Destructive or Disruptive Innovation

With the well talked about added feature of Google spreadsheets, we have another example of a very good innovation team launching a new product that shakes the world.

Ok this isn’t shaking the world.  But it is creating possibilities and forcing the likes of Microsoft to evolve.  I was reading a comment from someone over on MIPscan that listed all of the other spreadsheets that have gone by the wayside.  The one that triggered me was good old Lotus 1-2-3.  It was awesome.  When Excel came out it wasn’t as strong and it was integrated into a suite and so forth, but Excel won.  At that time Microsoft was doing the destructive innovating (don’t slam me if you think that this was stuff Microsoft stole/borrowed/or learned from Xerox).

Is there room for a new player?  Maybe not, but the consumers will tell us.  And guess what, Google has a lot of consumers.  And there are a lot of companies that will like the price tag, the functionality and the built in back-up.

I would love to know what the cost of this new application cost Google.  I bet it wasn’t much.  DabbleDB was built by a couple of guys in Vancouver and it is pretty good as well (Mark Evans and I talked about it in our CoffeeCAST).  It is interesting to watch these heavyweights battle it out.  The consumer is the winner in the end.

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