Technology Forecasting for Strategic Decision Making

LECTURE - 1

Step 0: Set up the business context

Step 1: Frame the questions for answering via the Tech Forecasting (TF) exercise
Step 2: Answer those TF questions using:
- Qualitative (2a) Methods
- Quantitative (2b) Methods
Finally, make the business decision.

What is Strategy?
Strategy is a management plan for strengthening the performance and competitive advantages
in the context of technological forecasting for strategic decision-making, we are interested in
reinforcing our plans in such a way that when we perform what was planned, you will benefit
companies, you will increase competitive advantages of technology.

What is a Decision?
A decision is a choice between two or more options. To make this choice, we must forecast.
We need to reduce uncertainties and transform uncertainties into risks.

What is the area of strategic decision?

The strategic decision is the area when we plan for the changes and when we plan for the
reason, when we define the objectives of design or when we define the objective of the
process. When we try to justify economically our decision, those are the strategic areas.

What is the area of operational decision?

The operational decision is the area of knowing how to use resources in the production
process.

What is the area of tactical decision?

When tactical decisions, the area of decision, is more management of resources, how we are
going to arrange resources, what are the functional specifications and what kind of
automation we are going to use in this process or another process? How we are going to
arrange human resources? How are we going to organize the process? The different kinds of
regulations are the areas of tactical decisions.
 LECTURE – 2

Some Famous Quotes That Went Wrong

 “The horse is here to stay but the automobile is only a novelty - a fad”
 By a President of the Michigan Savings banks
 he advised Henry Ford's lawyer, he said do not invest in Ford Motor
Company
 “Next Christmas the iPod will be dead, finished, gone kaput”
 By Alan Sugar in 2005
 “It will be years - not in my time - before a woman will become Prime Minister”
 By Margaret Thatcher
 “There is not the slightest indication that nuclear energy will ever be obtainable. It
would mean that the atom would have to be shattered at will.”
 By Albert Einstein in 1933
 “The telephone has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means
of communication.”
 By William Orton in 1876

LECTURE – 3

Why do we need a Technology Forecast?

The Technology Management function in an organization should be to argue when to invest

in technology development and when to withdraw, and those main functions stay on the core
of the demand about forecasting.

Invention VS Innovation
The invention is usually measured in the improvement of performance.
When innovation usually is something that we run production, we sell on the market and we
have a return in terms of financial resources.
Whenever we are talking about innovation, we are talking about production and profitability,
when we are talking about invention we are talking about feasibility and performance.
 QUESTIONS

Q. What is the main purpose of forecasting the future of technologies?

 to decrease risks and to manage a company technological fundamentals for creating
competitive advantages
 to learn about future of technologies in particular business context to support decision
making
 to be able to decide when to invest on technology development and when to withdraw

Q. What is strategy? (working definition for this course)

 is management's plan for strengthening the performance and competitive advantages
of a company

Q. What can be one of the causes of why an invention doesn’t become an innovation?
[Check all that apply]
 Not many people may find the invention useful and hence adoption may be poor
 Changes in user behaviour, system changes and perhaps, government regulations may
not be there.

Q. To what depends on the ability to forecast technological future? [Check all that apply]
 to ability of integrating knowledge from technological, economics, environmental and
social contexts
 to ability of managing hindsight biases of forecasters

Q. What is the right order of steps for the technology forecasting process?
 (0) set up the business context; (1) frame the question for TF; (2) answer the
questions; (3) make a business decision

Q. The main objectives of the course TF for SDM – an Introduction are:

 to learn how to use time-series data with logistic S-curve model for supporting
strategic decisions
 to understand some modern methods for technology forecasting
 to learn how to explore the future of a system to forecast

Q. Main usability of Strategic Technology Forecasting is to realize:

 What is the value of certain technology for the organization?
 When to invest in technology development and when to withdraw?
Q. Strategic Decision making is dealing with the following question(s):
 Are we going to enter a new market with our product?

Q. The main areas of operational decisions are:

 use of resources in fabrication process; restock inventory

Q. Why do a lot of long-range technology forecasts miss the mark?

 deep knowledge and involvement in the domain that is going to change

Q. Innovation is…
 an event when newly designed product/service or newly developed technique/method
is being put into regular production
 when an organized market for new product/service is first created

Q. What is the main function of patent documents?

 to protect intellectual property of described idea
 to protect commercial interest of an inventor/company for a limited period

Q. Please, select right statement(s):

 Effectiveness is about doing what is successful and useful.
 Efficiency is about doing more with less

Q. Please select the definition of a technology, suggested in this course:

 Technology is a synergy of hardware (machine and resources), knowledge to use the
hardware properly, and regulations for using hardware and knowledge.

