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The toy-titan was mystified when despite success- fully selling its famous Barbie doll in dozens of countries without any modifications, sales refused to pick up in the Japanese market. Takara, its Japanese licensee, decided to survey eighth-grade girls to account for the resistance from the market.
The Barbie bloomer soon became clear; Japanese girls could not relate to the doll as her breasts were too big and her legs too long. They modified the Japanese Barbie, and sales shot up. Hardly surprising then, that today, Mattel has made the quintessential blonde bombshell into a demure, dark-haired, sari-clad woman for the Indian market.
• A firm can produce a city version, for example a beer to meet Tokyo tastes.
3 Product invention is about creating something new. Research suggests two types. Backward invention is reintroducing earlier product forms that are well suited to a foreign country’s needs. The National Cash Register Company sold crank operated cash registers at half the price of a more up-to-date cash register and sold large numbers in Latin America and Africa. There is a growing interest in products for developing nations – not only is it a huge potential market but there is a sense that beyond the economic opportunity it is also an opportunity to help the people advance themselves. The second type is forward invention, not surprisingly, creating a new product to meet a need in another country. This type of invention is also of particular value in the developing world. There is a considerable need in the developing world for low-cost, high-protein foods. A number of firms, including Monsanto, Swift Foods and Quaker Oats are creating new food products to meet this need. Furthermore, new technologies are being created to enhance existing capabilities given the limitations of various infrastructures. Villages in central Africa do not have easily accessible power sources, rendering many standard technologies, such as computers, ineffective. Thanks to forward invention, laptops equipped with batteries that are recharged by turning a crank, allow