Harvard Business Review Case Study Looks at Google Glass

The full text of the case study titled, “Google Glasss” is fee-based but a recent blog post and Forbes article share some of what the case study has to say.
First, “Google’s Strategy vs. Glass’s Potential” by Harvard Business Review’s associated editor, Walter Frick (via HBR Blog Network)
From Frick’s Blog Post:

When professor Tom Eisenmann first taught his newly released case on Google Glass at Harvard Business School, he asked his students which of three scenarios was most plausible: that Glass would catch on first in the enterprise setting, followed by gradual consumer acceptance; that adoption would be limited to early adopter “digerati” consumers; or that mainstream consumer adoption would happen rapidly.
Many students voted for the first scenario. They’re not alone.
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Glass may yet turn out to be a great consumer success. But in the meantime, Google’s choices in marketing and distributing its new product get to the heart of the tension between new opportunities and existing strategy.
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At the same time, the case indicates that the team behind Glass recognizes that it doesn’t yet fully know what it has created. Glass product manager Steve Lee is quoted as saying:
Major new consumer tech products are rarely brought out of the lab at this stage of development. But we knew that by putting prototypes into the wild, we’d start to learn how this radical new technology— something that sits on your face, so close to your senses—might be used.

Read the Full Text of “Google’s Strategy vs. Glass’s Potential” (via HBR Blog Network)
Second, Forbes.com contributor Susan Kalla mentions the case study and shares her views in, “Google Glasses: ‘They Make Me Feel Powerful'”
Kalla writes:

Enterprises are not likely to be early adopters [of Glass], mainly because the corporate networks may not be able to handle Glass, or other data-hogging smart devices. Glasses will generate high volumes and varieties of formats, moving at high velocity. Legacy data systems can’t scale, can’t interface with every API, and can’t deal with massive real-time processing.
Enterprises generally don’t develop custom apps in house, but wait until they are available off the shelf. Operating managers would have a hard time finding the funds for a development project in beta, which implies it could change substantially. Businesses want a sure bet, or at least controlled risk. And, finding the talent, software developers who fit in culturally, would be time-consuming and expensive. Tech companies may have extra developers on staff, but most corporations don’t.

Read the Full Text of “Google Glasses: ‘They Make Me Feel Powerful'” (via Forbes.com)

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