Exploring Frugal Innovation
A systematic literature review
__________________________________________________________________________
A dissertation submitted by
Henrik Huenting
(S2669250/130590626)
in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degrees of
M.A. in Advanced International Business Management
and
M.Sc. in International Business and Management
awardedby
Newcastle University
University of Groningen
Newcastle University Business School
Faculty of Economics and Business
Supervisor: Prof. Daniel Muzio
Supervisor: Drs. Ad Visscher
II Abstract
Frugal Innovation is a relatively new innovation approach for emerging markets that has recently gained considerable attention from both academics and practitioners. However, research on frugal innovation is still in its infancy and systematic analysis is required to shed more light on this emerging innovation phenomenon. Therefore, this dissertation attempts to determine the current state of research on frugal innovation by deploying a systematic literature review to consolidate the knowledge on frugal innovation. Moreover, this dissertation aims to provide valuable insights for practitioners and suggests avenues for future research for academic scholars.
The systematic analysis has been based on the 52 documents from the review sample and is comprised of a descriptive and thematic analysis. First, the descriptive analysis investigates the authors, journals, yearly development of publications, research fields and a country analysis of authors. The findings reveal interesting facts such as an exponential growth rate of publications on frugal innovation in recent years which indicates the rising attention by academic and non-academic scholars. Second, the thematic analysis determines the current state of research on frugal innovation by systematically consolidating, differentiating and integrating the definitions, theories, methodologies, conceptual models and managerial implications presented in the review sample. For example, seven core dimensions of frugal innovation have been identified as well as the three dominant theories explaining frugal innovation. All in all, this dissertation is the first systematic literature review to determine the current state of research on frugal innovation. This research will be a contribution to the academic literature on frugal innovation, innovation management and strategic management.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank my two dissertation supervisors Professor Daniel Muzio and Drs Ad Visscher for their valuable support, insights and feedback throughout the process of this dissertation. Moreover, I would like to thank my two personal tutors, Dr Tracy Scurry and Dr Stefanie Reissner, for their support and guidance throughout the year. Finally, I would like to thank my family and friends for their encouragement, unconditional support and patience during my academic career.
Declaration
I hereby declare that this dissertation entitled, “Exploring Frugal Innovation”, is my own work and that all the sources I have used or quoted have been indicated or acknowledged by means of completed references.
____________________________ _________________________
III
Index
List of tables... IV
List of figures ... IV
List of abbreviations ... V
1 Introduction ... 1
2 Theoretical background ... 3
2.1 Innovation management and the role of emerging economies ... 3
2.2 Frugal Innovation ... 4
2.3 Related innovation concepts ... 5
2.3.1 Jugaad ... 5
2.3.2 Gandhian Innovation ... 5
2.3.3 Reverse Innovation ... 6
2.3.4 Other types of emerging market innovation ... 7
3 Review methodology ... 8
3.1 Overview of systematic literature review (SLR) ... 8
3.2 Application of SLR-Model for management research ... 8
3.2.1 Planning the review ... 9
3.2.1.1 Identification of the need for a review ... 9
3.2.1.2 Identification of existing reviews ... 9
3.2.1.3 Scoping study ... 9
3.2.1.4 Development of the review protocol ... 10
3.2.1.4.1 Research questions ... 10
3.2.1.4.2 Search strategy and information sources ... 10
3.2.1.4.3 Study selection criteria and procedure ... 11
3.2.1.4.4 Study quality assessment ... 12
3.2.1.4.5 Data extraction strategy ... 13
3.2.1.4.6 Data synthesis ... 13
3.2.2 Conducting the review ... 13
3.2.3 Reporting and dissemination ... 14
4 Analysis and Results ... 15
4.1 Descriptive analysis ... 15
4.1.1 Data origin ... 15
4.1.2 Authors and Institutions ... 16
4.1.3 Journals ... 17
4.1.4 Core years ... 17
4.1.5 Research fields ... 18
IV
4.2 Thematic analysis ... 20
4.2.1 Definitions and main dimensions ... 20
4.2.2 Theories ... 24
4.2.3 Methodologies ... 28
4.2.4 Conceptual models ... 30
4.2.5 Managerial implications for MNCs ... 33
5 Discussion... 35
6 Limitations and validity threats ... 39
7 Avenues for future research ... 40
8 Conclusion ... 42
Bibliography ... VI
Appendix ... XIII
List of tables
Table 1 Search results of the pilot trial ... 10Table 2 Inclusion and Exclusion criteria of review ... 12
Table 3 Search results of the review ... 13
Table 4 Core authors and ranking ... 16
Table 5 Frugal innovation centres ... 17
Table 6 Sample definitions ... 21
Table 7 Overview of methodology / research methods used in this systematic review ... 29
List of figures
Figure 1 Conceptual model of dissertation ... 2Figure 2 Linking frugal innovation with closely related innovation concepts ... 6
Figure 3 Adapted SLR-Model for management research ... 8
Figure 4 Distribution of document origin ... 15
Figure 5 Yearly development of articles ... 18
Figure 6 Research fields ... 18
Figure 7 Country analysis ... 20
Figure 8 The seven dimensions of frugal innovation by definition ... 23
Figure 9 Overview of theories used to explain frugal innovation ... 25
V
List of abbreviations
AOM Academy of Management
BOP Bottom of Pyramid
CEO Chief Executive Officer
CFI Centre for Frugal Innovation
CSR Corporate Social Responsibility
EMF Emerging Market Firm
JFI Journal of Frugal Innovation
MNC Multinational Corporation
NULS Newcastle University Library Service
P&G Procter and Gamble
R&D Research and Development
RBV Resource-based View
1
1 Introduction
“I would prize every invention of science made for the benefit of all” - Mahatma Gandhi
Imagine a full-fledged car for £2000, a laptop for £100 or a portable ultrasound machine for less than half of the conventional price! Frugal innovations make this possible, and honour Mahatma Gandhi’s wish for a future in which innovation is targeted for the benefit of all. Keeping this in mind, this dissertation investigates various aspects of frugal innovation by systematically analysing the literature to determine the current state of research on frugal innovation. In order to explore this emerging innovation phenomenon, the first chapter of this dissertation will provide an introduction to the research subject by discussing the motivations, approach, research questions and objectives.
