Building Successful Technology Commercialization Teams: Pilot Empirical Support for the Theory of Cascading Commitment

Improving the process of commercializing a technology from a public lab requires a deep understanding of which factors actually contribute to successful commercialization. Such factors are complex, including the quality of the technology itself, choice of transfer mechanism, quality of business intelligence, project evaluation and selection techniques, team building processes, organizational structures, reward and penalty structures, financial support, human resources support, and project management tools, among others. This article focuses on the improvement of team-building processes. It describes a pilot empirical test of the theory of cascading commitment, using data from a study of 34 technology transfer cases from 5 different Canadian federal labs. Of the 34 cases, 20 were successful, 11 were unsuccessful, and 3 were uncertain. In this paper, success was defined as the private sector manufacturer's perception of how well the project attained the profit objective associated with sales of a new product which embedded the new technology. The pilot results provide directional support for the key propositions of the theory: 1) a complete team of both public and private organizations is necessary; 2) a complete team of key individuals (linchpins) from within each organization is necessary; 3) there is an optimal sequence for recruiting the organizational partners; 4) there is an optimal stage for recruiting each organizational partner; 5) high commitment from every linchpin is necessary; 6) linchpin commitment to the team is determined by a variety of factors; and 7) the probability of success is improved if the team of linchpins remains intact until the commercial launch is achieved. Some provisional implications for management practice are provided, as well as suggestions for future research.     

State Rainy Day Funds and Fiscal Crises: Rainy Day Funds and the 1990–1991 Recession Revisited

The recession of the early 1980s prompted many states to establish budget stabilization (rainy day) funds. Initial examinations of rainy day funds find a limited impact by the funds in alleviating fiscal stress. In this article, we propose an enhanced model of rainy day fund impact. Using data from 48 states for the 1990–1991 recession, our analysis indicates that the presence of a number of structural factors and the maintenance of generally large balances in other funds entering recession helps to alleviate fiscal stress when a state's economy is in recession.     

The law and economics of organ procurement

This paper presents an economic analysis of the organ procurement system in the U.S. and examines proposals to alleviate the shortage of transplantable organs. The paper's principal conclusions are: (1) Although non-market solutions deserve the highest priority, demand increases fueled by improvements in transplant technology will probably make some market-based solution necessary in the future. (2) Quality deterioration and coercion will not necessarily be worrisome problems under a market-based procurement system.     

The Geography of Empire

Abstract

Wealth and poverty, overdevelopment and underdevelopment, are sides of the same coin; in a capitalist system the one cannot exist without the other. This is as true at the global level as at the national level, and the U.S. Empire consists of both external and internal colonies (e.g. the ghettoes or the Indian and Chicano communities of the Southwest).