by Jeffrey Morrison Director of Modeling
Equifax Corporation
(jeff.morrison@suntrust.com)
Forecasters have always struggled with how best to develop realistic projections
in an environment where historical data and adequate market research may
be scarce. Although new product forecasters are faced with even more challenges
in this area, some statistical modeling techniques used to analyze mature
products can be applied to new products to provide valuable insight into
long run market acceptance.
This is the last article in a three part series discussing quantitative forecasting
techniques for new product forecasting.
In the last article (Visions, October 1999), we looked at Jim who had recently
been promoted to Product Manager in a national sports equipment company,
ABC Athletics. The research group had just completed the development of a
new golf ball that travels 20% further than anything on the market. The financial
people needed a ten-year forecast for demand and revenue. One of Jimís
main tasks in his new job was to develop a sales forecast that he could sell
as "believable" to the very conservative vice-president of Finance. By using
some relatively straightforward regression techniques and information from
a survey, Jim was able to develop a variety of "whatif" scenarios related
to the anticipated long run market penetration for the new product. http://www.pdma.org/visions/apr00/forecasting.html
http://www.audioscience.com/internet/oem/oem.htm
