In the New New Product Development Game, Takeuchi Hirotaka (1946-) and Nonaka Ikujiro (1935-) proposed a new way of developing new products based on the analogy of a rugby game. They contrasted the way a rugby team moves forwards by passing the ball from one person to another as they move down the field with the kind of sequential strings of individual operations (akin to a relay race) common in traditional product development. They used the word "Scrum" for the first time to highlight the need for the team to come together as they progress the ball forwards, the general idea being to move the scrum down the field as a unit.

The New New Product Development Game is therefore a holistic method in which the team has a level of unity that goes beyond mere collaboration. Takeuchi identified six key characteristics of the approach: built-in instability, self-organising project teams, overlapping development phases, multilearning, subtle control, and organizational transfer of learning. The positive results of the approach are speed and flexibility, in addition to becoming a change agent within an organisation; the New New Product Development Game was proposed as a vehicle for introducing creative, market-driven ideas and processes into an organisation. There are many potential ways to implement this concept, and one particular implementation pathway has subsequently become popular and taken on the name "Scrum". Therefore a distinction has arisen between "Takeuchi and Nonaka's Scrum" and "Scrum".