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The Rise and Fall of Silicon Graphics

(www.abortretry.fail)
346 points BirAdam | 1 comments | 05 Apr 24 16:42 UTC | HN request time: 0.204s | source
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martinpw ◴[05 Apr 24 18:13 UTC] No.39945361[source]▶
Whenever this topic comes up there are always comments saying that SGI was taken by surprise by cheap hardware and if only they had seen it coming they could have prepared for it and managed it.

I was there around 97 (?) and remember everyone in the company being asked to read the book "The Innovator's Dilemma", which described exactly this situation - a high end company being overtaken by worse but cheaper competitors that improved year by year until they take the entire market. The point being that the company was extremely aware of what was happening. It was not taken by surprise. But in spite of that, it was still unable to respond.

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1. Octokiddie ◴[06 Apr 24 01:56 UTC] No.39949363[source]▶
> It was not taken by surprise. But in spite of that, it was still unable to respond.

This is even a major point of discussion in the book. The incumbents always see it coming a mile away. They can't respond because doing so breaks their business model. Employees can't go to managers and say, "We need to enter this low-margin market for low-end products." Doing so is a good way to get sidelined or fired.

The "dilemma" is that either traditional option, compete with the upstarts or move further up-market, leads to the same outcome - death.