2007. The presentation reads like an eerily accurate crystal-ball prediction of what actually happened in subsequent years. Evidently, Nokia executives knew well in advance what the iPhone could do to their company. Evidently, they knew they needed to do "something" to avoid an implosion of their mobile-phone business. Evidently, despite their prescience and best efforts, they were unable to avoid disaster. It's as i…
This is spot-on, and it's a remarkably common pattern when dominant players are faced with a seismic shift—even when it comes from within. Kodak essentially invented the modern digital camera, and had a phenomenal lead going into the 90s. It was not a little side project—they hired IDEO to do vision work, design enclosures and create on-camera UIs. They poured money in, and did ship products. I'd love to know what ha…
Xerox was kicking their ass, they were completely owning the copier market. But it was a natural fit for Kodak, they knew imaging better than everybody, why couldn’t they get into this market? This guy was on a crack team of engineers a VP assembled to create a competing product. 9 months later, they demo a fully digital copy machine, working, ready to go, with competitive pricing and features.
But the higher ups at Kodak were incensed. They told the product needs a redesign, because Kodak was a film company, so the product needed to use film for copying. The revised product was a complete failure, and was the reason said engineer left Kodak shortly thereafter.
My take is devotion to brand identity is death during these critical inflection points. YMMV