On the other hand, groundbreaking innovations are often made possible by incremental innovations in other areas (such as the improved precision of steel machining tools allowing the creation of cost-efficient gasoline engines).
Yes, continuous improvement is the key to make a new technology become economically efficient, but also it may become enabler as you've mentioned. Though, by breakthrough we usually mean a change of principle how the same objective is achieved better/faster/cheaper etc. This is qualitative change in the first place. Then continuous improvement starts.
On the other hand, groundbreaking innovations are often made possible by incremental innovations in other areas (such as the improved precision of steel machining tools allowing the creation of cost-efficient gasoline engines).
Yes, continuous improvement is the key to make a new technology become economically efficient, but also it may become enabler as you've mentioned. Though, by breakthrough we usually mean a change of principle how the same objective is achieved better/faster/cheaper etc. This is qualitative change in the first place. Then continuous improvement starts.