纳米技术的技术转移模式外文文献

Which model of technology transfer for nanotechnology A comparison with biotech and microelectronics Corine Genet n Khalid Errabi Caroline Gauthier Grenoble Ecole de Management GEM 12 rue Pierre Se mard 38000 Grenoble France a r t i c l e i n f o Available online 25 November 2011 Keywords Nanotechnology Biotechnology Microelectronics Technology transfer a b s t r a c t Nanotechnologies are often presented as breakthrough innovations where technology transfer and knowledge bridging will play a pivotal role in the industrial dynamics This article investigates the model of knowledge transfer in the nanotechnologies in depth by comparing it with the models of two recently emerged technologies biotech and microelectronics Our results show that the nanotechnol ogy transfer model is very different from that involved in biotechnology evolution while small medium fi rms play a valuable technology bringing role the central function of translating new knowledge between public research and industry is carried by the larger fi rms just as it was in the early stages of the microelectronics sector These results suggest that specifi c policy initiatives to facilitate biotech s transfer are inappropriate to boost the diffusion of nanotechnology Kostoff et al 2007 Romig et al 2007 Nanotechnologies are technologically multidisciplinary Bhat 2005 Salerno et al 2008 and have cross industrial utility Linton and Walsh 2004 product and process applications have been and are being developed in areas ranging from medicine electronics optics telecommunications aerospace to energy Niosi and Reid 2007 Nanotechnology is seen as a breakthrough innovation Robinson 2009 with technology transfer and knowledge bridging playing pivotal roles in its birth and growth Rothaermel and Thursby 2007 But very little is known about the model of technology transfer in nanotechnology Nikulainen and Palmberg 2010 and Palmberg 2008 discussed specifi c aspects of nanotech nology transfer the differences in perceptions of university and fi rms researchers Palmberg 2008 and the intensity with which universityresearchersareengagedinnanotechnology related research Nikulainen and Palmberg 2010 But the nanotechnology literature still leaves the roles of small and large fi rms in the technology transfer model unclear and we aim to contribute to our understanding by extending the discussion towards their respective roles in this model Aiming to help guide decision makers in making the right choices for its further development we investigate the model of technology transfer in the nanotech sector in depth by comparing the evolution of nanotech with those of two other recently emerged technologies biotechnology and micro electronics each of which has held out the innovative prospect of producing existing products using completely new sets of technical competencies Walsh et al 2002 Linton and Walsh 2004 describe the biotech microelectronics and nanotech process technologies as materials based technologies with concurrent product and process innovation curves and regard them as the likely engines of future economic growth Nanotechnologiesareoftencomparedtobiotechnologies because of the breakthroughs the latter have generated in the pharmaceutical industry Zucker and Darby 1997 The growth of nanotechnologies has been seen as threatening the leadership of established fi rms in the same way threatening to render their accumulated expertise redundant Hill and Rothaermel 2003 Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect journal homepage Technovation 0166 4972 see front matter Shane 2000 Such new entrants are seen as being better placed to take advantage of disruptive technologies than are incumbents who may suffer from organizational inertia and face the prospect of having to cannibalize their own markets Christensen 1997 Hendersen and Clark 1990 Tushman and Anderson 1986 If the comparison with biotechnologies holds small medium fi rms SMEs are likely to play a key role in the industrial dynamics of nanotechnologies leading to industrial architectures that include increasing numbers of dedicated spin offs focused on bringing nanotechnology processes tools and fi rst generation materials devices and systems to market Chachamidou and Logothetidis 2008 But the evolution of nanotechnologies may also be compared to that of microelectronics although here the comparison seems to point to a different industrial landscape Linton and Walsh 2008 show similarities in the innovation processes of nanotech products and the fabrication of micro semiconductors Abernathy and Utterback 1978 have highlighted how large fi rms such as Fairchild Semiconductors IBM and Texas Instruments played the fundamental roles in this fi eld s fi rst development phases in the 1960s and 1970s while Rothaermel and Thursby 2007 point to the similar pattern of early involvement of large incumbent fi rms and the later entry of small fi rms in the fi eld of nanotechnologies The development of nanotechnologies requires the kind of wide ranging knowledge base that incumbent fi rms tend to possess Mangematin et al in press implying that they will predominate in both the exploration and commercialization phases of potential nanotechnology applications and that small medium fi rms will play lesser roles This research focuses on the roles small medium fi rms play in the knowledge transfer model of this new technology as against those taken by large fi rms Empirical evidence has often showed that SMEs are more effi cient innovators than larger fi rms as illustrated by Walsh and Kirchhoff s 2002 analysis of the SAMPLES technology transfer program So this paper addresses the questions What role do SMEs play in the co production and translation of knowledge Are they central as in the biotech sector Are they just one of several avenues via which knowledge and technology is transferred from academy to industry Or do they operate in the same way SMEs do in the microelectronic sector as