How can a company verify if there is a market for a product when we’re still in the applied research stage? What is the success rate for new industrial products? Is it higher than for consumer products?

You have identified one of the biggest problems with product development in today's climate. Time-to-market cycles are becoming increasingly contracted and difficult to predict.

In today's volatile and fast-paced business environment, every company knows that its ability to create and launch new products is the key to sustainable growth. The combined effects of technology advancements, deregulation, more sophisticated and demanding customers, and competition from non-traditional sources are all increasing the pressure to innovate, and innovate quickly. But at the same time, the results of that innovation are less easy to forecast.

Perhaps that is why the U.S. Patent Office reports that a pathetic 3% of patents filed result in successful new products.

The secret to successful product development is to continue studying the market and maintain a development process flexible enough to shift direction if the market tells you that’s what potential customers desire.

• A market orientation helps ensure that products will have a market waiting for them when they are ready for commercialization
• A clear but flexible definition of the proposed new product is critical to successful new product development (NPD)
• Companies must do their homework in the form of initial screenings of product ideas, preliminary market assessments, detailed market research, test marketing or test selling, and pre-commercialization business analyses
• Involvement of customers throughout the NPD process minimizes the risk of developing the wrong product, develops lead customers and speeds market penetration

This new style of project management combines traditional product development with marketing. If you are worried that the market for your product will change over the two to three years it takes to develop that product, you should continually monitor potential customers' needs and desires and be prepared to change your product if necessary.

This monitoring can be done through regular focus groups or other forms of market intelligence gathering. Whatever method you choose, constantly listen to your market so that you can detect shifts in thinking before the product launch, and not after.