How New Technology Changes Business Models

18 hours ago

The key question to assess technology impact is: what fundamental constraint does it remove?
The framework classifies technology impact into five categories: No Material Impact, Existing Model Leverage, Economic Enablement, Technological Enablement, and Model Destruction.
No Material Impact: The technology removes no constraint that materially affects the business model; it only improves peripheral activities.
Existing Model Leverage: The technology removes a constraint that limits an already viable model, amplifying its scale, margins, or differentiation.
Economic Enablement: The technology removes a cost constraint, making a previously technically possible but economically unviable model scalable.
Technological Enablement: The technology removes a capability constraint, enabling a fundamentally new business model that was previously infeasible.
Model Destruction: The technology removes a constraint that an existing model depends on, undermining its viability and forcing adaptation.
The classification depends on the unit of analysis and can change over time as the technology matures.
The framework is designed to clarify strategic significance, not to predict winners.

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