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Companies measuring by “traditional” internally focused control measures have been found to be lagging through concentrating on efficiency rather than the causes of loss of control. It is argued here that those with more dynamic external focus, in which the role of production managers is vital to effecting improvements in performance, can be expected to take the lead, and better measurements are described which can produce an improvement in competitiveness.

The Taiwanese Government developed a series of six‐year plans promoting its industrial strategy. Part of the emphasis of the latest plan was to increase product sophistication in ten selected industries, of which the electronics industry is a leading example. The stimulus for this effort was the then rising value of the yen and rising wage levels, making Taiwan a less cost competitive producer than some of its neighbouring countries. Since the fieldwork was completed, Taiwan’s economy has been affected by the Asian economic crisis. In a sense this has given Taiwanese industry a breathing space in which it can learn how to overcome the problems shown in this paper. The paper shows that the Government’s strategy was partly frustrated in six plants in the electronics industry by limitations within senior manufacturing management. These were deficiencies in the technologies supporting production of new products, limited skills in the pre‐production phase, and weaknesses in the relationships with managers in other functions. The need to restore quickly the levels of manufacturing yield and productivity following new product introductions was recognised as important. However, the ability to achieve these goals was constrained by weak systems.

Examines how potential manufacturing managers are educated in 19 Taiwanese universities. It looks at undergraduate, postgraduate and post‐experience programmes in these institutions. The authors established that there was a limited availability of suitable modern manufacturing management textbooks in Chinese. It was found that only one in ten universities expected to increase its provision of courses in this area, which is one central to the Taiwanese economy. Equally, one in ten expected to reduce its efforts. It was found that less than 40 percent of universities had any programmes at any level in the subject area. We also established that the level of industrial involvement in either helping design courses, instructing on them or providing hands‐on projects was low. In terms of future careers we found that very few of those taking the few places available had ambitions to become manufacturing managers.

This paper examines how the career development and education of senior manufacturing managers in six electrical/electronics firms equipped them to support the priorities of the Taiwanese national strategy. It reviews the operations management literature, which is subsequently used to evaluate the work experiences and attendance at educational and/or training programmes of the senior managers responsible for manufacturing in the six plants. It shows that these senior managers had limited formal education in manufacturing topics, which was partly compensated for by a number of post‐experience programmes. It also shows that these managers had little prior exposure to manufacturing. This was true in terms of working at more junior levels or in working in related functions such as product development before these senior management appointments. It argues for a cadre of highly skilled manufacturing managers capable of sustaining the ideas built into the national strategy.

This case study examines the new product development (NPD) process of digital information products (DIPs) and its critical success factors (CSFs) in a small-sized German enterprise.

A case study was conducted with a small firm focused on the development of DIPs; data were obtained through semi-structured interviews, direct observation and document analysis.

The firm uses an informal and cross-functional NPD process (idea generation, idea validation, product creation and product launch) in converting an idea into a sellable product. Peculiar aspects of each stage within the process as well as ten CSFs to NPD projects were verified.

Limitations are attributed to its qualitative nature, which does not allow generalizations, though careful attention was given to validity and reliability issues through the use of data source triangulation.

The paper provides a conceptual process that may benefit further initiatives for developing and launching DIPs, as well as a comprehensive list of CSFs for such projects.

This paper is the first one to schematize the NPD process and practices for DIPs, as well as key capabilities. It contributes to the NPD literature in discussing dynamic aspects that are typical to the firm analyzed and to others operating in a digital context. At the same time, it reinforces other traditional aspects that have become overlooked in digital business debates.

Reports the efforts of six British small and medium enterprises (SMEs) to enhance their new product development (NPD) capabilities. Finds a strong recognition by managers of “the need for NPD” yet they consistently deprioritised work on NPD when faced with other shorter‐term pressures. The involvement of manufacturing managers was limited in their firms’ NPD activities. What involvement there was occurred late in the process. Identifies a major problem in terms of the lack of information available, with only a few of the firms recording the activities undertaken in the NPD process. This has a number of serious consequences; it was difficult to compare their performance with other firms and they did not have the information needed to improve systematically their systems and procedures. In those firms that did maintain records, their record keeping was limited. Much of what was recorded had little value, as it was not used systematically to improve performance. This shortage of suitable information also hindered the ability of management to learn and thus improve future generations of new products.

The purpose of this paper is to report on a study aimed at identifying factors that affect the innovativeness of growing small and medium‐sized firms (SMEs). It aims to use intellectual property rights (IPRs) as a proxy for innovations. The IPRs to be used include patents, trademarks, utility models and registered designs.

