Featuring high contrast and low power consumption, electronic ink-based displays are used in mainstream products such as e-readers, mobile phones, and watches. Electronic ink’s commercial fate seems secure–—that is, until some other new technology comes along.

Electronic ink’s fate was anything but secure in 1997 when E Ink pioneered the then-brand new technology. Even in 2005, a good eight years after E Ink’s founding, the outlook for electronic ink was grim. A contemporary Harvard Business School case characterized the company as beset by ‘‘numerous false starts’’ and flirtation with various approaches (Yoffie & Mack, 2005, p. 1). I thought of electronic ink’s early days when reading a recent article titled ‘‘The Bumpy Road to New Technology’’ (Plambeck, 2016): The hype of a new technology is outpacing commercial success. Sound familiar?

These days, interestin artificial intelligence has probably never been higher. The biggest companies are chasing it and venture money is flowing toward it. The same could be said for a couple of other technologies: virtual reality and self-driving cars.