Research Motivation
Frugal innovation is a relatively new and emergent innovation approach that attracts both practitioner and academic interest. Simply speaking, frugal innovations are innovative products (Tiwari and Herstatt, 2012a) that have high-cost advantages compared to existing solutions (Zeschky et al., 2011) and respond to the specific needs of resource-constraint customers, predominantly in emerging markets. Multinational corporations (MNCs) are recognising the increasing demand and growth rates coming from emerging economies. ”The next wave of consumers” (Drummond, 2012, p.49) is domiciled in emerging markets and possess specific customer requirements shaped through their contextual environment. Hence, multinational companies are looking for ways to seek and capture the high potential and attractiveness of emerging markets. MNCs such as General Electric, Siemens or Unilever have recently adopted the frugal innovation and management approach and are pioneering and exploring the field. However, the research on frugal innovation in association with emerging markets is relatively nascent and more systematic analysis is needed to explain this new innovation phenomenon.
Approach
In order to see “where we are and where we are going”, it is very important to summarise all existing information about frugal information. A systematic literature review appears to be the appropriate choice of research method since it allows us to locate existing studies, select and evaluate contributions, analyse and synthesise data (Denyer and Tranfield, 2009) in order to identify any relevant aspects, suggest areas for future research and generally, to shed more light on an emerging innovation approach.
Research Questions
According to Counsell (1997, p.381), “a good systematic literature review is based on a
2 highlighted the importance of the review question, this dissertation will comprise of one main research question and two sub-questions that will help to provide a deeper understanding of the research topic. The research questions are as followed:
1.
What is the current state of research on frugal innovation?1.1 What are the current definitions, theories, conceptual models and methodologies used to explain frugal innovation?
1.2 What are the proposed managerial implications in the literature on frugal innovation?
These research questions have been thoroughly selected since the definitions, theories, conceptual models and methodologies are appropriate research units that can identify the current state of research on frugal innovation. Furthermore, managerial implications can be valuable for practitioners to understand how to covert theory into practice.
Objective
The overall objective of this research is to consolidate the knowledge on frugal innovation in an attempt to determine the current state of research and to identify patterns, similarities and differences across the literature. Moreover, consolidating the information may lead to the opportunity to link and integrate different aspects of authors with each other in order to create new insights on the research topic. The result of the review will be a contribution to the literature on strategic management and innovation management by first, providing guidance and useful insights for MNCs seeking to implement the frugal innovation approach and by second, offering directions for academics seeking to conduct further research on frugal innovation as a scientific discipline. Figure 1 below illustrates the conceptual model underlying this dissertation.
3
2 Theoretical background
The second chapter provides the theoretical background of frugal innovation and its related concepts and emphasises on the relationship of innovation and emerging markets.
2.1 Innovation management and the role of emerging economies
Innovation has been a highly discussed and researched topic in management literature over the past few years (Christensen, 2003; Govindarajan and Trimble, 2005; Chandy et al., 2006; von Krogh and Raisch, 2009). One of the reasons for this is that innovation is critical for both economic growth and competitive advantage for companies and nations (Christensen, 1997; Brem, 2011). Schumpeter (1934) was among the first researchers to emphasise the importance of innovation and new product development for economic growth. The Schumpeterian view of dynamic firm capabilities has, more than ever, a significant impact on the study of business and management (Trott, 2012). The reason why dynamic firm capabilities are important is because the global economic power is shifting from Western economies to Emerging economies. Western markets are saturated and growth rates are stagnating, while emerging economies, even during the latest economic crises, offer high growth rates and huge market sizes. In particular, the potential mass markets in the so-called “bottom of the pyramid” (Prahalad, 2005) have caught the interest of multinational companies around the world. In order to be successful in emerging markets, multinational companies need to rethink their business and innovation strategy to get a foothold in these markets.
4
2.2 Frugal Innovation
In recent years, frugal innovation has gained much attention from both practitioners and academics as a new management and innovation paradigm. At first, the term “frugal engineering” was coined by the CEO of Renault-Nissan, Carlos Ghosn, in 2006 to describe the ability of Indian engineers to innovate cost-effectively and quickly under severe resource constraints (Sehgal et al., 2010). A few years later, The Economist (2010) was the first publication to discuss “the charms of frugal innovation” in a special report on innovation in emerging markets. In simple terms, the adjective “frugal” is used in the business world to denote simpler and cheaper products that are developed outside of advanced economies. Due to the contextual environment, entrepreneurs and companies are forced to search for alternatives and come up with solutions that are different to Western products, since they have to fulfil different requirements. In addition, Roland Berger Strategy Consultants (2014) use frugal as an acronym to define and highlight the main performance characteristics such as being functional, robust, user-friendly, growing, affordable and local. Thus, from a product perspective, frugal innovations can be defined as “good-enough, affordable products that meet the needs of resource-constrained consumers (Zeschky et al., 2011).
Other authors such as Gupta and Wang (2009) go one step further and describe frugal innovations as the development of simple and ecological products, processes, services, and business models with a low input of resources, low cost, and little environmental intervention. This indicates that frugal innovation is not only about frugal product development, but also a whole new management philosophy or mindset (Radjou and Prabhou, 2013) that finds its application throughout the whole value chain (Tiwari and Herstatt, 2012a).
5
2.3 Related innovation concepts
In order to understand the “big picture” of innovation approaches for emerging markets, it will be necessary to briefly describe the concepts that are directly or indirectly related to frugal innovation. Brem and Wolfram (2014) argue that there is no common understanding of terms used to describe new innovation approaches for emerging markets. Hence, understanding and distinguishing these terms is a prerequisite for further research and building knowledge. Therefore, the following section will briefly explain the concepts that are closely linked to frugal innovation.
2.3.1 Jugaad
Jugaad has its origin in the Indian countryside and is a Hindi word that can be translated as an
“innovative and improvised solution that is born from ingenuity and cleverness” (Radjou et al., 2012a). In India’s rural regions, farmers used their innovative spirit to build their own vehicles for daily work and transportation by using components that were not specifically designed for vehicles (Mitra, 1995). Based on improvisation, Jugaad is about doing the most in a resource-scarce environment. Similarly, Brem and Wolfram (2014) defined Jugaad as an “improvisational approach to solving problems in a
creative way, at low cost, in a short amount of time, and without serious taxonomy or discipline” (p.4).
Therefore, Jugaad can be described as a necessity-driven way of thinking that builds the mindset and foundation for the frugal innovation approach.
