Innovation beyond the stage-gate

Factors influencing commercialisation phase within financial services and solutions to mitigate barriers

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Abstract

Financial services industry which used to be relatively traditional is in the midst of change caused by the emergence of FinTech, forcing traditional firms to improve its innovation effectiveness. There exist various studies on corporate entrepreneurship, especially on the fuzzy front-end. However, studies on the back-end phase of innovations for financial services is still severely limited. This study attempted to increase our understanding of factors influencing the innovation outcome, as well as to explore possible solutions to increase effectiveness. A total of twelve factors were identified from literature.

Through an explorative case study and practitioners interviews, the influence of these twelve factors in real-life working situation are determined. The case study was undertaken at a major European bank. Meanwhile, expert interviews were conducted with practitioners from various traditional financial services firms and the academic field. Based on the empirical result, five drivers and three barriers are identified. Several factors are quite applicable for innovation in general, although others are more specific for the financial services industry. Five improvement points are proposed based on the interviews and further literature review. This research contributes to improving empirical knowledge of factors during the commercialisation of service innovation and providing a basis for further research.