Risk-Taker Consumers Fueling Tech Innovation
American consumers are inordinately willing to take a gamble on new products and it's thanks to them that the U.S. regularly produces huge successes like Dropbox.
What’s the Latest Development?
Amar Bhidé, in his book, “The Venturesome Economy,” shows that American consumers, businesses and individuals alike, are inordinately willing to take a gamble on new products. And it’s thanks to them that the U.S. regularly produces companies like Dropbox.
What’s the Big Idea?
Amar Bhidé uses the term “venturesome consumers” for the particularly large number of people who are willing to do something like hand over their precious data to a brand-new startup. The New Yorker says that venturesome consumers also provide companies with feedback that helps improve products and even “repurpose” them. In the process, the value of the innovations themselves increases. “In that sense, our culture of innovation depends on consumers as much as on entrepreneurs.”
