Sustaining vs. Disruptive Innovation: What's the Difference?

Innovation is on the minds of professionals across industries, and rightfully so. Strategizing for innovation can enable businesses to provide customers with continued value, create new market segments, and push competitors out of segments they once owned.

According to a recent McKinsey Global Survey, 84 percent of executives feel innovation is extremely or very important to their companies’ growth strategies. When formulating a business strategy, understanding the different types of innovation can help you conceptualize your business’s place in its industry, identify what your current innovation strategy is and if you’d like to change it, and recognize competitors’ innovation strategies.

These insights can inform innovation strategies that drive purposeful, proactive product decisions to disrupt an industry or avoid being disrupted by another organization.

The two types of innovation are sustaining and disruptive. Here’s a breakdown of each, the key factors that differentiate them, and the importance of incorporating disruptive innovation into your strategic mindset.

What Is Sustaining Innovation?

Sustaining innovation occurs when a company creates better-performing products to sell for higher profits to its best customers. Typically, sustaining innovation is a strategy used by companies already successful in their industries. The motivating factor in sustaining innovation is profit; by creating better products for its best customers, a business can pursue ever-higher profit margins.

One example discussed in the online course Disruptive Strategy is the introduction of laptops in the computing industry. Laptop computers were a sustaining innovation that followed the personal desktop computer. The computers’ qualities and abilities were roughly equal, with the laptop offering novel portability. This leveled-up version of the same product catered to desktop users willing to pay for the increased flexibility the laptop provided.

In a vacuum, relying on sustaining innovation is a sound strategy that involves continually creating better versions of your product to gain higher profit margins from customers who are willing to pay. Yet, some of the most successful companies built on sustaining innovation fail.

“Why is it that good companies run by good, smart people find it so hard to sustain their success?” Harvard Business School Professor Clayton Christensen asks in Disruptive Strategy. “In our research, success is very hard to sustain. The common reason why successful companies fail is this phenomenon we call ‘disruption.’”

What Is Disruptive Innovation?

Disruptive innovation—the second type of innovation and the force behind disruption—occurs when a company with fewer resources moves upmarket and challenges an incumbent business. There are two types of disruptive innovation:

• Low-end disruption, in which a company uses a low-cost business model to enter at the bottom of an existing market and claim a segment


• New-market disruption, in which a company creates and claims a new segment in an existing market by catering to an underserved customer base

Both types of disruptive innovation cause the incumbent company—which relies on sustaining innovation—to retreat upmarket rather than fight the new entrant. This is because the entrant has selected a segment (either at the bottom of the existing market or a new market segment) in which profit margins are relatively low. The incumbent company’s innovation strategy is driven by higher profit margins, causing them to pull out of the segment in question and focus on those with even higher profit margins.

As the entrant’s product offerings improve, it moves into segments with those higher profit margins. Once again, the incumbent company is motivated to retreat upmarket rather than fight for the lower-profit market segments.

Eventually, the entrant pushes the incumbent out of the market altogether, having improved its product so much that it claims all existing market segments or renders the incumbent’s products obsolete.

Returning to the example of the computing industry, the introduction of smartphones was a disruptive innovation, specifically new-market disruption. Smartphones catered to a new market segment of customers who didn’t need the level of capabilities offered by a laptop—basic, convenient internet access at a fraction of the cost of a desktop or laptop computer was enough. As the quality of smartphones improves, the laptop and desktop may be pushed further upmarket and, eventually, into obsolescence.

Related: 3 Examples of Disruptive Technology Changing the Market

Sustaining vs. Disruptive Innovation: Key Differentiators

1. Product Quality and Performance

The first differentiator between sustaining and disruptive innovation is product performance relative to existing products in the market. Sustaining innovation strives to create products that perform better and are of higher quality than those that already exist. Disruptive innovations, on the other hand, aim to create “good enough” products.

This “good enough” quality appeals to customers in low-end and new market segments and typically doesn’t take business away from high-paying customers who expect the best quality products.

2. Target Audience

Closely related to product performance and quality, another key difference between the innovation types is their target audiences.

While sustaining innovation targets customers willing to pay relatively high prices for high-quality products, disruptive innovation caters to those who are overserved by current product offerings—meaning they don’t need all the features that come with an expensive price tag. These customers, found in low-end and new market segments, are in search of a “good enough” product at a reasonable price.

3. Business Model

The final differentiator between sustaining and disruptive innovation is the business model. Disruptive innovations rely on a low-cost, low-profit business model, whereas sustaining innovations rely on a high-profit business model.

This difference is essential, because if a disruptive innovation yields a higher profit margin, the incumbent business would be motivated to fight for share of the segment.

Maintaining a Disruptive Mindset

While both types of innovation are useful and can help garner success, companies that rely solely on sustaining innovation are susceptible to disruption. If you work at a mature organization, developing a strategy that incorporates both disruptive and sustaining innovation can enable you to compete at either end of the market.

If your company is a new market entrant and has an opportunity to disrupt an existing incumbent business, your strategy is solely disruptive. Yet, as you continue to move upmarket, your business may become the incumbent and rely on sustaining innovation. Don’t let success undermine the importance of a disruptive mindset; just as your business disrupted the incumbent, so can another business disrupt yours.

Awareness of the types of innovation and how each plays into a successful strategy is the first step to preparing and strategizing for disruption. Consider taking a course like Disruptive Strategy to learn from the successes and challenges of real business leaders and apply their insights to your business strategy.

Are you interested in driving innovation for your organization? Explore our six-week course Disruptive Strategy to learn the tools, frameworks, and intuition to develop winning strategies.