Disruptive Innovation: Challenges and Strategic Stakes for Businesses
What is disruptive innovation?
A disruptive innovation is a significant breakthrough that fundamentally transforms a product or service and reshapes an existing market by creating new value. It refers to the development of a product or service capable of opening up a new market and generating previously non-existent demand.
When can we call an innovation “Disruptive”?
An idea is considered disruptive when it’s unexpected, when no one saw it coming, and when it has the potential to change the game and open up new territories. If, once implemented, it reshapes the functioning of an entire industry and the practices related to it, then it qualifies as disruptive innovation.
In other words, if it allows existing customers to access a product or service offering that the company had never proposed before, its disruptive character is clearly established. Disruptive innovation leads to the creation of new categories of products or services and brings new value to both the company and its clients.
This opening into new and extended markets often requires a rethinking or even dismantling of the previously established business model.
The benefits of disruptive innovation
Disruptive innovation brings major advantages to companies that can embrace it:
- Creation of new markets: It opens up previously untapped segments, often in response to unmet or latent needs.
- Technological or strategic leadership: Companies that lead with disruption often gain a competitive edge that’s difficult to close.
- Brand image enhancement: It reinforces the brand’s perception as bold and forward-thinking.
- Attraction of talent and partners: Innovative projects attract creative profiles, investors, and strategic partners.
- High profitability potential: By creating new value, disruptive innovation allows companies to define their own rules and margins.
Strategies to implement disruptive innovation
Putting a disruptive innovation strategy into motion requires a distinct approach, often developed alongside the company’s core business:
- Create dedicated structures: Innovation labs, corporate incubators or accelerators, spin-offs, or autonomous units that can experiment without short-term performance pressure.
- Promote a test & learn culture: Embracing failure as a learning step is essential to explore radical ideas.
- Invest in scouting and foresight: Identify weak signals, emerging technologies, and high-potential startups early.
- Bring in hybrid profiles: Intrapreneurs, transversal experts, designers… These talents offer fresh perspectives.
- Collaborate with the external ecosystem: Universities, startups, and industrial partners can become powerful catalysts.
- Protect and leverage ideas: Through intellectual property, patents, or rapid go-to-market strategies.
Disruptive Innovation as a Driver of Creative Destruction
Disruptive innovation opens new avenues for growth. It often requires new organizational structures and ways of working. The necessary technologies and expertise lead to the integration of new roles within the company. Sometimes, the entire business model is redefined due to a disruptive innovation.
This process inevitably disrupts the existing market, replacing it with a new model offering greater potential and adaptability. Disruptive innovation leads companies to regularly question the relevance of their business model.
The combination of destruction and creation inherent in disruptive innovation highlights the power of change dynamics necessary in modern enterprises.
By destabilizing established equilibria to generate strategic gains, disruption actively contributes to a form of Darwinian selection within organizations.
Should Companies Fear Disruptive Innovation?
The question isn’t whether to fear disruption—but rather, what are the risks of ignoring it?
Companies are designed to maximize stability and performance within their market. As long as growth continues and no major threat looms, the default posture is to preserve the status quo. In such times, disruptive innovation might seem like an unnecessary risk.
And yet, it’s precisely when everything appears stable that disruption should be explored—not to shake things up for the sake of it, but to be ready when change becomes unavoidable.
That’s why more and more companies are launching intrapreneurship programs or open innovation initiatives—not to deploy disruptive models immediately, but to build the capability to do so when the time is right. Just like athletes training for a future event, companies must prepare for possible scenarios.
When things get tough—or when new competitors begin eating into market share—disruptive innovation can become the escape hatch back to sustainable growth. The challenge is to have trained before the storm.
What Not to Repeat: The Case of BlackBerry and Nokia
Once a pioneer in mobile communications, BlackBerry reigned supreme for years. Much like Kodak, it failed to see the shift toward touchscreen smartphones. Despite a loyal professional user base, the company clung to its legacy model.
In 2016, BlackBerry stopped making phones and pivoted to software and cybersecurity. Nokia followed a similar path: once a dominant force, it was overtaken by Apple in 2007. By 2013, Nokia sold its mobile division to Microsoft—who would abandon it by 2016. Today, Nokia focuses on network infrastructure and health technologies.
Though both companies still exist, they went from industry giants to cautionary tales—powerful reminders of what happens when disruption is ignored.
Concrete examples of disruptive innovation
Uber – The Ride That Redefined an Industry
Launched in 2009, Uber didn’t just shake up the taxi industry—it redefined how we think about urban mobility. By combining real-time GPS, integrated payment, driver-passenger ratings, and on-demand access, Uber transformed a rigid service into a seamless, user-centric platform.
But the real rupture came from the economic model: Uber owns neither vehicles nor drivers, instead orchestrating a distributed network of micro-services through its tech infrastructure. Thus emerged the idea of “Uberization”, replicated across sectors, for better or worse.
Netflix – From Rentals to Streaming Revolution
Originally a DVD rental-by-mail service, Netflix anticipated the rise of digital consumption early. In the 2000s, it pivoted aggressively to streaming. But more than a technical shift, this was a complete rethinking of business models and user habits, leading even to content production.
Today, Netflix is a poster child of well-executed disruption, demonstrating strategic vision, timing, and boldness.
Zipline – Medical Logistics by Drone in Africa
This U.S.-based company developed an autonomous drone system for delivering blood, vaccines, and medicines. Deployed in Rwanda and Ghana, Zipline dramatically improved access to care in remote areas, cutting delivery times from hours to minutes.
Once seen as a bold experiment, Zipline’s model is now inspiring similar efforts worldwide, including in U.S. states. Beyond its technical feat, Zipline embodies social disruption—using existing technologies in radically new ways to meet vital needs.
Accor – When Hotels Become Modular Urban Hubs
Hotels have traditionally been places to sleep. But as remote work, urban flexibility, and the “service economy” gained traction, Accor reimagined its properties.
The goal? Monetize space differently—through more frequent, hybrid, and profitable uses. Think co-working areas, meeting rooms, wellness offers, and hospitality-as-a-service.
But this wasn’t just opportunism. It was a direct response to the Airbnb shockwave, which disrupted the industry with new standards in flexibility, personalization, and user experience. Accor had to evolve, shifting from being a lodging provider to an urban lifestyle player.
This case proves that disruption isn’t always technological. It can stem from reinvented usage and adaptive strategy, sparked by external threats that turn into opportunities for reinvention.
CEO & Co-Founder Yumana