2.3.2 Gandhian Innovation
6
2.3.3 Reverse Innovation
Reverse innovation is also a relatively new and emerging innovation approach that is closely related to frugal innovation. In 2009, Immelt et al. were the first scholars to describe product offerings that were developed and sold in emerging markets at first, and then modified and sold in developed economies. They argue that reverse innovation is the opposite of the “glocalization” approach, in which products were developed top-down in developed economies and then distributed worldwide. Given this new focus on low-cost innovation, MNCs are urged to see low-income markets as a source of innovation and as an engine of creativity and growth at a time when traditional and developed markets are stagnating (Prahalad and Mashelkar, 2010). Moreover, Deloitte argues in a recent publication that the global economy is recovering after the 2008-2009 recession, but consumers in advanced economies have become more price-sensitive and demand better-value products (Deloitte, 2014). Big MNCs such as General Electric, Siemens and P&G recognise this trend and are running high investments to engage in reverse innovation. However, frugal innovation plays a very important part since the reverse innovation approach can be better characterised as market-oriented and explains how products find their way to developed markets. Nevertheless, the core of reverse innovation is composed of the product development of frugal innovations within emerging markets and hence builds the basis for reverse innovations.
Figure 2 Linking frugal innovation with closely related innovation concepts
7
2.3.4 Other types of emerging market innovation
8
3 Review methodology
The third part of the dissertation deals with a detailed description of the review methodology and the steps that have been taken to produce a high-quality systematic literature review.
3.1 Overview of systematic literature review (SLR)
Systematic literature reviews (often referred to as systematic review) have gained increased recognition as a popular research methodology since the 1990s. Originally widely used in medical research, systematic literature reviews as an evidence-based approach to manage large bodies of information find more and more application in business and management research (Tranfield et al., 2003). Systematic review is a “specific methodology that locates existing studies, selects and evaluates contributions,
analyses and synthesises data, and reports the evidence in such a way that allows reasonably clear conclusions to be reached about what is and is not known” (Denyer and Tranfield, 2009, p.671).
Moreover, systematic reviews closely adhere to a certain set of scientific methods that aim to limit systematic bias and deal as a way to inform academia, policy and practice about a certain subject of interest (Pettigrew and Roberts, 2006).
3.2 Application of SLR-Model for management research
As explained earlier, systematic reviews, as a research methodology, closely adhere to a specific set of scientific methods and follow certain activities and tasks. The Cochrane Collaboration (Clarke and Oxman, 2001) provides a renowned systematic stage-approach in conducting reviews that was adjusted by Tranfield et al. (2003) for management research purposes. The outline of this dissertation closely follows the three-stage-model illustrated in Figure 3. However, the proposed three-stage model by Tranfield et al. (2003) has been slightly adjusted due to the customised dissertation layout. But generally, the specific stages and phases can be seen as milestones and sub-milestones that will be dealt with in the progress of this dissertation.
Figure 3 Adapted SLR-Model for management research Phase 6
Data Extraction and Monitoring
Phase 7 Data Synthesis Phase 2
Development of a Review Protocol
Stage 2 Conducting the Review
Stage 3 Reporting and Dissemination
Phase 8
Descriptive and Thematic Analysis
Phase 9
Discussion, Limitations and Conclusion Stage 1
Planning the Review Phase 0
Identification of the Need for a Review
9
3.2.1 Planning the review
The first stage of the systematic review comprises of three phases that are the starting point before actually conducting the review.
3.2.1.1 Identification of the need for a review
In general, for the purpose of this study, a systematic review is the appropriate research method since its aim is to investigate the current state of a relatively nascent research area and to give an accurate picture of the evidence on frugal innovation, helping to identify research gaps and highlight avenues for future research. Moreover, it becomes necessary to detect if an exact systematic literature review has been carried out before. While it may be less likely that a review answering the research questions of this dissertation has been done before, it is possible that a similar one exists. Therefore, a search for previous systematic reviews has been carried out to evaluate whether the review should proceed, an existing review can be updated or added, or whether no further review is required.
3.2.1.2 Identification of existing reviews
In order to investigate if a systematic literature review on frugal innovation already exists, a search for peer-reviewed journal articles on two academic databases (EBSCO and JSTOR) using the search string “Frugal Innovation” AND “Systematic review” has been carried out. Moreover, Google Scholar as an additional possibility to locate academic journal articles has been searched. However, all searches did not identify any relevant prior systematic reviews. Hence, this research can carry on with the first systematic review on frugal innovation.
3.2.1.3 Scoping study
Within management, it will be necessary to conduct a scoping study to assess the relevance and size of the literature and to delimit the subject area or topic. To receive an overview about the amount of literature on frugal innovation, the academic databases EBSCO, JSTOR, Google Scholar and the Newcastle University Library Search (NULS) have been selected and used to search for the most famous terms such as “frugal”, “frugal innovation”, “Jugaad”, “Gandhian innovation” and “Reverse
innovation”. For this pilot trial, no restrictions in terms of search strings have been applied, since the
10
Search Word EBSCO JSTOR NULS Google Scholar Total
Frugal 23.421 8.583 85.440 101.000 218.696
Frugal Innovation 95 835 274 708 1.911
Jugaad 111 6 347 764 1.227
Gandhian Innovation 3 2 8 38 49
Reverse Innovation 412 785 921 1.100 3.218
Table 1 Search results of the pilot trial *(20/10/2014)
3.2.1.4 Development of the review protocol
According to Tranfield et al. (2003), the protocol “is a plan that helps to protect objectivity by providing
explicit descriptions of the steps to be taken.” These steps can include decisions about the review
question, inclusion criteria, search strategy, study selection, data extraction, quality assessment, data synthesis and plans for dissemination (NHS, 2009). The pre-defined protocol is mostly necessary to avoid bias of the researcher (Kitchenham and Charters, 2007) and to set a systematic frame to conduct the research. In the next sections, the steps that have been performed to conduct the systematic review will be explained.
3.2.1.4.1 Research questions
The first part of the protocol has been to define the research questions that guide throughout the whole review process. In order to come up with questions, a scoping study to get an overview about frugal innovation has been conducted. After screening the literature, it became obvious that a systematic review would be the appropriate research method to explore frugal innovation; hence the research questions have been customised to the purpose of systematic review and are formulated as the following:
(1) What is the current state of research on frugal innovation?
(2) What are the current definitions, theories, conceptual models and methodologies used to explain frugal innovation?
(3) What are the proposed managerial implications in the literature on frugal innovation?
3.2.1.4.2 Search strategy and information sources
11 University library database was also used as it allows quick access to a wide range of journals. Furthermore, Google Scholar was included in the data sources since it also allows broad searches for scholarly literature. However, this database raises concern in terms of ranking algorithms used and which documents it actually indexes. Therefore, only the first 100 search results have been analysed, since after the 100th result there is a ‘drop-off’ in precision of findings of about 40% (Beel and Gipp, 2009). Moreover, data sources such as Research Gate and Social Science Research Network have been used to locate journals that could not been downloaded through the main databases. This ensured the best possible amount of literature to conduct the review. However, in order to back-up the choice of databases, a librarian has been consulted that provided new insights of data selection methods. The librarian advised to use ProQuest and Scopus as well, since these databases provide thousands of other journals that are not particularly focused on business or management research. If there were frugal innovation articles published outside business and management journals, it would be possible to locate them in journals of different academic disciplines.
