Low gas wellhead prices in North America have put its shale gas industry under high competitive pressure. Rapid technology innovation can help companies to improve the economic performance of shale gas fields. Cash flow models are paramount for setting effective production and technology innovation targets to achieve positive returns on investment in all-global shale gas plays. Future cash flow of a well (or cluster of wells) may either improve further or deteriorate, depending on: (1) the regional volatility in gas prices at the wellhead - which must pay for the gas resource extraction, and (2) the cost and effectiveness of the well technology used. Gas price is an externality and cannot be controlled by individual companies, but well technology cost can be reduced while improving production output. We assume two plausible scenarios for well technology innovation and model the return on investment while checking against sensitivity to gas price volatility. It appears well technology innovation - if paced fast enough - can fully redeem the negative impact of gas price decline on shale well profits, and the required rates are quantified in our sensitivity analysis. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.