concepts put forward by marketing academics. The possible explanations for the divide between ‘theory’ and ‘practice’ in marketing are assessed. We then focus on new product development and consider the practical implications of the considerable corps of research aimed at identifying the influences affecting new product success. We continue by discussing the traditional representation of new product development. This assumes a staged process that can be managed, but which ignores in particular the impact of uncertainty. We conclude by suggesting that marketing needs to reappraise its model of the new product development process.

The spectre of declining international competitiveness has haunted Britain since the latter half of the nineteenth century; but the need to improve the market performance of Britain's manufacturing industry in the light of the chronic decline in world market share, the rising penetration of manufactured imports in the domestic market, and a growing increase in the deficit on the balance of UK trade in manufactures, has been particularly stridently stated throughout the post‐war period. Numerous reports and academic studies have been generated that have tended to concentrate for the most part on the reasons for the poor economic performance. A pot pourri of explanations have been offered, ranging from an emphasis on traditional “empire” and hence captive markets, an inadequate educational system, and an over concentration of scarce R&D resources on defence sectors, through to a lack of a sufficiently inspired marketing orientation, a failure to invest in the longer term (because of inter alia the myopia of the UK financial community) and insufficient effort directed towards being technologically innovative. Within these it might be discerned lie the seeds of a range of policy prescriptions and strategies. The problem is that many of these tend to reside in the province of Government or are too general to have any effective relevance for management. What is needed is a more “on the ground” approach founded on a deeper understanding of how individual businesses establish a competitive position in their particular market, and the means that their managers employ to preserve competitiveness. It is also clear that one needs to explore the notion of competitiveness, which has received a glib notoriety, and possibly a variety of confused and probably in some cases meaningless interpretations. We have therefore established a research programme at UMIST aimed at exploring the nature of new technology sectors, the implications for, in particular, strategic management of businesses operating in them, and the competitive strategies such businesses employ. In this way we aimed to draw out some lessons on competitiveness.

Remarks that the importance of innovation is now well recognized in the marketing literature. Argues that radical innovation is still very important to a mature company for the development of new sales. Discusses the details that are important to radical innovation, and proffers an initiative for the development of new business. Analyses the results of empirical studies carried out by UK companies into product innovation. Concludes that organizations should remain sensitive to market demand before embarking on innovation, and that “entrepreneurism” is an important factor, although hard to cultivate in a mature company.

Introduction All industries eventually attain maturity This means that, at best, demand for output is rising at a slower rate, and may actually be declining; marginal returns on the effort to improve technology is falling; and there is increasing competition, often from third world countries.

Presents a case which suggests that companies in new‐technology‐based industries have a greater need for long‐term planning than those in other industries at other stages of development. During the period of an industry′s infancy, there is also a greater need for an industry, rather than a company, perspective. Judgemental forecasting techniques are suggested to be more suitable in new industries because of the problems associated with other forecasting methods. However, problems such as time pressure on executives and the need for confidentiality are more acute when using judgemental forecasting techniques in new industries. The Delphi technique has been used many times as a method of forecasting the future of established industries, but it has never been used to consider the future of a new industry. Discusses ten problems which can be encountered when Delphi is used in this situation and provides practical hints on procedures to overcome them, gained from its use to forecast changes in one new industry, the market analysis industry. Since new industries rarely have established trade organizations to carry out such Delphi studies, the role could be played by institutes of management education.

There would appear to be a view in common currency that IT is revolutionizing marketing, offering the possibilities of enhanced operational efficiency, the facilitation of the development of innovative products and services as well as the potential for reconfiguring marketing in the organization. Addresses the manner in which IT has affected and may significantly affect marketing by references to an empirical study of the existing and projected impact of IT on marketing activities, as well as analysing the factors which are likely to facilitate or impede the process. IT can be the handmaiden to the erosion of marketing as a major organizational function, with many of the traditional customer oriented activities being more widely diffused throughout the organization. On the other hand, it may be that marketing retains its position by adopting the role of guardian of the customer orientation, taking responsibility for defining the form and content of information that is an acceptable basis for organizational discourse.

The paper aims to identify which factors determine (German) retail banking customers' intention to adopt a new remuneration system for financial advice. The new system is a pay‐per‐use advisory model that supersedes existing commission‐based advisory approaches.

The paper develops and tests a comprehensive conceptual framework that includes perceived innovation characteristics, relationship quality, and socio‐demographic and psychographic variables to explain adoption intentions of the new remuneration system. The data come from a survey among clients of a large German retail bank.

Perceived innovation characteristics (i.e. relative advantage) largely determine the intention to adopt the fee‐based advisory model. Consumer and relationship quality variables do not directly impact adoption intentions, but have an indirect effect through influencing perceived innovation characteristics and moderating their relative importance. Relationship quality indicators, such as satisfaction with the current service and trust in the bank or its employees, do not impact customers' intentions to switch to the new remuneration system.

The paper describes a (case) study using data from a large German retail bank. Future research may investigate the findings' (international) generalizability using different datasets and also assess additional drivers of customers' intentions to adopt a fee‐based advisory model.

The results suggest that banks should always explain the relative advantage of financial service innovations to their clients, as existing satisfaction and trust levels are not sufficient to ensure adoption.

This is the first paper examining the adoption of a new remuneration system for financial advice in the retail banking industry. By assessing a variety of variables the authors increase understanding of why customers adopt or reject such complex and difficult to evaluate service innovations.

Since the first Volume of this Bibliography there has been an explosion of literature in all the main areas of business. The researcher and librarian have to be able to uncover specific articles devoted to certain topics. This Bibliography is designed to help. Volume III, in addition to the annotated list of articles as the two previous volumes, contains further features to help the reader. Each entry within has been indexed according to the Fifth Edition of the SCIMP/SCAMP Thesaurus and thus provides a full subject index to facilitate rapid information retrieval. Each article has its own unique number and this is used in both the subject and author index. The first Volume of the Bibliography covered seven journals published by MCB University Press. This Volume now indexes 25 journals, indicating the greater depth, coverage and expansion of the subject areas concerned.

This paper aims to examine the factors that affect the adoption of technological innovations in a service industry, like the higher education industry. Specifically, the use of Web-based technology (WEBCT/blackboard) by faculty and administrators in universities in Egypt in the delivery of educational material and communication with students and peers is the focus of this study.

A distinctive business-to-business (B2B) model is developed drawing on Rogers’ innovation adoption model, the resource-based view of the firm, as well as theoretical and empirical foundations in previous innovation adoption literature. The model is testified drawing on the results of empirical work in the form of a large survey conducted on 200 faculty and administrators in two different universities in Egypt. Structural equation modeling is used to test the research model.

In addition to the attributes of the innovation, all university-based factors as well as one service provider factor, namely, need for interaction, were identified to have a significant influence on the adoption of technological innovations in the higher education industry.

This paper attempts to enhance current understanding of the adoption of innovations in an important industry like the higher education industry. Empirical results shed light on influential factors when adopting technological innovations by faculty and administrators in the higher education industry. This is the first empirical study of this type to be conducted in the Middle East.

Examines the case of the consumer adoption of Internet financial services, which may be viewed as an innovation in service delivery. The qualitative study employed Rogers’ model of perceived innovation attributes is augmented by Bauer’s concept of perceived risk. The perceived innovation attributes were found to be important determinants of consumers’ adoption decisions. However, two additional dimensions were found to influence people’s adoption decisions, highlighting the complexity of the adoption decision for Internet financial services.