IPL: Non-Disruptive Innovation

 IPL as a non-disruptive innovation

The Indian Premier League is an example of how all innovation is not necessarily disruptive. 

IPL cannot be considered a disruptive innovation because it does not disrupt any existing market. Yes, it did postpone the releases of many Indian movies. However, rather than disrupting an existing industry, IPL is creating a new market of its own and seizing an opportunity. It changed the way cricket was perceived in India and brought onboard numerous segments of the society that traditionally, never found cricket interesting. Truly innovative, IPL formed a niche of its own in the intersection of cricket and Bollywood in cricketainment. Although disruption is certainly a driver for market creation, there are considerable opportunities to create new markets and industries without disrupting or displacing the existing order, and IPL proves this case. 

Today, every new innovation which has become widely adopted and successful is considered as a disruptive innovation. However, Clayton Christensen who coined the term ‘disruptive innovation’, in his 1997 book ‘The Innovator’s Dilemma’, disagrees with calling every great innovation a disruptive innovation. The theory of disruptive innovation goes that a smaller company with fewer resources can unseat an established, successful business by targeting segments of the market that have been neglected by the incumbent, typically because it is focusing on more profitable areas. IPL does not meet any of the criterions of a disruptive innovation coined by Christensen. I neither unseated any established business nor did it target audiences that were neglected earlier. 

Traditionally, cricket was played to test the players’ physical and mental strength instead of creating a chilling and thrilling competition. The IPL changed this and shifted the focus of the cricket match to the viewers and offered what they valued. By doing so, the IPL created the league of cricketainment, innovating a dynamic sporting event that combined the gentleman’s sport of cricket with Masti filled Bollywood entertainment. And changed the way cricket is perceived within the country, and even around the world. What the BCCI did by launching the IPL is to create a new and dynamic market of its own. 

 Before the IPL came about there was nothing even remotely similar to it of this grand scale. It did reduce the viewership of movies, during a few months of the year and television programs lost out on views, during the IPL season. However, the impacts were not large enough to proclaim IPL destructive. Every innovation has direct and indirect impacts on different markets. These effects of innovation, do not necessarily make it disruptive. For IPL’s arrival did not majorly impact Bollywood, to an extent that they stopped producing movies, hence it would be incorrect to consider it disruptive innovation. 

A true example of disruptive innovation is the online streaming platform Netflix which disrupted the movie rental industry, headed by Blockbuster. They initially started by offering mail-in subscription service for movies, online. However, this was a truly low-quality product, compared to the on-demand movie rentals provided by Blockbuster offline at the time. Only customers that  Netflix obtained were online shoppers, and people who did not particularly care about new releases. These were customers who were overlooked by Blockbuster, who chose low quality and low-price. Eventually, Netflix moved upmarket and started offering mainstream products for all customer bases, and completely disrupted the former industry giant Blockbuster, forcing them to eventually shut down all operations. The Netflix example shows what true disruptive innovation is and how it differs from creative non-disruptive innovation. 

IPL has been successful in creating a new requirement and an adequate solution for the newly created requirement. It created a need for an entertaining sporting competition and created one that was filled with glamorous cricket matches alongside performances by Bollywood stars. According to Christensen, a truly disruptive business starts with a low-quality product, then ultimately covers the mainstream market by improving quality. Innovations like the IPL and the taxi-booking app Uber don’t meet this criterion, they are truly innovative but not disruptive. They are non-destructive creative innovations. And are disproving the myth that you have to disrupt, to not get disrupted.