Adoption of behaviour: predicting success for major innovations

Purpose The goal of this article is to show that memetics is particularly useful to predict the adoption of major innovations. Design/methodology/approach Describes how TNO Telecom, an applied research institute in The Netherlands, adopted the theory of memetics to develop an instrument that predicts the adoption of major innovations. Explains and defines relevant aspects of this focus. Findings Initial results are encouraging and suggest that the approach may provide qualitatively better results than the existing methods when applied to major innovations. Originality/value Describes for the first time how the theory of memetics can be used to gain a real insight into the market adoption of major innovations as well as to focus and optimise product development.