National innovation systems and the globalization of nanotechnology innovation

While there has been much emphasis over the last decade on the science of nanotechnology and on the implications and risks of potential applications, it is now timely to increase attention to the emerging dynamics of nanotechnology commercialization. This paper examines, from a global perspective, where and how corporations are entering into nanotechnology innovation. The paper tests the proposition that a significant shift has occurred in recent years in the orientation of corporate nanotechnology activities—from research discovery to patented applications. It also examines the extent to which the character and structure of corporate nanotechnology activity by country initially reflects national innovation system characteristics and prior public research funding inputs in the stage when discovery is most emphasized. The results indicate that national innovation systems characteristics are significant factors in the commercialization shift of nanotechnology and highlight the importance of innovation system policy factors. We also observe the influence of cross-border international invention linkages, suggesting that national innovation policies also need to be open and international in orientation.     

The transfer and commercialisation of nanotechnology: a comparative analysis of university and company researchers

Nanotechnology has been proposed as the next general purpose technology and engine for growth for the 21th century. Increasing public R&D investments are foremost reflected in the growth of scientific publications, while nanotechnology still is in an uncertain phase of development with various directions of commercialization pending. This paper focuses on the challenges, modes and outcomes of nanotechnology as an emerging science-based field in Finland. The paper contributes by interrogating how challenges and modes of nanotechnology transfer differ across universities and companies and determine outcomes broadly defined. It uses survey data covering university and company researchers in the Finnish nanotechnology community. The results show significant differences in the perceptions of researchers across these organisations, and highlight specific challenges and modes as determinants of outcomes. The specificities of nanotechnology are also assessed.

Mapping the nanotechnology enterprise: a multi-indicator analysis of emerging nanodistricts in the US South

Nanotechnology has attracted significant research, funding, and policy activity in recent years in the US and many other countries. Of particular interest are the locational characteristics of this emerging technology. This study examines the emergence of nanotechnology in the US South to explore questions of regional standing and spatial trajectory, using an exploratory multi-indicator approach. Our research employs an array of 10 indicators of knowledge generation, human capital, R&D funding, and patenting, to uncover developments, clusters, and linkages in nanotechnology emergence. Results indicate that although there is nanotechnology activity in every state in the US South, this activity agglomerates in a few locations. One emerging nanodistrict (North Carolina’s Research Triangle) has prior strengths in high technology research and commercialization, especially based on biotechnology; but other districts (e.g., Oak Ridge Tennessee and Atlanta, Georgia) that have strengths in certain aspects of the nanotechnology research ecosystem have weaknesses in commercialization. The study illustrates how multi-indicator approaches can be developed from existing databases, using customized search techniques, and how the insights from multi-indicator measurement can be used to provide insights for research and innovation policy.

Silent innovation: corporate strategizing in early nanotechnology evolution

Nanotechnology offers a rare opportunity to study the early evolution of a new generic technology in real time. This paper suggests focusing more on the market formation side, rather than technology generation, when seeking to explain technology evolution. Applying an evolutionary capabilities perspective, the paper examines how firms organize innovation in the early embryonic stages of a technology and how the market as a selective device undergoes qualitative change as part of economic evolution. The traditional Danish window chain is used as a case. A model of nanotechnology evolution is proposed which suggests that nanotechnology commercialization is significantly driven by small and medium-sized firms based on their internal knowhow, with larger firms as important suppliers of know how. These smaller firms are adept at addressing social needs which appear to be key factors in the nano-commercialization process. A taxonomy of nine enterprise strategies for entry into nanotechnology is suggested. The paper identifies a marked shift in marketing strategizing among the nanotechnology innovative companies, from being “loud” around the turn of the millennium to becoming increasingly “silent” at the present time, illustrating the unconsolidated stage of the current nanotechnology market.     

Nanotechnology in Global Medicine and Human Biosecurity: Private Interests, Policy Dilemmas, and the Calibration of Public Health Law

This paper considers how best to approach dilemmas posed to global health and biosecurity policy by increasing advances in practical applications of nanotechnology. The type of nano-technology policy dilemmas discussed include: (1) expenditure of public funds, (2) public-funded research priorities, (3) public confidence in government and science and, finally, (4) public safety. The article examines the value in this context of a legal obligation that the development of relevant public health law be calibrated against less corporate-influenced norms issuing from bioethics and international human rights.     

