Course:               BUS 284 Managing Product Development and Strategy

Day/Time:          Thursday 18:00-20:45

Instructor:          Aharon Hibshoosh

 

Office:  BT 751

Office Hours:  T R: 20: 45 -22:45,   T : 1500-1600

Phone:  (408) 924-3520                                                         

Email:  hibsho_a@cob.sjsu.edu 

Instructor's website: http://www.cob.sjsu.edu/hibsho_a/index.htm

 

Bus 284 Managing Product Development and Strategy

Course Description 

We will rigorously study the essentials of product strategy and planning, with an emphasis on new product management, within the business organization, with sensitivity to its various environments.  New product strategy and development is thus studied not in isolation but systematically as part of the overall product management effort. New product management requires development of a cross functional perspective in planning and execution.  Hence, the theoretical and practical foundations are borrowed from variety of disciplines: economics, finance, marketing, engineering, management, psychology, statistics and operations research.  We will emphasize currency of conceptualizations and empirical findings.   While the textbook will provide the framework for our study, we will also encompass key authoritative studies in the academic literature.  Those will offer further depth in substance and methodology.   We will pay attention to developments in Silicon Valley.   In particular, we will have exposure to incubation and acceleration process in the Valley, and review the related role of SJSU and the COB.   Homework of varied nature and projects will support the learning of the subject.

 

Learning Objectives:

 

 1.  Learning to conceptualize the process of product planning and management within the business organization.

2.  Learning criteria and techniques for market evaluations for new product entry.

3.     Learn to analyze the potential success and failure of new products, as a function of market structures and information variability.

4.     Learn to distinguish planning of new product development of industrial and consumer products.

5.     Examine processes of new product development {NPDs).

6.     Gain exposure to creativity techniques used in the generation of new product ideas.

7.     Understand market planning and research tools that are essential in NPD.

8.     Learn how incubators and accelerators foster new product/ market development. 

9.     Gain exposure to the entrepreneurial effort of high-tech start-ups.  Focus on learning how they try to balance their marketing product and distribution strategy, technological development and financial backing.

10.     Learn to incorporate key standards of NPD into product and marketing plans.

11.     Learn product portfolio management and Product Life Cycle principles, and their impact about dynamic product portfolio management.

 

Textbook

Urban G.L., and Hauser J.R. & N. Dholakia, Essentials of New Product Management , Prentice Hall, 1987.

( Later editions, e.g. 1998, are identical).

TOPICS^ AND TENTATIVE SCHEDULE

We will focus on elements in the following chapters^, in Urban, Hauser and Dholakia.

24/1  Introduction to new product Management  1 

31/1     Introduction to Incubators and accelerators * (A)

7/2- 14/2    Product Strategy and Innovation  2 

14/9-21/9   Market Definition for Entry strategy  3 

28/2      Success and Failure of New Products (A)

6/3   An Overview of the New Product Design Process  5 

6/3 -20/3  New Product Development

13/3 Midterm

24/3-28/3  Spring break

3/4   Generating and Screening Ideas  4 (A)

10/4   Product Engineering and the Marketing Mix  9    

17/4-24/4   Managing throughout the Product Life Cycle and Portfolio models. 13 (A)

24/4-8/5   Electives

8/5 Review 

15/5  Final  Thursday May 15,  1715-1930.

^ The numerical reference to a chapter in the textbook.  A, stands for article references that support the Course Topics on the Web site, in addition to the lecture.

 * This topic would be studied throughout the course.

^ The time table is tentative. This is not an exclusive list of topics to be covered in this course. If time permits, I will accelerate the presentation. We will cover additional related topics in the textbooks and outside the textbooks.

Grading Guidelines:

Class participation  10

Homework and project 30*

Midterm 30

Final 50 

Total course points: 120*

* Additional points may be assigned for extraordinary project performance.

The grade will be based on a curve.   Extra Credit is available through contribution to course learning or to research.  Students interested in these options must approach the professor very early in the semester.


 

 

  College of Business Policies and Procedures

 

To ensure that every student, current and future, who takes courses in the Boccardo Business Center has the opportunity to experience an environment that is safe, attractive, and otherwise conducive to learning, the College of Business at San José State has established the following policies:

 

 

Eating

Eating and drinking (except water) are prohibited in the Boccardo Business Center.  Students with food will be asked to leave the building.  Students who disrupt the course by eating and do not leave the building will be referred to the Judicial Affairs Officer of the University.

 

Cell Phones

Students will turn their cell phones off or put them on vibrate mode while in class.  They will not answer their phones in class.  Students whose phones disrupt the course and do not stop when requested by the instructor will be referred to the Judicial Affairs Officer of the University.

 

Computer Use

In the classroom, faculty allow students to use computers only for class-related activities.  These include activities such as taking notes on the lecture underway, following the lecture on Web-based PowerPoint slides that the instructor has posted, and finding Web sites to which the instructor directs students at the time of the lecture.  Students who use their computers for other activities or who abuse the equipment in any way, at a minimum, will be asked to leave the class and will lose participation points for the day, and, at a maximum, will be referred to the Judicial Affairs Officer of the University for disrupting the course.  (Such referral can lead to suspension from the University.)  Students are urged to report to their instructors computer use that they regard as inappropriate (i.e., used for activities that are not class related).

 

Academic Honesty

Faculty will make every reasonable effort to foster honest academic conduct in their courses.  They will secure examinations and their answers so that students cannot have prior access to them and proctor examinations to prevent students from copying or exchanging information.  They will be on the alert for plagiarism.  Faculty will provide additional information, ideally on the green sheet, about other unacceptable procedures in class work and examinations.  Students who are caught cheating will be reported to the Judicial Affairs Officer of the University, as prescribed by Academic Senate Policy S04-12. 

 

8/04

 

 

 

 

Mission

The College of Business is the institution of opportunity, providing innovative business education and applied research for the Silicon Valley region.