suppliers of specialist equipment to large companies To explore the model of knowledge transfer in nanotechnol ogy we built a database of the approximately 10 000 fi rms which patented in nanotechnologies between 1990 and 2008 using a validated search strategy based on keywords Mougotov and Kahane 2007 to extract patents from PatStat and then cross referenced this database against ORBIS to retrieve fi rms fi nancial data so as to identify and extract large and small fi rms Our paper is structured as follows fi rst we question the model of knowl edge transfer in nanotechnology by considering the patterns of technological evolution in the biotechnology and microelectronics industries then we describe our empirical data and analysis methods and fi nally present and discuss our results 2 Are the knowledge transfer models of nanotechnology biotechnology and microelectronics similar 2 1 Comparing nanotechnology with biotechnology Many scholars Rothaermel and Thursby 2007 Zucker and Darby 1997 Niosi and Reid 2007 Youtie and Shapira 2008 fi nd that nanotechnology and biotechnology have exhibited similar technological evolutionary patterns The pattern of biotechnology development has largely been based on the creation of research intensive SMEs Orsenigo 1989 Orsenigo et al 2001 Gambardella 1995 Sharp 1985 Kenney 1986 usually university spin offs formed through the collaboration of a scientist and a professional manager backed by venture capital aimed at applying new scien tifi c discoveries to commercial product development Mangematin et al 2003 Catherine et al 2004 In many cases these spin offs benefi ted from access to top world experts on specifi c topics with the fi rms expertise essentially developing in research areas directly related to the scientifi c fi eld of their expert s original laboratory The products of these SMEs were almost exclusively research within relatively narrow ranges and in terms of their ability to translate their research into innovations such fi rms typically lacked critical assets in areas such as manufacturing testing and marketing and access to either regulatory agencies or to pharma ceutical or food industry distribution channels Senker and Sharp 1997 In order to integrate their biotechnology innovation cap abilities they had to develop different forms of collaboration with established fi rms Audretsch and Feldman 2003 It has been argued that since large pharmaceutical companies were committed to the old organic chemistry paradigm where all their competences were concentrated they could not easily internalize this new biotechnological knowledge and that few of them had the absorp tive capacity required to internalize the new paradigm or could construct such a capacity rapidly Pyka and Saviotti 2005 So these collaborative arrangements between small and large fi rms provided both partners with access to the competences and assets they lacked large companies to the SMEs scientifi c discoveries to sustain their product pipelines and SMEs to commercial markets with the potential of receiving royalties if their discoveries succeeded there Consequently the biotechnology industry is characterized by a network structure of inter organizational alliances between the different actors involved research institutions and large and small medium fi rms in which the latter are seen as a nexus mediating between the scientists and the large established commercial players Mangematin et al 2003 In such frame works the SMEs play a key role in the process of co producing and translating knowledge acting essentially to bridge the gap between public research institutions and large chemical and pharmaceutical companies buying research outputs from their discoverers developing or refi ning them towards specifi c objec tives and then selling this knowledge on to larger partners for downstream commercialization Greis et al 1995 Zucker and Darby 1997 Orsenigo 1989 argues that this specialization of biotech start ups y provided an institutional solution to the transfer problem and Orsenigo et al 2001 refer to these new organizations as specialized technology originators while Pyka and Saviotti 2005 refer to their role as translators The biotech technology transfer model thus has SMEs as its central economic actors Zucker et al 2007 argue that the evolution of nanotechnol ogy is following the same pattern fi rms are entering where and when academics scientists publish breakthrough articles They suggest that the production of nanotechnological knowledge is embedded in the wider social context of cross institutional collaboration and expect development patterns to be based on strong ties between academe and industry leading to the creation of spin offs In their framework the process of knowledge transfer from academic science and engineering to industrial application involves SMEs mediation Zucker et al 2007 Top scientists involvement contributed importantly to the appropriability of biotechnology inventions and a similar process appears to have started in nanotechnology Zucker et al 2007 In such high technology sectors newly founded fi rms have been seen as the main drivers of technological change and it has been argued that this type of actor is likely again to be in a better position than C Genet et al Technovation 32 2012 205 215206 larger fi rms to exploit the new opportunities created by the emergence of nanotechnologies Bhat 2005 To examine whether the technological transfer model of nanotechnology mirrors that of the biotechnology industry in terms of the role of SMEs we test Proposition 1 SMEs play a key role in co producing and transfer ring knowledge in nanotechnology by acting as a node of high centrality between public research and large fi rms in nanotech co patenting networks 2 2 Comparing nanotechnology with microelectronics Abernathy and Utterback 1978 Peck 1986 and Braun and MacDonald 1978 have all stressed the fundamental role that large fi rms played in the early stages of the