Q. Please put into right order stages of forecasting:

Select methods; Obtain information(A); Evaluate results(B); Formulate problem(C);
Implement methods(D); Use forecast (for decision making)(E); Select Methods (F)
 C 🡪A🡪F 🡪D 🡪B 🡪E

Q. Why is the professor standing in front of the refrigerator?

 To talk about a case study in vacuum forming for an appliance, refrigerator

Q. Is a pile of bricks in a construction site a system or a set?

 Set
Q. Railway transportation evolved like this:
 Solid fuel to liquid fuel to electricity based

Q. When representing a technology life cycle on a time plot, we should always use the
same scale for all technologies.
 False

Q. What does FORMAT stand for?

 FORecasting and Roadmapping of MAnufacturing Technologies

Q. What is a working definition for System, as suggested in our course?

 is a collection of interconnected elements arranged in a particular order to perform
some collective function

Q. Is a group of cars waiting at a traffic light a system or a set?

 Set

Q. What is a working definition for a Function, as suggested in our course?

 it is a process that transform energy of resources from one state to another to satisfy
needs

Q. What was the decision that had to be made in the vacuum forming case study?
 Should we renew the annual maintenance contract or not?

Q. What is the function of a bicycle?

 <to transport> <rider and goods>

Q. What was the evolution of energy sources for Railway transportation?

 from animals, to solid, to liquid, (to gas) to electricity

Q. When forecasting we should undoubtedly identify on which stage of the life cycle the
system to forecast is today for knowing what to do next.
 True

Q. Strategic forecast has to cover the following time horizon:

 at least one cycle in accordance with “clockspeed” of system to forecast
Q. Choose right statement(s):
 Lifecycle of a technology can be described quantitatively with Bell-shaped curve and
with logistic S-curve
 To know the level of accomplishment of a certain technology on the market in
advance, the time series data can be applied.

Put industries from the right list into the right category
Q. fast-paced industry
 cosmetics; semi-conductors; sport shoes

Q. medium-paced industry
 cars; fast food; pharmaceutical

Q. slow-paced industry
 electricity production; paper; shipbuilding

Q. What is the role of technology management? [Check all that apply]

 to understand the value of technology
 to make decisions on the financial aspects of technologies

Q. What is a super-system?
 is the system where the selected System is a component (super-system cannot operate
without System)

Q. What are some areas of study which can complement technology forecasting?
 technology monitoring
 technology intelligence

Q. What are some of the reasons companies don’t perform technology forecasting?
 Decisions are working favorably even without forecasting
 When there is not much time available

Q. What does ENV stand for?

 Element-Name_of_feature-Value_of_feature

Q. Within the course we discussed the role of technology management in relation with
technology forecasting. What is the role(s) of technology management?
  to understand the value of certain technology for the organization in dynamics
 to support decision making about when to invest on a certain technology and when to
withdraw

Q. Why is it difficult to forecast distant technological future?

 cognitive limitation of researchers, professional biases
 lack of data and information, limited budget of time and money

Q. What are the main applications of technology forecast?

 strategic planning
 consensus building
 strategic decision making

Q. What are the limiting factors of Strategic decision-making?

 unclear objectives; erroneous assumption of values; preferences and beliefs of
decision makers

Q. When trying to understand why company often do not perform regular and rigorous
forecasting studies, we observed from practice two main reasons:
 business is going well without forecasting and thorough planning
 company is already in the “urgency mode” when quick action is required

Q. The time duration between invention and innovation of product/service depends on:
 readiness of technology infrastructure and legislation institutions
 availability of knowledge (designing, manufacturing, delivering to customers,
maintenance)
 customer demands for new values and efficiency

Q. When discussing the basic economic problem (how to satisfy unlimited human
demands with limited resources), economics is concerned with three questions. Which
one is more answerable with technologies?
 How to produce?

Q. Can our definition of a function for a system change over time?

 Yes, of course, as our understanding of the function changes, the definition also
change
Q. Typically, how many examples of products/services have to be analyzed before we
can identify the function of a system?
 There is no such magic number of examples

Q. One of the empirical laws of technology evolution from the TRIZ body of knowledge is
called “Law of increasing dynamization”. This is the law that the professor talks about in the
lecture titled “System function - What's function 1 Energy for cooking”. What does the
empirical law imply [check all that apply] ?
 Fuel sources: Firewood 🡪 Charcoal 🡪 Petrol/Diesel
 State of Matter: Solid 🡪 Liquid 🡪 Gas

Q. What is Fisher-Pry transform?

 Graphically transform a curve into a linear plot

Q. What is the correct sequence of steps that we carry out in quantitative forecasting?
 Define-Model-Measure-Analyze

Q. Quantitative forecasting can be applied in the decision making [True or False]

 True

Q. What is one of the main forms of data that is used in quantitative forecasting?
 Time-series

Q. What are some examples of the types of technology roadmaps?

 Product planning
 Strategic planning