After having decided on the databases, key search words and search strings have been identified. As the scoping study has shown, the search word “frugal” has not been accurate enough. Therefore, the search string “Frugal” AND “Innovation” will be applied to create a direct connection to innovation. Moreover, since the focus of this dissertation is on frugal innovation, articles on reverse innovation will only be selected through the search string “Reverse Innovation” AND “Frugal Innovation”. This allows to select only articles on reverse innovation that directly deal with the concept of frugal innovation. The search words “Frugal Innovation”, “Jugaad” and “Gandhian Innovation” have remained the same. However, these terms have been put in quotation marks in order to ensure that exactly these approaches are filtered out. The quotation marks fix two or more terms to each other so that exactly the term is found. Furthermore, the scoping study has been useful due to the fact that while reading the first sample articles, it became obvious that finding frugal innovation articles within other associated emerging market innovation literature could be possible. Therefore, additional search words and strings such as “Resource-Constrained Innovation” AND “Frugal Innovation”, “Low-Income Innovation” AND “Frugal Innovation” and “Inclusive Innovation” AND “Frugal Innovation” have been added.
In general, it was decided not to restrict the data search only to title or abstract since the amount of literature is not excessively huge and to ensure finding articles that deal with frugal innovation but do not explicitly state this in the title or abstract.
3.2.1.4.3 Study selection criteria and procedure
12 was decided to include conference proceedings and working papers as well. Conference proceedings possess a particular value since they often present new findings or recent developments to the research area. In addition, working papers can be valuable since it is unpublished work in progress that is going to be published usually within one to three years (Harvard Business School, 2014) and can provide new and deeper insights on the subject. Table 2 illustrates further inclusion and exclusion criteria for the review:
Table 2 Inclusion and Exclusion criteria of review
The final decision if an article will be selected for further assessment will be made after reading the abstract of the paper. Only if the abstract demonstrates a certain value to the research purpose, will the article be analysed further.
3.2.1.4.4 Study quality assessment
As part of the review protocol, an assessment of the study quality has been carried out to evaluate and ensure the validity of the included studies. Staples and Niazi (2007) stress that it is very challenging to determine to what extent the validity threats have been addressed by authors. However, the validity and reliability of the documents have been addressed by evaluating the structure and content of the documents. To be selected for the review analysis, the documents needed to fulfil the data inclusion and exclusion criteria and provide relevant information to answer the research questions. Therefore, the documents needed to contain definitions, theories, conceptual models, methodologies or managerial implications to explain frugal innovation. In addition, the documents had to make contributions to theory and practice by providing managerial implications and future research. Although documents were supposed to answer all parts of the research questions, exceptions have been made to documents
Inclusion Criteria Exclusion Criteria
Academic and journal articles, conference proceedings and working papers that directly cover frugal innovation
Duplicate copy of other documents
Academic or journal articles that describe innovation approaches closely related to frugal innovation
Papers that contain the word frugal, but do not have a connection to innovation
Selected documents need to have a clear structure that allows answering distinguished parts of the research question.
Papers that do not describe frugal innovation
Documents should provide information on at least one of the areas: Theories, Concepts, Models, Definitions, Methodologies, Future Research or Managerial Implications
Documents written in languages other than English
13 that offer relevant importance to single dimensions. Finally, if the strengths and lengths of the documents were insufficient, they were excluded for further assessment.
3.2.1.4.5 Data extraction strategy
The objective of data extraction forms is to keep systematic record of the obtained study documents. Using MS Excel as a database, various spreadsheets depending on the kind of extraction desired, have been created. First, the search results obtained through database searches were systematically recorded. Second, the selected documents were categorised into their origin, such as academic articles, business journals, conference proceedings and working papers. Third, the papers were categorised by author, year, title, content, source and keywords. A detailed sample extraction form can be found in Appendix A. After the database has been updated and ready-to-analyse, a second spreadsheet has been used to perform the thematic analysis. In accordance to the research question, five themes have been identified as followed: Theories, Conceptual Models, Methodologies, Definitions and Managerial Implications. Every document has been analysed and categorised for every dimension.
3.2.1.4.6 Data synthesis
After having extracted the relevant information from the documents, the data synthesis involves collecting and summarising the results. The data has been observed to find similarities, differences and patterns within the themes. This has been necessary in order to be able to consolidate, differentiate and integrate distinct publications from each other. Because of the heterogeneous nature of the data, qualitative synthesis has been performed and documented in accordance with the research questions expressed in the review protocol. After this step, the data was ready-to-use for the descriptive and thematic analysis in the reporting stage.
3.2.2 Conducting the review
Conducting the review actually means carrying out all the pre-defined processes of the review protocol described in section 3.2.1. Table 3 illustrates the main data sources and search strings used to identify papers in the systematic review as well as the obtained search results.
Table 3 Search results of the review *(02/11/2014)
Search String EBSCO JSTOR NULS ProQuest Scopus Google
Scholar Total Total Selected
"Frugal Innovation" 95 (12) 5 (1) 274 (35) 36 (10) 33 (11) 733 (42) 1176 111
"Jugaad" 111 (1) 6 (0) 347 (1) 29 (5) 19 (4) 779 (3) 1291 14
"Gandhian Innovation" 3 (0) 2 (0) 8 (2) 2(0) 1 (0) 38 (3) 54 5
"Reverse Innovation" AND "Frugal" 9 (6) 213 (8) 85 (12) 9 (5) 9 (6) 263 (28) 588 65 "Resource-Constrained Innovation" AND "Frugal" 1 (1) 50 (2) 148 (22) 2 (0) 4 (2) 26 (8) 229 35 "Low-Income Innnovation" AND "Frugal" 0 (0) 5 (1) 143(4) 0 (0) 0 (0) 1 (0) 149 5 "Inclusive Innovation" AND "Frugal" 0 (0) 5(1) 6 (2) 0 (0) 1 (1) 89 (22) 101 26
14 As the table shows, through the application of the search strings within the six selected databases, 3,588 search results have been generated. These consist of all sorts of documents such as newspapers, reviews, magazines etc. and still contain duplicates. 261 documents have been selected for further assessment. The first step within the data selection has been to filter out unnecessary documents by applying the data exclusion criteria. After extracting newspapers, magazines, reviews and all other documents not stated in the inclusion criteria, 186 documents remained. Then, all documents that were not written in English have been filtered out. This decreased the amount of articles down by 31 to 155. These 155 articles still contained duplicates. After extracting duplicates, 95 documents remained. These 95 documents were academic and journal articles as well as conference proceedings. The next step was to check their relevance for the purpose of the review by reading the titles and abstracts. 30 articles have been extracted since their abstracts indicated no direct connection to frugal innovation. The remaining 65 documents have been fully read and analysed.
