305 research outputs found
General Purpose Technologies "Engines of Growth?"
Whole eras of technical progress and economic growth appear to be driven by a few key technologies, which we call General Purpose Technologies (GPT's). Thus the steam engine and the electric motor may have played such a role in the past, whereas semiconductors and computers may be doing as much in our era. GPT's are characterized by pervasiveness (they are used as inputs by many downstream sectors), inherent potential for technical improvements, and innovational complementarities', meaning that the productivity of R&D in downstream sectors increases as a consequence of innovation in the GPT. Thus, as GPT's improve they spread throughout the economy, bringing about generalized productivity gains. Our analysis shows that the characteristics of GPT's imply a sort of increasing returns to scale phenomenon, and that this may have a large role to play in determining the rate of technical advance; on the other hand this phenomenon makes it difficult for a decentralized economy to fully exploit the growth opportunities offered by evolving GPT's. In particular; if the relationship between the GPT and its users is limited to arms-length market transactions, there will be "too little, too late" innovation in both sectors. Likewise, difficulties in forecasting the technological developments of the other side may lower the rate of technical advance of all sectors. Lastly, we show that the analysis of GPT's has testable implications in the context of R&D and productivity equations, that can in principle be estimated.
Market Segmentation and the Sources of Rents from Innovation: Personal Computers in the Late 1980's
This paper evaluates the sources of transitory market power in the market for personal computers (PCs) during the late 1980's. Our analysis is motivated by the coexistence of low entry barriers into the PC industry and high rates of innovative investment by a small number of PC manufacturers. We attempt to understand these phenomena by measuring the role that different principles of product differentiation (PDs) played in segmenting this dynamic market. Our first PD measures the substitutability between Frontier (386-based) and Non- Frontier products, while the second PD measures the advantage of a brand-name reputation (e.g., by IBM). Building on advances in the measurement of product differentiation, we measure the separate roles that these PDs played in contributing to transitory market power. In so doing, this paper attempts to account for the market origins of innovative rents in the PC industry. Our principal finding is that, during the late 1980's, the PC market was highly segmented along both the Branded (B versus NB) and Frontier (F versusNF) dimensions. The effects of competitive events in any one cluster were confined mostly to that particular cluster, with little effect on other clusters. For example, less than 5% of the market share achieved by a hypothetical entrant would be market-stealing from other clusters. In addition, the product diffe- rentiation advantages of B and F were qualitatively different. The main advantage of F was limited to the isolation from NF competitors it provided; Brandedness both shifted out the product demand curve as well as segmenting B products from NB competition. These results help explain how transitory market power (arising from market segmentation) shaped the underlying incen- tives for innovation in the PC industry during the mid to late 1980s.
Consistency and trends of technological innovations: a network approach to the international patent classification data
Classifying patents by the technology areas they pertain is important to enable information search and facilitate policy analysis and socio-economic studies. Based on the OECD Triadic Patent Family database, this study constructs a cohort network based on the grouping of IPC subclasses in the same patent families, and a citation network based on citations between subclasses of patent families citing each other. This paper presents a systematic analysis approach which obtains naturally formed network clusters identified using a Lumped Markov Chain method, extracts community keys traceable over time, and investigates two important community characteristics: consistency and changing trends. The results are verified against several other methods, including a recent research measuring patent text similarity. The proposed method contributes to the literature a network-based approach to study the endogenous community properties of an exogenously devised classification system. The application of this method may improve accuracy and efficiency of the IPC search platform and help detect the emergence of new technologies
How citation boosts promote scientific paradigm shifts and Nobel Prizes
Nobel Prizes are commonly seen to be among the most prestigious achievements
of our times. Based on mining several million citations, we quantitatively
analyze the processes driving paradigm shifts in science. We find that
groundbreaking discoveries of Nobel Prize Laureates and other famous scientists
are not only acknowledged by many citations of their landmark papers.