microelectronics industry Peck 1986 and Levin 1982 point out that there was no profound interaction between scientifi c theory and technolo gical practice during the fi rst years of the transistor s develop ment the integrated circuit concept did not rest on any novel application of scientifi c theory but was rather an engineering achievement In the same vein Mowery 1983 argues that the evolution of the industry s structure is best explained by refer ence to the central role of manufacturing processes the pure science input into semiconductor innovation currently is rather modest it is production engineering that is critical Arcangeli et al 1991 pointed out that the accumulation of knowledge in the early stages of the industry was mainly based on the history technical knowledge and forms of corporate organization inherited from electromechanical technologies and Braun and MacDonald 1978 explained that in the fi rst two decades of the computer and semiconductor industries large integrated produ cers such as AT Mowery 1984 Murovec and Prodan 2009 Vinding 2006 have highlighted how internal R Wasserman and Faust 1994 to map the links between actors involved in such activities i e universities hospitals nonprofi t institutions and governmental institutions so as to yield a complete visual representation of the network of their linkages Network analysis a methodology developed within graph theory framework is increasingly used to study the industry links between different but interrelated groups of actors and network scholars have developed an enormous array of conceptual and methodological toolsforanalyzingdifferentstructuresoftheinteractions between actors Scott 1991 Wasserman and Faust 1994 3 1 Data acquisition To build a database of fi rms involved in nanotechnologies we collected a data set of nanotechnology related patents from 1990 to 2009 from the PATSTAT EPO http www epo org database which collects data coming from 73 offi ces worldwide We identifi ed 617 000 nanotechnology applications from more than 65 000 000 patents PATSTAT listed in our focal period and used a keyword based approach to select a subset of the patents related to nano technologies Mougotov and Kahane 2007 We found that 9447 companies had patented in nanotechnologies over our study period We then matched this database with ORBIS http www to retrieve economic and fi nancial information about our data set fi rms ORBIS is a comprehensive world wide database of information on 60 million companies combining information from nearly 100 sources fi ltered into various stan dard report formats This search found 3719 fi rms involved in nanotechnology which we label nanotech fi rms ORBIS defi nes four categories of fi rms VL Very Large companies operating revenue of at least US 40 m or over 1000 employees L Large companies operating revenue at least US 14m or over 150 employees M Medium sized companies operating revenue at least US 1 4 m or over 15 employees and S Small companies those not included in another category Using this classifi cation we identifi ed 2140 58 of our nanotech fi rms as being very large or large fi rms and 1579 42 as medium or small SMEs C Genet et al Technovation 32 2012 205 215207 3 2 Data characteristics Tables 1 4 describe the main characteristics of our population of 3719 nanotech fi rms The data preparation and the statistical analysis for this paper were generated using SAS software Copyright SAS Institute Inc In Table 1 we observe that 71 of nanotech SMEs were created after 1990 Since the potential of understanding the nanoscale properties of matter and the for mulation of key research opportunities were becoming clearer by 2000 Roco et al 2000 we can suppose that these fi rms were created specifi cally to apply these new scientifi c discoveries to commercial product development In contrast 70 of large very large L VL nanotech fi rms were created before 1990 we can characterize these fi rms as investing in nanotechnology but not as being dedicated nanotech companies Table 2 shows that about 90 of nanotech SMEs are located in Europe and US Canada while L VL nanotech fi rms are mostly located in Europe 48 and US Canada 24 but also in Asia 21 Mangematin and Errabi forthcoming and Islam and Miyazaki 2010 have shown that the investment of Asian fi rms in nanotechnology is mainly centered on nanoelectronics a sector that remains dominated by large companies Table 3 shows that 42 of nanotech SMEs have high nano patenting intensity more than 50 but that 60 of the large nanotech fi rms have nano patenting intensities of less than 10 Table 4 lists the main industrial sectors where our 3719 nanotech fi rms operate based on the North American Industry Classifi cation System NAICS and shows that the largest sectoral involvement for nanotech SMEs is the Professional Scientifi c and Technical Services sector 20 while L VL nanotech fi rms are found in largest numbers in the Pharmaceutical and Medicine Manufacturing the Control Instrument and the Semiconductor and Other Electronic Component Manufacturing sectors According to the NAICS the Professional Scientifi c and Tech nical Services sector provides specialist services to clients in a variety of industries and some households that involve expertise in the following legal advice and representation accounting bookkeeping and payroll services architectural engineering and specialized design services computer services consulting ser vices research services advertising services photographic ser vices translation and interpretation services veterinary services etc It can be argued that these activities represent valuable ways Table 1 Firm s size by year of incorporation Firm s sizeYear of incorporation Pre 19501951 19801981 1990Post 1990Total Small and medium fi rms Frequency4314726511241579 Percent1 163 957 1330 2242 46 Row percent2 729 3116 7871 18 Col percent6 2323 1142 4763 54 Large and very large fi rms Frequency647489359645214 Percent17 4013 159 6517 3457 54 Row percent30 23