Corning and the Craft of Innovation - Hardcover

Graham, Margaret B. W.; Shuldiner, Alec T.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0195140974 ISBN 13: 9780195140972

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 2001

Synopsis

For 150 years, Corning Incorporated has repeatedly succeeded in their quest to create new products for an ever-changing marketplace. Corning and the Craft of Innovation is the story of the extraordinary research and development strategy that propelled this company to its leadership position in leading-edge technologies for the new world economy.
Since its founding in the mid-nineteenth century, Corning has placed a premium on research and development in tandem with an unending spirit of innovation. Corning's innovations made possible such essential items as light bulbs, television, Pyrex, catalytic converters for cars, and high-speed telecommunications through fiber optics. Most impressive is Corning's evolution into a highly innovative producer of specialty materials. In its early days, Corning developed specialty glass for use in railroad signal lenses that had to withstand the rigors of high and low temperatures; and developed its high speed Ribbon Machine--still used today--to produce glass envelopes for light bulbs more quickly and efficiently than anyone else. Today Corning leads the world in fiber optics and is a premier provider of cable and photonic products. In 1999 Wired magazine nominated Corning for its coveted Wired Index, confirming Corning's astonishing staying power as a leading-edge company.
Corning and the Craft of Innovation examines how Corning fostered a culture of innovation while showing extraordinary patience in backing long-term projects. The book illustrates how a pattern of deliberate, regular, and profitable innovation begun 150 years ago, has put Corning at the vanguard of leading-edge technologies for the fastest-growing markets of the global marketplace. It will be essential reading for anyone interested in strategic management, innovation, science and technology or knowledge management.

About this title

About the Author

Margaret B.W. Graham is the founder of The Winthrop Group, a company that assists corporations, foundations, and other organizations to document and make use of their experience. Currently, she is a visiting professor of management at McGill University in Quebec. Alec Shuldiner is a member of The Winthrop Group.

From Library Journal

These two books, along with a third volume (the forthcoming Corning Through the Ages), were commissioned by Corning to mark 150 years in business. While such an endeavor is inevitably self-serving, the authors have been allowed to present both the accomplishments (and they are numerous) and the sticking points and warts. In The Generations of Corning, Dyer and Gross detail the history of the organization from its inception to the current day. From a business perspective, it is intriguing to learn how a company was able to take a fundamental material glass and both develop its particular formulation and engineer the industrial process to expedite manufacturing. This was true for the electric light bulb, fiber optics, and a host of other industrial and consumer products. The history also shows how Corning leveraged its competencies through large-scale partnerships. In Corning and the Craft of Innovation, history is subjugated to more specific topics. Hence, Gross and Shuldiner deal with glassmaking as both an art and a science, the realm of processes, and military applications. Perhaps the greatest value of the book is in showing how Corning came to embody what in today's jargon is a "learning organization." As a result, an organization that made its living off the mundane (e.g., the light bulb) was able to create the spectacular (e.g., the 200" telescope mirror). While each work covers much the same material, the scientist may prefer Craft and the social economist, Generations; both books are recommended. Steven Silkunas, Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority, Philadelphia
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 0195140974
• ISBN 13: 9780195140972
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 528