Multi-disciplinarity breeds diversity: the influence of innovation project characteristics on diversity creation in nanotechnology

Cristina Páez-Avilés (), Frank J. Rijnsoever, Esteve Juanola-Feliu and Josep Samitier
Additional contact information
Cristina Páez-Avilés: University of Barcelona
Frank J. Rijnsoever: Utrecht University
Esteve Juanola-Feliu: University of Barcelona
Josep Samitier: University of Barcelona

The Journal of Technology Transfer, 2018, vol. 43, issue 2, No 9, 458-481

Abstract: Abstract Nanotechnology is an emerging and promising field of research. Creating sufficient technological diversity among its alternatives is important for the long-term success of nanotechnologies, as well as for other emerging technologies. Diversity prevents early lock-in, facilitates recombinant innovation, increases resilience, and allows market growth. Creation of new technological alternatives usually takes place in innovation projects in which public and private partners often collaborate. Currently, there is little empirical evidence about which characteristics of innovation projects influence diversity. In this paper we study the influence of characteristics of EU-funded nanotechnology projects on the creation of technological diversity. In addition to actor diversity and the network of the project, we also include novel variables that have a plausible influence on diversity creation: the degree of multi-disciplinarity of the project and the size of the joint knowledge base of project partners. We apply topic modelling (Latent Dirichlet allocation) as a novel method to categorize technological alternatives. Using an ordinal logistic regression model, our results show that the largest contribution to diversity comes from the multi-disciplinary nature of a project. The joint knowledge base of project partners and the geographical distance between them were positively associated with technological diversity creation. In contrast, the number and diversity of actors and the degree of clustering showed a negative association with technological diversity creation. These results extend current micro-level explanations of how the diversity of an emerging technology is created. The contribution of this study could also be helpful for policy makers to influence the level of diversity in a technological field, and hence to contribute to survival of emerging technologies.

Keywords: Technological diversity; Multi-disciplinarity; Innovation projects; Topic models; Social networks; Nanotechnology (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10961-016-9553-9 Abstract (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:kap:jtecht:v:43:y:2018:i:2:d:10.1007_s10961-016-9553-9

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer. ... nt/journal/10961/PS2

DOI: 10.1007/s10961-016-9553-9

Access Statistics for this article

The Journal of Technology Transfer is currently edited by Albert N. Link, Donald S. Siegel, Barry Bozeman and Simon Mosey

More articles in The Journal of Technology Transfer from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().