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Crossing the Chasm by Geoffrey
MooreTechnology Adoption Life Cycle
Early Adoption
Early Majority
Late Majority
Innovators
Laggards
Psych Profile
Tech has central interest in their life
Tech has central interest in their life
Practical wait see
Waiting for the established standard
The cracked model is more accurate.
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Innovators
Early Adopters
Late Majority
Laggards
Early Majority
When a hot new technology product cannot be
readily translated into a major new benefit
Home Banking.
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In the High Tech Industries the Innovators are
the technology enthusiasts (e.g., VCE,
Camcorders). Early Adopters (or visionaries)
provide insight to match an emerging
technologies to a strategic opportunity. (E.g.
Henry Ford assembly line they did not look for
improvement. Rather they looked for a
breakthrough. The Early Adopters communicate the
deliverable to the next group (Price
sensitively, ease of use.) Laggard are the
skeptics. Entering the mainstream or how to
start a fire is the challenge. The strategy is
not to become a sales driver, (vs. a niche
strategy) because we need to capture the
Reference Base. The key select a strategic
segment with entry points to a bigger segment.
Apples segment (originally school children).

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It reflects dissociation between the 2 groups
(Innovators Early Adopters). There exists an
opportunity to lose momentum and to miss
transition to the next stage. e.g., PC based
home banking (In the transition from Innovators
to Early Adopted). The second crack (between
Early Adopters and Early Majority) is even more
important. The transition requires a need for a
strategic leap. E.g. LANs launch has been
attempted several times in the early eighties
until the development of Novel software running
on IBM PC hardware with interface cards that
fitted into existing IBM PC slots.
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Successful Crossings
(Desktop Publishing)
Apple
Application
Niche Approach
Tanden
(Automatic Teller Machine)