The process of innovation: A study of the origination and development of ideas for new scientific instruments

The process of technical innovation is treated as occurring in three phases: 1) idea generation; 2) problem solving; and 3) implementation and diffusion. Two questions are addressed in a study of the origin and development of 32 new scientific instruments: first, what information led to the origination of ideas for these new products, and second, how was information acquired and used in developing these ideas? Idea generation was assumed to require a synthesis of several pieces of information. Innovators relied on oral communications outside their firm in generating ideas. Conversely, they tended to rely on sources inside their firm and to use first local sources of information (literature and experience), then secondary sources (discussion) and finally primary sources (analysis and experiment) in problem solving.