GLOSSARY	Portfolio Management for New Products
	Portfolio Management for New Products

Portfolio Management for New Products is a process to manage large numbers of new product development projects and R & D activities.

New Product Portfolio Management typically covers some or all of the following ? new products, innovation and renovation projects, planned initiatives, existing products and services.

The underlying goals of New Product Portfolio Management are to maximize the return from constrained resources, within an acceptable level of risk. Specifically, this means that a disciplined mechanism must be in place to assess and approve investment decisions, and then to track and manage the benefit realization.

The concepts used in New Product Portfolio Management have their roots in financial portfolio management. However, there are many differences. Firstly, new products typically aim to address a range of strategic and marketing goals, as opposed to a singular focus on financial return. Secondly, new products and R&D projects are not as easily traded as financial investments - put another way there are typically large costs incurred to close down one project and switch resources to another. Thirdly, projects typically demand a complex and usually constrained mix of resources, probably requiring different skills or roles to be filled.

Portfolio management for new products combines a number of approaches to prioritize and select projects, in order to maximize value, align to strategic goals, maintain the right balance and optimize the use of resources.

New Product Portfolio Management is closely tied to Stage Gate or other similar process to manage projects through their lifecycle. Portfolio Management for new products integrates closely with Stage Gate processes, as gate decisions are effectively the point of control over what projects are selected and funded through the portfolio pipeline.

More on Portfolio Management for New Products at:

• Project Portfolio Management

See main page on Project Portfolio Management Software Solutions