Since 10 of these documents could not been downloaded from the database due to the fact that the university did not possess the subscription right, the databases Social Science Research Network and
Research Gate provided the missing articles. However, another set of 20 documents have been filtered
out since their content was too short or not sufficient enough to answer any of the research questions, such as regarding the current state of frugal innovation, definitions, theories, concepts, methodologies, future research or managerial implications. This brought down the amount of documents to a final set of 45 to be included in the review. However, an additional search for working papers on Research Gate, Google Scholar and Social Sciences Research Network has brought up another 7 working papers that fulfilled the inclusion criteria and hence have been added to the final set. All in all, 52 documents containing academic and business journal articles, conference proceedings and working papers have been included for further analysis in the review.
3.2.3 Reporting and dissemination
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4 Analysis and Results
The final stage of this systematic review presents the analysis and findings derived from the data extraction forms. Tranfield et al. (2003) suggest a two-stage report within management research that includes a descriptive and thematic analysis.
4.1 Descriptive analysis
The descriptive analysis provides a comprehensive picture about the research topic and is achieved through the use of categorisation from the data extraction form. The categories included publication details such as authors, title, year, journal, brief content and key findings. These have been illustrated into descriptive tables and are presented and explained in the following section. Appendix B (1-4) provides an overview of the documents that are being analysed in the descriptive analysis.
4.1.1 Data origin
The descriptive analysis is based on 52 documents that have been identified and selected through the scoping study and the application of search strings in the data conduction. These 52 documents contain journal articles, conference proceedings and working papers. The journal articles have been divided into academic and business journals depending on their origin and purpose. Figure 4 illustrates the origin of the selected documents:
Figure 4 Distribution of document origin
16 they offer particular and often novel insights, from different scholarly backgrounds that are further described in section 4.1.5.
4.1.2 Authors and Institutions
Frugal innovation is still a novel and nascent field of research, therefore it is useful to provide a list of authors that are active and exploring the field of frugal innovation. Appendix C lists the forty-eight authors that are included in the review and the corresponding number of articles that they have published. As Appendix C illustrates, the distribution of authors is relatively high and fragmented and only a few have published more than one article. This could be due to the fact that frugal innovation is quite novel, but could also indicate that not many scholars have specialised in researching frugal innovation so far. However, Table 4 provides a useful overview and ranking for both academics and practitioners about the authors that published the majority of papers in the field. This helps academics and practitioners to locate the authors that research the most and might possess the best comprehensive knowledge on frugal innovation so far.
Table 4 Core authors and ranking
After having illustrated which authors have written most of the articles on frugal innovation, a closer look at their academic background and the institutions they work for has been taken. This has revealed that some of the authors have established or work for particular competence-centres of frugal innovation which are often affiliated to certain academic institutions. Therefore, an internet search for “Frugal Innovation Centres” and similar terms has been conducted. Table 5 shows and summarises core facts of three different frugal innovation competence-centres that are actually associated with core authors of this review. This indicates the growing awareness and importance of frugal innovation since these competence centres have been founded within the last few years and are affiliated to renowned global universities. In particular, the Frugal Innovation Portal, administered by Yasser Bhatti, a PhD-candidate from Oxford, has brought research on frugal innovation to a new level. In 2013, Bhatti organised the first Frugal Innovation Symposium at the Academy of Management (AOM) Conference in Orlando, USA. The AOM publishes some of the most influential business and management journals
Rank Author # Articles
17 and hence hosting a Symposium at their annual conference means that frugal innovation has gained global recognition in academia and real-life business.
Table 5 Frugal innovation centres
4.1.3 Journals
Appendix D provides a list of the journals in which the authors have published their work. In this list, only academic and business journals have been included since working papers have not been published so far and conference proceedings do not necessarily get published. Hence, thirty-four (34) different journals have been identified with Journal of Indian Business Research leading with 5 (12%) publications. Research-Technology Management, Ivey Business Journal and Technovation have published the second most amount of articles with 2 each (5%). All others have only published a single article on frugal innovation that has been selected for this review. Similarly to the core authors, the ‘journals’ are also very distributed and besides the Journal of Indian Business Research, there is no particular journal that can be directly associated with publishing frugal innovation articles.
4.1.4 Core years
Figure 5 illustrates the range of years in which the selected review articles on frugal innovation have been published. The first articles have been published in 2011 (6) which shows that frugal innovation is a new and nascent research topic. As the table significantly shows, the number of articles published between 2011 and 2014 has been constantly rising. This development could also be explained with the rising interest in the frugal innovation approach and the increased recognition among academics and practitioners.
Chairs / Person Centre/Lab Institution Purpose / Mission/Highlights 1 Tiw ari and Herstatt Centre for Frugal Innovation Technical University
Hamburg-Harburg, Germany Institute for Technology-and Innovation Management
CFI seeks to w ork on conducting and promoting research, consulting, and education in the field of affordable and sustainable innovations for emerging markets through collaboration betw een academics and practitioner. Hosted Symposium "Mastering the frugal challenge:
Innovating for global grow th through affordable solutions" in 2013.
2 Radha R. Basu and Elizabeth Sw eeny
Frugal Innovation Lab Santa Clara University, USA School of Engineering
To develop accessible, affordable,adaptable and appropriate technologies, products and solutions for emerging markets. The Lab w orks closely w ith w
ell-know n MNCs to develop frugal products and both Basu
and Sw eeney are aften assigned as guest-speakers on renow ned innovation conferences.
3 Yasser Bhatti Frugal Innovation Portal Affiliated w ith Said Business School, University of Oxford, United Kingdom
A Portal for frugal innovation, entrepreneurship and inclusive markets that mainly seeks to provide aw areness of research on frugal innovation. Organised first Frugal
18
4.1.5 Research fields
This section looks at the research fields in detail, in which the articles have been published. In order to cluster the journals into research fields, the name of the journal has been looked at. However, sometimes the name of the journal does not explicitly indicate how to classify the article. Therefore, the homepage of the respective journal has been consulted to analyse what the purpose of the journal is meant to be from the editors’ perspective. As Figure 6 illustrates, 8 different meaningful clusters have been identified into which frugal innovation journals can be categorised. These clusters mainly result from the Australian Bureau of Statistics that developed a classification including major fields and related sub-fields of research (ANZSRC, 2008). With the exception of Area Studies and Public Sector, the journals have been clustered alongside the generally accepted ANZSRC classification.