A theoretical model was developed and tested on longitudinal sample data representing 348 continuously growing SMEs located in two diverse regions in Finland. The firms in the sample represented various industries. Logistic regression analysis was used to analyse the data.

About 8 per cent of the firms in the sample could be defined as innovative growth SMEs. Most of these firms operate in the service and manufacturing sectors. They are small businesses that employ ten to 49 people and are between five and 19 years old. Innovative firms in this class were found to be less likely successful in the short‐term than their non‐innovative counterparts. The results obtained seem to be consistent with the expected preconception that growing IPR‐intensive firms may be subject to greater financial pressures than those that do not produce IPRs. Public research and development (R&D) funding seems to increase the likelihood of innovation.

From a policy perspective, the allocation of resources to R&D has been an appropriate strategy for increasing the amount of IPRs generated by growing SMEs.

This paper reports one of a very small number of studies that have sought to identify and analyse factors that affect innovation in growing SMEs.

The purpose of this study is to examine the new product management practices adopted by low‐tech small and medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs) in the context of design‐intensive products.

The results are based on a multi‐case comparative setting covering SMEs in furniture industry in three countries, Italy, Spain and Finland.

The study shows considerable differences in performance that occur in terms of the degree of design and innovation, goal orientation and the systematics by which a single furniture business is managed. Proactiveness and freedom in design and innovation together with systematic new product development (NPD) and goal orientation enhances NPD performance. As to the new product uniqueness, innovative design is applicable in furniture industry much as in a similar way as new technological knowledge is in technology industries. The management education and/or interests which are closely related to furniture design and decoration have a clear impact on the level up to which innovative designs are implemented.

The study has direct implications for furniture companies aiming at improving their competitiveness and NPD effectiveness. The study points out the importance of creating a proper innovative culture and being open to new ideas if export markets are targeted.

Technology intensive products in large‐ and medium‐sized companies have been the main focus of NPD performance research, also facing the risk of over‐generalization due to cross‐industry approaches. Low‐tech industries however play a major role as to national income and employment. In this respect the present study aims to highlight the prevailing NPD practices in small design‐intensive firms in the furniture industry by reporting any management gaps which may occur in terms of new product performance.

The paper aims to address the issue of generalizability by examining process formality across the global regions of North America, Europe and Asia. A common prescription in the new product development (NPD) discipline is to employ a formal process. Because generalizability of this prescription has not been fully investigated across global regions, the present manuscript addresses the issue of generalizability by examining process formality across the global regions of North America, Europe and Asia.

Recently made available to researchers, data of the Product Development and Management Association’s 2012 Comparative Performance Assessment Study (CPAS) were analyzed. The uniqueness of the 2012 CPAS data set is its global composition with sizable samples from North America, Europe and Asia. Chi-square tests and multivariate analysis of variance were applied.

Results support use of a formal process, as companies with a formal NPD process perceived higher performance than companies with no standard process. Process formality appears to differ across regions and be influenced by innovation strategy. European firms tended to not use a formal process when pursuing radical innovation, and these firms perceived higher performance. North American firms tended to not use a formal process when pursing incremental innovation, but these firms perceived lower performance.

Having some NPD process is generally better than not having any process at all. Process differences across regions appear to exist when pursuing radical innovation or incremental innovation.

This is one of few studies comparing global regions to examine generalizability of a best practice prescription, namely, the extent to which a formal process should be implemented.

This study analyses new product development (NPD) processes of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The purpose of this paper is to find successful innovation processes of SMEs on the one hand, and to reveal starting points to further improve these processes on the other.

Data were gathered from 49 semi-structured, face-to-face interviews with German firms. From the total of 49 cases, the authors identified three manufacturing SMEs with high-performing innovation processes, whose NPD processes the authors took as best practice examples. The authors then used the design structure matrix to map these three NPD processes, and optimised the sequence by applying an optimisation algorithm.

The authors determined which activities could be done sequentially, in parallel, or overlapping. The authors also scrutinised the position of dynamic milestones and demonstrated that the best-performing SMEs had flexible NPD processes, which allowed for an accelerated innovation process.

Due to the qualitative design of the investigation, the research presented was not specifically designed to draw statistical generalisations. For this reason, the results may not be applicable to all SMEs.

The authors recommend that SMEs uncouple activities as much as possible. In this regard, the findings revealed that that especially technical and economic activities may be conducted in parallel due to their low dependence.

The paper offers an SME-specific NPD process to optimise the innovation performance. Moreover, the findings deliver new knowledge on how the best-performing SMEs innovate.