Bridging the ‘Concept–Product’ gap in new product development: Emerging insights from the application of artificial intelligence in FinTech SMEs
研究了金融科技中小企业如何开发基于人工智能的创新，识别出两种加速创新、缩小概念-产品差距的方法，并构建了四种开发过程配置，可作为诊断工具帮助相关企业有效利用AI创新。
Building on the literature on the concept-product gap in new product development, we examine how FinTech SMEs are developing Artificial Intelligence (AI)-based innovations and which organisational or project factors best contribute to the acceleration of AI innovation. The empirical evidence collected from interviews with key stakeholders, practitioners’ forums, and public company documents yields two distinct approaches that differ in their potential for accelerating innovation and reducing the concept-product gap. From a contingency perspective, these two approaches are expanded into four distinct development process configurations, contingent on the business development stage, reliance on 3rd party platforms, availability of high volumes of data, investment level, organisational agility, and level of novelty. The resulting process typology could be used as a diagnostic tool for FinTech SMEs interested in effectively leveraging AI innovation. Using contingency theory, we further develop these insights into a new theoretical framework to explain how AI innovation development unfolds in FinTech SMEs and the rationale for different implementations. Our new process typology and theoretical model can help researchers investigate the mechanisms underlying technological innovation processes. We further identify the specific reasons why the potential of AI for creating new services and disrupting incumbents via digital startups has not been fully realised even in contexts with significant investment and support from public and private business development programmes. This field is still rapidly evolving, and thus, new areas for future research are also highlighted.