Figure 6 Research fields
From the review selection, 29% (12) of the journals can be related to Business & Management research. This indicates that frugal innovation has a high value as a strategic and management approach. The second biggest cluster is Technology with 22% (9) of articles being published in this research area. This
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14
Business & Management Technology Area Studies / Emerging Markets Medical and Health Science Innovation and Entrepreneurship Marketing Information and Computing Science Public Sector
Field of Research
Year # Publications %Total Publications
<2011 0 0% 2011 6 12% 2012 9 17% 2013 15 29% 2014 22 42% Total 52 100% 0 5 10 15 20 25 <2011 2011 2012 2013 2014
Development of Publications
19 shows that there is a high technological component of frugal innovation. A further 17% (7) of articles have been published in journals with an Emerging or Area Studies background. This emphasises the specific context of frugal innovation. Medical and Health Science (10%), Innovation & Entrepreneurship (5%), Marketing (5%), Information and Computing Science (2%) and Public Sector (2%) complete the clusters in which journals have been published in this review. In the latter clusters, frugal innovation finds particular research application. However, three journals could not be devoted into a particular cluster, since they were inter- or multidisciplinary.
In general, this analysis has identified three dominant research fields. When taking a closer look at the contents of each cluster, slight differences in scholarship can be recognised. First, articles clustered as ‘Area Studies’ emphasise on the emerging market context and the role frugal innovation plays there. Kahle et al. (2013) show how frugal innovation impacts state-building and has democratising effects, while Rao (2014) stresses how this innovation approach can alleviate poverty to benefit society. On the other hand, articles in the ‘Business & Management’ cluster tend to address practitioners by emphasising on the opportunities of frugal innovation in difficult and changing times (Nocera, 2012; Swaminathan, 2012). Other authors promote a view of competitive advantage and strategies for growth when discussing frugal innovation (Leavy, 2014; Strategic Direction, 2014). Finally, articles in the ‘Technology’ cluster emphasise the capabilities (Lim et al., 2013) or process characteristics (Ray and Ray, 2011) needed to execute frugal innovation development. For all three clusters, there is a tendency towards covering specific and different points of interest alongside the respective research fields. Generally, it will be helpful to combine ideas and findings from different research fields to learn and benefit from each other in order to create more comprehensive knowledge on frugal innovation.
4.1.6 Country analysis
20 This analysis from the review sample shows that the majority of documents has been published in Europe. However, the division of countries into developed economies (64%) and developing/emerging economies (33%) reveals that almost two thirds of the documents are written from developed economies. This could indicate that authors take on a developed-market perspective on frugal innovation.
4.2 Thematic analysis
After having presented the descriptive findings, the second part of the analysis is a thematic analysis of the review topic. In accordance with the review questions, the thematic analysis will contain five themes that will be analysed in a critical and narrative way by using the information from the 52 selected review documents. Furthermore, Appendix B (1-4) provides a comprehensive overview about the selected documents and deals as a reference to the derived research findings.
4.2.1 Definitions and main dimensions
The first section of the thematic analysis will pay special attention to the definitions of frugal innovation presented in the review sample. The method to analyse frugal innovation definitions consists of three steps. First, the definitions were gathered through scanning the review documents. However, some authors do not provide a clear definition, cite different authors’ definitions or describe frugal innovation in a more descriptive way. Nevertheless, these definition-like statements provide useful information and are also treated like definitions. Second, seven dimensions of frugal innovation were identified through a content analysis of the definitions. This has been necessary due to the fact that the definitions were highly diverse in terms of their wording and in order to illustrate the main components of frugal innovation presented in the definitions. Finally, a brief discussion of particular definitions from the review sample will end this section.
21 From the systematic review sample, 35 out of the 52 documents offered direct or indirect definitions on frugal innovation. 10 authors used their own developed definitions while the majority of authors were citing or using different authors’ definitions. Table 6 shows some relevant sample definitions that have been cited by other authors frequently and show a development of definitions over time.
Table 6 Sample definitions
The first ever cited and still frequently used definition is from the Economist (2010), who were the first to explain frugal products and frugal innovation. The other three definitions were taken from the review sample and should provide a first impression of what frugal innovation is about. When taking a closer look at the various definitions used by authors from different research fields or disciplines, no obvious differences in terms of how authors interpret frugal innovation has been found. However, authors tend to use definitions that fit the purpose of their article, but overall have the same understanding about what constitutes frugal innovation. The only remark is that over time, academics have further developed and extended frugal innovation definitions that lead to a new understanding and meaning. Since there are no significant differences of the meaning of frugal innovation definitions, the content analysis looks closer at its components. As part of the content analysis, a coding scheme needed to be developed. By analysing the definitions, it became apparent that definitions were referring to many of the same dimensions of frugal innovation. Therefore, a technique called emergent coding (Haney et al., 1998) which uses the data (phrases) to identify context units (dimensions) has been applied. A total of 100 phrases have been identified from the 35 documents that were then systematically grouped into dimensions. This resulted in the identification of 7 different dimension that are recurring throughout the definitions. An overview of the dimensions and phrases can be found in Appendix F.
