Frugal Innovations - An Inquiry into Causes, Effects and Pathways of Affordable Excellence

This book draws on many years of research by the author involving collaborative work with various scholars and research institutions. It enables a different perspective on frugal innovations, as it draws on streams as varied as business management, sociology, psychology, philosophy, culture and engineering. This is missing in publications on frugal innovations so far. It is based on a mixed, multi-methods research approach (literature review, bibliometrics, expert interview, focus groups, case studies and conceptual work) in a multi-national context, providing rich insights.

List of contents

1. Introduction


2. Concept of Frugal Innovation: Literature review




1. Scholarly discourse on frugal innovation



2. Bibliometric analysis of published literature




3. Frugality Discourse in Related Scientific Fields




1. Historical and philosophical context of frugality



2. Frugality in political economy



3. Connecting culture with frugality



4. Frugality discourse in other disciplines of social sciences



5. Engineering sciences and frugality




4. Redefining frugal innovation




1. Universal relevance of frugality in today's world



2. Empirical assessment of expert opinion & consumer perception



3. Mapping the frugality paradigm



4. From "good enough" to "affordable green excellence"




1. Role of digital transformation



2. Principles of circular economy



3. Avoiding rebound effects



4. Measure against planned obsolescence




5. India: Learning from a lead market




1. Brief profile of country and its research & innovation system



2. Connecting India to frugal innovations



3. India's lead market potential for frugal solutions




6. Frugal innovations and industrialized economies




1. Factors driving the need (e.g., financial factors, environmental consciousness, changing value systems -> voluntary simplicity)



2. Examples of known frugal solutions (from countries such as Germany, Japan, Austria, USA)




7. Relevance for a large, industrialized economy: Example of Germany
   (with brief profiles of the country and its research & innovation system; results of an empirical survey)



8. Relevance for a small, industrialized economy: Example of Austria
   (with brief profiles of the country and its research & innovation system; results of an empirical survey)



9. Modes & routines of frugal product development: lessons from a patent data analysis



10. Comparative study of innovation pathways in Indian and German auto-components industries



11. Discussion of results




1. Identification of suitable (context-specific) innovation pathways



2. Relevant implications for research and innovation systems (for policy makers, managers and scholars of business management)




12. Conclusion

About the author

Dr. Rajnish Tiwari is a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Technology and Innovation Management of Hamburg University of Technology in Germany. He leads the research program Global Innovation and has co-founded the Center for Frugal Innovation. Rajnish has advised Germany's Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) concerning "new global innovation pathways" and has led projects to investigate potentials of "affordable excellence" in industrialized economies in sectors such as food industry, automotive and renewable energies. He is an alumnus of the Japan Society for Promotion of Science and has been a visiting fellow at several universities in Australia, India, Japan and the USA. He has co-authored/edited seven books and published numerous articles and book chapters.

Product details

• Authors: Rajnish Tiwari
• Publisher: De Gruyter
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Release: 01.03.2021, delayed
• EAN: 9783110711103
• ISBN: 978-3-11-071110-3
• No. of pages: 350
• Illustrations: 40 b/w ill., 40 b/w tbl.
• Series: De Gruyter Studies in Innovation and Entrepreneurship; ISSN
• Subject: Social sciences, law, business > Business > Management