Closing the divide: accelerating technology commercialization by catalyzing the university entrepreneurial ecosystem with I-Corps™

In recent years, universities have seen an increasing amount of activity in entrepreneurship and commercialization, not only for students, but for faculty as well. Traditionally, these initiatives have been separate, such that programs and curriculum have been focused on supporting just students or just faculty. In 2012, the National Science Foundation (NSF) launched the NSF I-Corps? program, an innovative funding program that not only offered principle investigators (PIs) funding, but also exposed PIs to an innovation/entrepreneurship curriculum as well. The University of Michigan (U-M) was one of the first two NSF I-Corps? Nodes funded in 2012 and has leveraged the program to catalyze the entrepreneurial ecosystem. This paper describes the growth of this entrepreneurial ecosystem since 1983, the call of entrepreneurship in the U-M College of Engineering and describes the role the U-M NSF I-Corps? program has played across the university. The paper concludes with lessons learned and recommendations to administrators and policy makers considering more active promotion of academic entrepreneurship and commercialization in universities.     

Boundary-spanning in emerging technology research: determinants of funding success for academic scientists

Emerging technologies, including nanotechnologies, are generally seen as those latest scientific innovations which have a potential impact on industry structure, and commercialization and economic potential. Work in this area of emerging technologies has distinct boundary spanning characteristics from the perspective of academic science. First, many emerging technologies involve collaboration of scientists across disciplinary boundaries. Second, because of the commercializability of many emerging technologies, scientists may interact more often with industry throughout the research and commercialization process. We ask, what are the boundary-spanning characteristics of scientists engaged in emerging technology research and how do those characteristics matter in obtaining funding in this area? We examine the characteristics of academic scientists in the United States who are employed in research intensive institutions and who are engaged in funded research in the area of emerging technologies. We address the factors that predict their grant success in areas of emerging technology. Findings reveal that interdisciplinary activities and industry orientation are both important in predicting funding in areas of emerging technology. Moreover, the findings imply that the emergence of new technologies may offer opportunities for women in low representation fields.     

Government procurement law and hacking technology: The role of public contracting in regulating an invisible market

This article considers the purchasing of hacking technology by governments and the role of government procurement processes in regulating the hacking market and reducing risks to the buyer. While the proliferation of hacking technology for government actors has led to various proposed solutions for accountability, little consideration has been given to public purchasing of this technology. This article explores whether public contracting processes could be used to help minimize the risks that arise from the use of government hacking technology, and, if so, the types of contractual clauses and institutional supports that might be useful to achieve that goal. In exploring this issue, this article considers theories of government by contract and the publicization of the private sector. These theories posit that public contracting can be used as a vehicle to impose public considerations—for example, certain policy goals—on the private sector. It argues that requirements of transparency and accountability that inhere on the public sector could be transferred in part to the private sector through the vehicle of a public contract and explores how public contracts for government hacking technology could be structured in order to reduce risks posed by the use of this technology.     

Social and economic impact of the commercialization of the Argus II artificial retina in the United States

Each year, the United States invests about $45 billion in research conducted by federal researchers within federal laboratories. These efforts generate extensive social benefits when results are transferred to the private sector. It is important that we effectively quantify the economic and societal impact of federal technology transfer activities to inform taxpayers and policymakers about the value of public investments in this form of research. The Argus II device, an artificial retina commercialized in the United States by Second Sight in 2013, provides a rich example of how private sector innovation can be enhanced by research collaborations with federal labs and academia. Over the 25-year journey from idea to product, Second Sight carried out research and development collaborations with six Department of Energy national laboratories and seven universities. The case of Argus II also offers valuable insight into (1) how private industry, academia, and government can work together to bring socially beneficial innovations to fruition and (2) the tradeoffs inherent in these public–private collaborations. In this paper, we use a Markov model to estimate the realized and potential future social benefits associated with Argus II. We provide an interactive tool that can be used to replicate our findings and modify assumptions using updated patient information as it becomes available. We also provide insight into the aspects of federal involvement surrounding the development of Argus II that contributed to its successful commercialization and discuss other spillover benefits from these public–private collaborations.     