The first two dimensions are ‘product characteristics’ and ‘product attributes’. Although attributes and characteristics are quite similar, it was decided to distinguish them. This is due to the fact that characteristics can be used to identify or classify something, whereas attributes are more generic and describe specific things more in detail. From the ‘product characteristics’ dimension, it becomes
(The Economist, 2010) “Frugal products need to be tough and easy to use (...) and are often sparing in the useof raw materials and their impact on the environment”
(Zeschky, Widenmayer and Gassmann, 2011, p.39)
“Frugal innovation, defined as responding to severe resource constraints with products having extreme cost advantages compared to existing solutions. The products of frugal innovation often look inferior to existing solutions because they provide limited functionality and are often made of simpler, cheaper materials”
(Tiwari and Herstatt, 2012, p.98)
“The term frugal innovation refers to innovative products and services that “seek to minimize the use of material and financial resources in the complete value chain (development, manufacturing distribution, consumption and disposal) with the objective of reducing the cost of ownership while fulfilling or even exceeding certain pre-defined criteria of acceptable quality standards”
(Brem and Wolfram, 2014, p.19)
"A derived management approach, based on jugaad, which focuses on the development, production, and product management of resource-saving products and services for people at the BoP by achieving a sufficient level of taxonomy and avoiding needless costs”
22 apparent that frugal products need to have a high value for customers, being at a low-cost, new and innovative. From the ‘product attribute’ perspective, frugal products need to be, for example, functional, robust, user-friendly, affordable, simple and easy to use. The third dimension covers ‘Environmental and Sustainability’ aspects of frugal innovation. An important factor for the development of frugal products is resource-scarcity, which leads to producing with minimal amounts of resources, using local resources to reduce the impact on the environment. The fourth dimension considers the ‘market environment’ of frugal innovations. Frugal products are developed in and specifically for the so-called ‘bottom of the pyramid’, emerging markets, mass-markets, low-income markets or resource-constraint settings. This illustrates a clear geographic position in which frugal innovations are developed and distributed. The next dimension considers the ‘cost perspective’. Frugal innovations need to have high cost-advantages compared to existing solutions achieved through reducing the cost of operation and hence the selling price. Another important factor is to reduce the cost of ownership by developing low-maintenance products that have a long product life-span. The following dimension considers the ‘socio-economic’ context for which frugal products are intended. Frugal innovations are responses to the severe resource constraints and the particular needs of people that have pronounced affordability constraints. The final, but very important dimension is the ‘Conceptional’ dimension. These phrases have a higher meaning and often emphasise the development or enhancement of the frugal innovation approach. Authors go one step further and use a frugal mindset, management approach or philosophy to denote frugal innovation. They demand that companies should re-think entire processes or business models and stress that frugal innovation can happen throughout the whole value chain of a company, from development to disposal.
23 levels of analysis to create a comprehensive definition. Figure 8 below illustrates the seven core dimensions and shows the interrelationships with each other.
Figure 8 The seven dimensions of frugal innovation by definition
As mentioned above, the Economist (2010) was the first reference to provide a definition on frugal innovation. However, they just simply described the product features as being “tough and easy to use
(…) and often sparing in the use of raw materials to reduce the impact on the environment.” However,
as the level of interest rose and more academics researched frugal innovation, the definitions have become more sophisticated, precise and more comprehensive. This development can be recognised through Zeschky et al. (2011, p.39) who were the first academics to define frugal innovation as “responding to severe resource constraints with products having extreme cost advantages compared to
existing solutions (…); these products often look inferior to existing solutions because they provide limited functionality and are often made of simpler, cheaper products.” However, many authors (Tiwari
and Herstatt, 2012a; Basu et al., 2013; Popescu, 2013) argue that frugal products particularly offer a functional value to emerging market customers.
The meaning of frugal innovation further developed when Tiwari and Herstatt (2012a, p.98) defined frugal innovation as “innovative products and services that seek to minimize the material and financial
resources in the complete value chain (development, manufacturing, distribution, consumption and disposal) with the objective of reducing the cost of ownership while fulfilling or even exceeding certain pre-defined criteria of acceptable quality standards.” They added a completely new dimension to frugal
24 Van Beers et al., 2014) describe the latest status of frugal innovation represented in definitions as a management approach or philosophy or even a mindset.
All in all, within less than five years of research on frugal innovation, through analysing the definitions, we are able to see an evolution or development of frugal innovation. The core, in terms of product characteristics and attributes is still the same, whereas frugal innovation as an academic discipline is still developing.
4.2.2 Theories
This section deals with an analysis of the theories that are meant to explain the frugal innovation phenomenon. According to the Oxford English Dictionary (2014), theories are “a system of ideas or
statements held as an explanation or account of a group of facts or phenomena (…) and are propounded or accepted as accounting for known facts.” The analysis of the theories underlying frugal innovation
is valuable, since it provides an overview of which theories might be most appropriate to explain frugal innovation and which theories appear to be promising for further analysis. To my knowledge to date, a mapping of theories within frugal innovation management has never been done before; therefore it offers particular value, especially for academics that want to analyse the theoretical perspective on frugal innovation in more depth.
25 Figure 9 Overview of theories used to explain frugal innovation
As the illustration shows, 20 different theories have been used to explain the frugal innovation approach. The three most dominant theories have been Resource-based Theory (22%), Institution-based Theory (16%) and (Neo)-Schumpeterian Theories (10%). However, the results from the review sample indicate that theories on frugal innovation are highly fragmented and there is no dominant frugal innovation theory so far. In order to show how the authors use the theories above to explain frugal innovation, the following section will describe the different theories more in detail.
The majority of authors explain frugal innovation with the Resource-based view (RBV) which was first introduced by Barney (1991) in his famous publication ‘Firm resources and competitive advantage.’ Later, Amit and Schoemaker (1993) split the RBV into resources and capabilities where resources are the ‘stock of available factors’ and capabilities are the ‘capacity to deploy resources (…) using organizational processes to effect a desired end’ (p.35). Many authors use this theory because companies within emerging markets often face strong resource-constraints and therefore have to develop capabilities to create valuable product solutions such as these invented through the frugal innovation approach. Brem and Wolfram (2014), for example, argue that the complex R&D top-down approach is replaced by a simple bottom-up approach that considers the needs of the people in emerging markets while making efficient use of scarce resources. Crisp (2014) agrees to this changing approach and states that although not fully established, the path to a truly ‘global innovation flow’ is now well under way. These two examples from a resource-based perspective show that companies, such as the
0 2 4 6 8 10 12
26 ones that offer frugal innovation, are changing the deployment of capacity, e.g. in R&D, to react better to people and resources in emerging market economies.
In general, the Resource-based view is valuable in explaining frugal innovation since it covers many aspects to produce successful frugal innovation solutions. First, tangible and intangible resources that a firm owns play a pivotal role to implement a frugal innovation strategy (Barney, 1991). Frugal product developments are limited by scarce resources bounded by the contextual environment of emerging markets. Therefore, from a tangible-perspective, resources have to be used in an efficient manner to execute a frugal innovation approach. However, this requires certain capabilities, intangible assets, to deploy these resources effectively. Many authors in the systematic review (Hartley, 2014; Lim et al., 2013) agree by stressing the importance of capability-building, knowledge creation and constant learning to understand the unique customer requirements in emerging markets.
