The Explainer: Launching New Products for Emerging Markets

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0:45Gemini and Chrome is here for it. Ready to make anything online make sense? There's no place like Chrome. Check responses set up required, compatibility and availability varies 18+. There's really no way to take a product created for, say, the American mass market, make a few changes, and make it work for the Indian mass market. But that hasn't stopped multinationals from trying. That's the model global companies have followed for decades. To appeal to customers in emerging markets, they water down products designed for developed markets. However, a better way is for global companies to develop brand new, cost-effective products inside the countries where they'll actually be used.

1:26For example, General Electric developed several medical devices in emerging markets that were a little simpler and a lot less expensive. In China, they developed a compact, portable ultrasound machine from scratch. It cost just$15 ,000, compared with over$100 ,000 for their high-end model. Although it didn't have all the bells and whistles, it was a hit in China's rural clinics. That's when GE realized that American doctors could use it too, not to compete with the more expensive product, but for new uses, in situations where portability was important or space was tight. This is what Vijay Govindarajan and Chris Trimble call reverse innovation.

2:05Not only does it result in products that address market needs in emerging economies, it also creates new sales opportunities in developed ones. Reverse innovation can be tough to pull off, but there are two reasons to try. First, because emerging markets have larger populations and lower per capita GDPs, they're especially sensitive to many of the forces affecting competition in global markets today. products built for emerging markets are more likely to be well suited to issues that ultimately affect every market second as emerging market companies grow they'll be looking to export their own products often at much lower prices which incumbent firms will find tough to beat practicing reverse innovation today will help protect incumbent firms from being disrupted by low-cost competitors tomorrow

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