Closing the distance between academia and market: experimentation and user entrepreneurial processes

We inductively examine how exceptional Principal Investigators (PIs), who are active in biotechnology, medical devices, and nanotechnology, affect new technology trajectories and shape market boundaries by leveraging synergies stemming from their being simultaneously a scientist and a (lead) user. Our central contribution is the scientist-user template that explores how these types of PIs perform successfully their technology transfer task and, consequently, address increasing expectations about PIs as agents of economic and societal development. Building upon five illustrative case histories, we propose that scientist-user PIs exhibit superior capabilities in turning generic technology into several selected market applications, with no negative effects on their academic role. Overall, we develop a holistic view of synergies stemming from the scientist and user sides and offer insights into academic entrepreneurship and research project management.     

Venturing into uncharted financial waters: an essay on climate-friendly finance

This paper explores links between global financial imbalances and tensions around reserve currency along with climate change. Currently, risky levels of private and public debts coexist with vast amounts of savings that “do not know where to go.” Long-term climate-oriented financial products could enhance investors’ confidence in low-carbon projects (LCP) and channel to them large amounts of private savings. The paper outlines a financial architecture, the cornerstone of which is an agreement on the Social Cost of Carbon (SCC) integrated into a project’s appraisal and acting as a surrogate for a carbon price. This SCC would be the value of carbon certificates issued by the government and delivered to banks to issue credit facilities reducing the risk-adjusted costs of LCPs. These carbon certificates could be gradually transformed into legal reserve assets of the banks after verification of the reality of the projects. Finally, the paper considers whether such certificates would be recognized as genuine international reserve assets, backed by the rising value of carbon over time. It shows how emerging countries could then diversify their foreign exchange reserves through an asset based on the international recognition of climate as a global public good.     

Transnational Models for Regulation of Nanotechnology

Like all technologies, nanotechnology will inevitably present risks, whether they result from unintentional effects of otherwise beneficial applications, or from the malevolent misuse of technology. Increasingly, risks from new and emerging technologies are being regulated at the international level, although governments and private experts are only beginning to consider the appropriate international responses to nanotechnology. In this paper, we explore both the potential risks posed by nanotechnology and potential regulatory frameworks that law may impose. In so doing, we also explore the various rationales for international regulation including the potential for cross-boundary harms, sharing of regulatory expertise and resources, controlling protectionism and trade conflicts, avoiding a "race to the bottom" in which governments seek economic advantage through lax regulation, and limiting the "nano divide" between North and South. Finally, we examine some models for international regulation and offer tentative thoughts on the prospects for each.     

Drawing the Boundaries of Nanoscience – Rationalizing the Concerns?

Nanotechnology as an emerging field is strongly related to visionary prospects which are disposed to reappear as dystopian concerns. As long as nanotechnology does not provide reliable criteria for assessing these worries as rational or as irrational they remain a challenge for ethical reflection. Given this underdetermination, many nanovisions and their corresponding concerns should therefore be considered as "arational." For that reason, a "constructivist" stance is endorsed which does not seek to take part in discussions as to how ethicists should cope with controversial worries, but tries to observe how concerns are managed by different social actors. This perspective allows us to remodel some concerns such as "grey goo" not solely as a societal reaction, but also as challenging and irritating factors. As such they potentially initiate two different processes simultaneously: a differentiation in terms of demarcating science from non-science on the one hand, and a rationalization of concerns on the other. Analyzing these processes empirically allows to reconstruct how "arational" concerns are socially made rational or, on the contrary, irrational.     

Regulating small things: genes, gametes and nanotechnology

Biotechnology and nanotechnology both intersect with other technologies in ways that open new possibilities for further technological progress. The potential for increased convergence between technological fields highlights the need for regulatory frameworks to be integrated, flexible and responsive. Within a federal legal system such as Australia's, there is a need to ensure that we adopt a coordinated national approach to the crafting of regulatory solutions. In addition, there is a need for global cooperation in the development of international standards and regulatory harmonisation. Finally, this article considers the role that law plays in negotiating risk in relation to new technologies.     

Matching consequences to behavior: implications of failing to distinguish between noncompliance and nonresponsivity

Neither punitive nor therapeutic approaches alone are effective at addressing the dual public health and public safety concerns associated with managing criminal behavior perpetrated by people who have psychiatric and substance use disorders. The optimal solution may instead require the integration of both criminal justice supervision and treatment. Using problem-solving courts (PSCs) as a model, we focus on one dimension of this integrated approach, distinguishing between behavior that stems from willful noncompliance with supervision and behavior that results from nonresponsivity to treatment. First, we discuss the public health and public safety consequences of using singular approaches to address the criminal behavior of this population. We then present lessons learned from PSCs that distinguish between noncompliant and nonresponsive behaviors in making treatment and supervision decisions. Finally, we consider how the concepts of nonresponsivity and noncompliance may be extended, via policy, to probation and parole settings as well as mental health and substance abuse treatment services outside the criminal justice setting in order to enhance public health and safety.     