The Institution-based view (or Institutional Theory) has also been frequently used to explain frugal innovation. Zeschky et al. (2014b) argue that more recently, institutional theory has become the dominant theory to explain how and why firms in emerging markets act differently compared to firms in developed markets. They illustrate that institutional voids are often related to individual resource-constraints that can be addressed by developing frugal innovations. In addition, Bhatti and Ventresca (2013b) emphasise that institutional theory plays an important role in understanding the socio-economic context in which firms make resource choices. Through institutional theory, companies can become aware of the specific emerging market context and the often accompanied formal and informal institutions (North, 1990) that shape the society. On the other hand, Pansera and Owen (2013) challenge the institutional theory since it argues that weak economic institutions, resources and infrastructure discourage innovation (Freeman, 1995). However, they argue that weak institutional settings and necessity-driven innovation actually spurs the development of frugal innovations in emerging markets. Generally, the Institution-based view is important for companies to understand the unique circumstances in emerging markets that are often accompanied by weak institutional environments. When considering a frugal innovation approach, meaning to develop and produce products in emerging markets, companies have to understand and react to the specific institutional settings to be successful. The third most frequently used theory to explain frugal innovation has been through the theories of the Austrian-American economist Joseph Schumpeter (1934). Van Beers et al. (2014) argue that
Schumpeterian theories seem to be the natural starting point for analytically trying to grasp the frugal
innovation approach and its societal impacts since “Neo-Schumpeterian Economics deals with the
dynamic processes causing qualitative transformation of economies driven by the introduction of innovation in various multifaceted forms and the related co-evolutionary processes” (Hanusch and
27 standard of living of the people. In addition, Panda (2014) says that Schumpeter (1934) originally defined innovation as the introduction of a product that is new to consumers, or one of higher quality than what was available in the past. However, the author argues that frugal innovations are not necessary new scientific discoveries, but may lead to the opening of new markets, the use of new sources of supply, new forms of competition and hence a restructuring of an industry. In the case of frugal innovation, all these things are currently recognisable since the beginning of 2011.
Therefore, Schumpeterian Theories play an important role to explain how frugal innovation changes whole industries and societies and how local entrepreneurs use their specific mindset to develop ‘more with less’ solutions. However, these theories do not provide detailed information about how frugal innovation is applied, but emphasise the superior role that it can play for whole societies.
Keeping these three theories in mind, Figure 10 below presents a newly developed model that was created through the research findings by illustrating the three dominant theoretical perspectives that directly influence a company’s frugal innovation strategy. To my knowledge, to date no author has discussed frugal innovation strategy and its theoretical input factors and output factors in form of performance. Therefore, scholars should consider analysing the specific strategy and performance constructs of frugal innovation. This model is just a first attempt to illustrate the most important theories influencing frugal innovation strategy and performance.
Figure 10 The three theories shaping frugal innovation strategy and performance
28 already existing developed-country products have been shipped to emerging markets. However, this is changing since the emergence and development of frugal innovations. Third, many authors explained frugal innovations with the particular “bottom-of-the-pyramid” context or were stressing the importance of sustainability of frugal innovation. However, there is currently no agreed theoretical background that focuses on these things. Not to mention that to date, there exists no generally accepted, nor attempted theory on the frugal innovation phenomenon as a new business paradigm (Radjou and Prabhu, 2013). All in all, this section has described, discussed and highlighted the main theoretic dimensions explaining frugal innovation and presented some contradictions with traditional theories. In general, academics and practitioners should keep in mind that developing frugal innovations and executing a frugal innovation strategy cannot rely on a single theoretical foundation. It is important to understand the big picture of this innovation approach, especially due to the fact that frugal innovations originate in emerging markets that are completely different from developed markets. Therefore, theoretical constructs are needed that encompass and combine various different theoretical views to create a comprehensive frugal innovation theory. The newly developed model can deal as a starting point to conduct more research underlying frugal innovation. Especially theories that have a practical value and include specific frugal innovation components might be useful to be researched for real-life business.
4.2.3 Methodologies
According to Grix (2002), a researcher’s methodological approach, reflecting specific ontological and epistemological assumptions, represents a choice of approach and research methods adopted in a given study. The author argues that the terms methodology and research methods are often used interchangeably. However, methodology is concerned about the logic and way to acquire knowledge, whereas research methods are the precise procedures to acquire this knowledge. For the purpose of this review, it is necessary to have a closer look at if authors used quantitative or qualitative research and which research method they have deployed. This provides us with an overall picture about the way authors are analysing frugal innovation and may offer the possibility to argue why they use certain research methods.
29 Table 7 Overview of methodology / research methods used in this systematic review
However, it was more difficult to classify articles without a clear and obvious research method. Therefore, these articles have been analysed for their particular purpose. In general, research designs can be of exploratory, descriptive or explanatory nature. According to Sreejesh et al., (2014, p.25), “exploratory research can be used to obtain necessary information and to develop a proper foundation
for conducting research later.” Moreover, these studies are conducted for three main reasons such as
to analyse a problem situation, to evaluate alternatives and to discover new ideas. In the next stage, descriptive research attempts to ‘explore’ and ‘explain’ by providing additional information and describes ‘what’ is happening, fills missing parts and expands our understanding. Finally, explanatory research can be defined as “an attempt to connect ideas to understand cause and effect, meaning
researchers want to explain what is going on” (Kowalczyk, 2014, p.1). However, the literature on frugal
innovation is still nascent and no explanatory research design has been identified in the review sample. As the explanations on exploratory and descriptive research indicate, these two research approaches are relatively similar and sometimes difficult to distinguish. Therefore, for the analysis of this review, they have been treated equally.
The predominant research methodology used in the sample was Qualitative – Exploratory / Descriptive analysis in 38% of the articles. These articles did not have a distinct research method but used inductive theory-building approaches containing literature reviews, thematic analyses, discussions or models. These articles explained various different aspects of the frugal innovation approach or expanded our knowledge through exploring the field. In addition, another 16% (8) of articles were exploratory and descriptive, but also contained case examples to illustrate frugal innovations or propositions that were concluded from previous discussions.
Methodology / Research Method # Articles % of Total
Qualitative - Single Case Study 4 8%
Qualitative - Multiple Case Studies 8 15%
Qualitative - Multiple Case Studies + Propositions 3 6%
Qualitative - Ethnographic Casy Study 1 2%
Qualitative - Content Analysis 1 2%
Qualitative - Exploratory/Descriptive 20 38%
Qualitative - Exploratory/Descriptive + Propositions 5 10%
Qualitative - Exploratory/Descriptive + Case Examples 3 6%
Qualitative - Extended Literature Review 3 6%
Total Qualitative 48 92%
Quantitative - Empirical Analysis 3 6%
Quantitative - Multiple Case Studies 1 2%
Total Quantitative 4 8%
