Technological expectation and consumer preferences for product form

Abstract

Increasingly, manufacturers address consumers' fear of product obsolescence by offering products in a modular form, hence allowing the consumer to replace or upgrade components as needed. The extant literature, however, has not studied consumers' responses to product modularity. This study explores how consumers weigh potential benefits (e.g., alleviate obsolescence concerns) vis-a- vis downsides (e.g., magnify complexity perceptions) to arrive at product-form preferences. The study further extends the literature by showing product lifecycle stages and order-of-entry to moderate the impact of product modularity on consumer preferences. © 2011.