Regulating the invisible: interaction between the EU and Norway in managing nano-risks

Over the last decade, the need for governance of human health and environmental safety risks of nanotechnology (NT) has received increased attention at international, national and EU levels. There were early calls for increased funding of independent research, risk analysis and voluntary or mandatory regulation, but currently overall regulatory efforts have not materialised. One possible explanation is that research has revealed little need to regulate environmental and health safety risks of NT. Alternatively, there is a gap between politics and governance and the evolving state of knowledge. Such a gap can be caused by various factors including change in interests, saliency and organisation. Organisational challenges related to the science–policy interface at national, international and the EU can affect how new knowledge is channelled into decision-making processes. Decrease in public saliency is another possibility. Finally, opposition to regulation among affected producers may have increased and in turn stalled regulation through lobbying. The two explanations are analysed in a multi-level governance context. Norway is chosen as an interesting case: Highly profiled as a frontrunner i.a. in regulating gene technology, but currently awaiting regulations in the EU due to the European Economic Area agreement.     

Developing Public Safety and Crime Indicators in Taiwan

Many countries and international organisations (for example, the USA, England and Wales, Japan, the European Union and the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development) have developed measures of public safety and measures of the effectiveness of criminal justice agencies. This paper briefly considers the background to such comparative developments and relates these to the specific contextual conditions of Taiwan. We report the results of a study which reviewed the state of empirical indicator availability in Taiwan and sought to develop an indicator framework for those charged with the governmental task of ‘public safety’. The paper concludes by considering how such a framework can be implemented in Taiwan.     

The role of a Proof of Concept Center in a university ecosystem: an exploratory study

The Proof of Concept phase in university technology transfer is considered to be critical for the success of both licensing and the creation of spin-off companies. In the United States, Proof of Concept Centers are emerging as successful structures to address the challenges of this phase. In this paper, we present a framework to assess the role for such a structure in a university ecosystem. The framework is built from previous references that we use to explicitly link the features of Proof of Concept Centers with the challenges of the Proof of Concept phase, and establish their specific contributions to the overall technology commercialization efforts of a university. We illustrate the application of this framework in a case study of the University of Coimbra, in Portugal, and develop a characterization that is representative of the role that a Proof of Concept Center can play in comparable university ecosystems that feature conventional technology commercialization structures, and struggle with the challenges of the Proof of Concept phase. Our study suggests that there is in fact a possible role for a Proof of Concept Center in the regional ecosystem of the University of Coimbra, with a potentially very relevant impact in the technology commercialization process, through networking outside academia and research environments, funding of Proof of Concept activities, and technology entrepreneurship education for the development of entrepreneurial skills for researchers.     

Technology commercialization: a literature review of success factors and antecedents across different contexts

This paper provides a systematic review of the current literature on technology commercialization. It serves to establish a foundation for the following empirical and theoretical contributions. Technological inventions are fundamental for a country’s economic growth. However, in order to actually generate value for society and profits for the involved companies, these inventions need to be successfully transferred to the market. Therefore, newly developed technologies need to be integrated into products which sell. In particular, our study focuses on the different interaction channels through which technology commercialization occurs. We analyze main groups of institutions, which can either act as developers of technologies and/or organizations bringing these technologies to the market: Universities and research institutes, technology startups, and established companies. We propose a theoretical framework of possible interactions between these organizations and analyze the success factors within the respective channels. Based on the systematic review of 140 articles, key characteristics of the technology development organizations are analyzed with regard to the different possible channels available to commercialize their technology.     

Researching safety and cost-effectiveness in the life cycle of nanomedicine

Nanotechnology is rapidly emerging as a transformational influence on many industry sectors. This is particularly true of medicines and medical devices. This article argues that, as policy interest in devising an appropriate regulatory framework for nanotherapeutics escalates, it will be important for public health to ensure that a broad life-cycle approach to both safety and cost-effectiveness is adopted. It charts some of the most important issues likely to be faced and begins to map how they can best be addressed.