[Despegar]

>Winning the "race to 5G" means the US will be the first to innovate in systems that take advantage of faster wireless broadband networks. That's important.

Why is being "first to innovate" important? What happens if we aren't first?

[xvilka]

Sometimes being second means to avoid the mistakes and downfalls of the first. So I would argue it is not the bad position either.

[thaumasiotes]

'The best way to learn something is when somebody else figures it out and tells you, "Don't go in that swamp. There are alligators in there."'

[ori_b]

The first to innovate tends to make the most money off of the innovation.

[Despegar]

Being first is often not a sustainable competitive advantage and we have a good case study in looking at the recent past with 3G and 4G. Apple makes all the profit in smartphones and all the incumbents like Nokia, RIM, Ericsson are gone.

[ori_b]

That's why you need to keep innovating if you want to keep making money. Turns out that doing a thing once isn't sufficient to profit off it for eternity.

[wpietri]

But Apple has rarely been the first to innovate. They were not first in the personal computer, the laptop, the MP3 player, the smartphone, or the smartwatch. Most of the true innovators there are dead.

[sandworm101]

Tell that to disney. IP protections are designed specifically so that a day of innovation may last a lifetime.

[inflatableDodo]

No, the first to innovate tend to be in research roles and rarely make the most money from their work.