the science of discovery

happen to finish reading a book titled 'The Innovators' Dilemma'.
The book is a good read, is replete and descriptive of examples and life cycle curves of the computer hard drive industry - laying emphasis to the fact that the innovations that are the norm or part of the computer industry today, came from smaller firms.
It goes on to explain what favoured the smaller firms compared to the bigger established players at that time.

The book also clearly points out that the established firms were not ignorant or unaware about the technologies that the smaller firms were promoting.

Not that these technologies were not apparent to the bigger firms but the bigger firms having ploughed investments in their scope of business failed to push the novel technologies in their own company to the fore letting other competing smaller firms to push these novel solutions.
The bigger firms were not betting on these nouvelle solution.
Their market research was telling them that such a market for the nouvelle does not exist.

So what actually favoured the rise of these novel technologies and small firms to make it big in the market place.

The smaller firms had a serious lack of distribution networks, clients and a marketing plan, probably even few believers in their product, but the factor that did help some smaller firms to succeed was the event of a black swan.

Such events lie outside the realm of normal expectations and they end up having an extreme impact on the environment.

Today after the occurrence of the event or the sure place that such firms have in the market place, making it all explainable and predictable, these events happened by an element of chance and also the fact that they were in the right place at the right time with some thing right.

But since none of us knew any of these right things before the event these events are pure chance or black swans.

The strategy for the entrepreneur or the innovator is to rely less on top down planing and focus on maximum tinkering with opportunities as they present themselves.