Excerpt from Technology Strategy in a Software Products Company The first step of the research was to map the company's Unix product family. We stated that a product family is defined as a set of products that share common core technology and address a related set of market applications. This can be validated for a group of products by applying the technology and market newness criteria proposed by Meyer and Roberts The commonality of technologies and markets leads to efficiency and effectiveness in manufacturing, distribution, and service, where the firm tailors each general resource or capability to the needs of specific products and niches. The technological foundation of the product family is the product platform. A platform is the physical implementation of a technical design that serves as the base architecture for a series of derivative products. Working with three company founders, we proceeded to map the product family of the company under study, identifying its platform versions and follow-on products with an approach adapted from work on assembled products. A number of authors have stressed the importance of managing the evolution and renewal of product architecture for sustained competitive success [5, 18] The architecture of a product refers to its overall design concept. Different architectures result in variation with respect to product functionality, cost, quality and performance. Architectures are both a basis for product innovation and a constraint on the variety of product versions that can be offered. For example, Intel and Motorola have competed for years in supplying computer chips for personal computers. [bm aligned with the Intel architecture (chips designated 8086, 80286, 80386, 80486, while Apple aligned with the Motorola architecture (chips designated 65000, 65010, 65020, 65030, 65040, Both chips relegated the earlier Zilog architecture (the Z80 chip used with early Tandy /radio Shack pcs) to an insignificant presence in today's chip market. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.