Technology Disruption in the Simulation Industry

Abstract

The military simulation industry has been transformed by technological advances multiple times in its history. In some cases those changes have come from within the industry, and in others they have been introduced from outside of the mainstream and have disrupted the established status quo. These external disruptions have traditionally made significant contributions to the state of the art in the field. However, in doing so they have negated millions of dollars in government funding that could have been more valuably applied had the sponsors understood the disruptive forces that were at work. These events have also overturned a number of leading companies in the field and replaced them with upstarts whose technology contained the seeds for future advances.

In this paper, we explore the impact that computer game technologies are having on the simulation industry. These technologies initially provided low-end capabilities for a small niche of the industry. However, over time they have improved to the point that they are more powerful than many of the established tools in the field. This disruption is following the well-established innovation model that was put forward by Harvard professor Clayton Christensen. Game technologies entered the industry as a “toy” application, but they now offer the foundation upon which the next generation of successful systems will be built. PC game technologies are just one of the waves of disruption that are entering and will permanently change the simulation industry. Future disruptions will arise from game consoles, web-based 3-D environments, and wireless technologies. These disruptions will spur the growth of new types of companies and threaten the positions of established companies in the industry. There are technological and economical forces at work in the gaming and military simulation markets that will create a wave of change throughout the industry. This wave will spread cheaper, more powerful, and more accessible simulations and simulators across the modern military.