Letting the market work for you: an evolutionary perspective on product strategy
研究了管理者如何在产品多样性与生产效率之间权衡，以及定期淘汰产品的程度，发现产品多样性的价值取决于行业竞争生态：市场产品越多则多样性价值越低，但需求不确定性越高则价值越高。
Managers must choose to allocate scarce resources either to the maintenance of a range of products tailored to heterogeneous consumer preferences or to the efficient production of a small number of products. In addition, managers must choose the degree to which they periodically cull the product line. Vigorous selection removes poor performers from the product line, but this action simultaneously impairs the firm's ability to monitor changes in consumer preferences. Empirical evidence from the computer workstation industry reveals that the ideal choice of product variety depends on the competitive ecology of the industry. Product variety becomes less valuable as the total number of products on the market increases, but it increases in value as uncertainty makes the accurate prediction of demand difficult. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.