For products where technology is an integral part of product performance, competition often focuses on continuous technological improvement. In such markets, a company must make products less costly and technology better. Increasingly, companies achieve competitive advantage in the global market place by offering customers a continuous stream of technologically improved products. Market perceived quality includes anticipating a customer's future needs and being ready with technologically improved product.
The japanese, who are seen as providing the market with superior quality products are adept at continuously incorporating technological changes and constantly improving their products with a series of small incremental steps than in large jump "Kaizen" "Katzen" as this process is called "means gradual, unending improvements, doing little things better, setting and achieving even higher standard". The concept of "Kaizen" and encourages marketers in the effort at developing new products, to do it better, make it better, improve it better, because if this is not done, they can't compete with those who do.
The japanese are seen as gaining a competitive advantage through flexible manufacturing that permits them to respond to changing customer needs and to incorporate incremental technology cull improvements quickly and costs effectively ahead of competitors. An incremental product approach increases the speed of a new product introductions, meet the demands of a rapidly changing marketplace and helps to capture large market shares.
