How Can Great Firms Fail? Insights from the Hard Disk Drive Industry

The disk drive industry is ideal for studying patterns of business failure, because rich data exist about it and because it has a particularly fast life cycle. In a matter of a few years, market segments, companies, and technologies emerge, mature, and decline. Companies with apparently sound management practices fall prey to disruptive innovators who grab their market share and precipitate their decline. This chapter outlines the history of the industry and shows how new entrants to the industry repeatedly unseat incumbents.