Matching Innovation- Introducing new innovations on the BoP market

Abstract

In recent years increasing attention has been directed towards the reasonably untapped markets at the Bottom of the Pyramid (BoP). These emerging markets infer great opportunities for business and the lack of technical development intensifies the interest of innovative companies. However, penetrating the BoP market implies difficulties and not all companies succeed in this endeavor. This study emphasizes the importance of matching an innovation in to the desired context, in this case in the BoP market. By examining three products developed by the Indian company Greenway Grameen Infra, and adopting the translation model and the art of interessement, the author illustrate how a company can accomplish this matching. The result of this study accentuates the importance of co-creation i.e. the significance of a close relation to the prospective users through extensive actor involvement in the development of a product. Moreover, the study shows that there is a difference in how to legitimize a product depending on the context, and that this is correlated with the level of awareness in the context where you wish to attain legitimacy.