Surprisingly, they also boost the citation rates of their previous
publications. Given that innovations must outcompete the rich-gets-richer
effect for scientific citations, it turns out that they can make their way only
through citation cascades. A quantitative analysis reveals how and why they
happen. Science appears to behave like a self-organized critical system, in
which citation cascades of all sizes occur, from continuous scientific progress
all the way up to scientific revolutions, which change the way we see our
world. Measuring the "boosting effect" of landmark papers, our analysis reveals
how new ideas and new players can make their way and finally triumph in a world
dominated by established paradigms. The underlying "boost factor" is also
useful to discover scientific breakthroughs and talents much earlier than
through classical citation analysis, which by now has become a widespread
method to measure scientific excellence, influencing scientific careers and the
distribution of research funds. Our findings reveal patterns of collective
social behavior, which are also interesting from an attention economics
perspective. Understanding the origin of scientific authority may therefore
ultimately help to explain, how social influence comes about and why the value
of goods depends so strongly on the attention they attract.Comment: 6 pages, 6 figure
A full degree-of-freedom photonic crystal spatial light modulator
Harnessing the full complexity of optical fields requires complete control of
all degrees-of-freedom within a region of space and time -- an open goal for
present-day spatial light modulators (SLMs), active metasurfaces, and optical
phased arrays. Here, we solve this challenge with a programmable photonic
crystal cavity array enabled by four key advances: (i) near-unity vertical
coupling to high-finesse microcavities through inverse design, (ii) scalable
fabrication by optimized, 300 mm full-wafer processing, (iii)
picometer-precision resonance alignment using automated, closed-loop
"holographic trimming", and (iv) out-of-plane cavity control via a high-speed
micro-LED array. Combining each, we demonstrate near-complete spatiotemporal
control of a 64-resonator, two-dimensional SLM with nanosecond- and
femtojoule-order switching. Simultaneously operating wavelength-scale modes
near the space- and time-bandwidth limits, this work opens a new regime of
programmability at the fundamental limits of multimode optical control.Comment: 25 pages, 20 figure
Technological diversification within UK’s small serial innovators
This paper investigates the determinants of technological diversification among UK’s small serial innovators (SSIs). Using a longitudinal study of 339 UK-based small businesses accounting for almost 7000 patents between 1990 and 2006, this study constitutes the first empirical examination of technological diversification among SMEs in the literature. Results demonstrate that technological diversification is not solely a large firm activity, challenging the dominant view that innovative SMEs are extremely focused and specialised players with little technological diversification. Our findings suggest a nonlinear (i.e. inverse-U-shaped) relationship between the level of technological opportunities in the environment and the SSIs’ degree of technological diversification. This points to a trade-off between processes of exploration and exploitation across increasingly volatile technology regimes. The paper also demonstrates that small firms with impactful innovations focus their innovative activity around similar technological capabilities while firms that have introduced platform technologies in the past are more likely to engage in technological diversification
International patent families: from application strategies to statistical indicators
This paper provides an in-depth analysis of the characteristics of international patent families, including their domestic component. We exploit a relatively under-studied feature of patent families, namely the number of patents covering the same invention within a given jurisdiction. Using this information, we highlight common patterns in the structure of international patent families, which reflect both the patenting strategies of innovators and the peculiarities of the different patent systems. While the literature has extensively used family size, i.e. the number of countries in which a given invention is protected, as a measure of patent value, our results suggest that the number of patent filings in the priority country within a patent family as well as the timespan between the first and last fillings within a family are other insightful indicators of the value of patented innovations
Structural versus experienced complexity: a new perspective on the relationship between organizational complexity and innovation
In this paper, we explore the relationship between organizational complexity and firm-level innovation. We define and operationalize a new construct, experienced complexity, which is the extent to which the organizational environment makes it challenging for decision-makers to do their jobs effectively. We distinguish experienced complexity from structural complexity, which is the elements of the organization, such as the number of reporting lines or integrating mechanisms, that are deliberately put in place to help the organization deliver on its objectives, and we argue that structural complexity correlates positively with firm-level innovation while experienced complexity correlates negatively with innovation. Using a novel dataset combining survey and objective data on 209 large firms, we find support for our arguments
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