تحریک صنایع جدید از فن آوری های در حال ظهور: چالش هایی برای بخش دولتی

Stimulating new industries from emerging technologies is central to successful high-tech based economic growth, employment, competition and sustainability in modern market economies. The Taiwanese experiences in developing new technology-based industries (e.g. integrated circuits, personal computers, notebooks, scanners, and TFT LCDs) illustrate some of the ways policy makers can shape the development of emerging technologies into new industries. These ways of actions are manifold, but at least policy attentions to three key mechanisms are critical. These mechanisms encourage partnership in the commercialization process, foster entrepreneurship and venture initiatives in the innovation system, and sustain commercialization and the creation of new firms. The study of Industrial Technology Research Institute in Taiwan on biochips and nanotechnology further shows how the policy makers can build a statutory body to effectively address the functions of three mechanisms as a whole.

Companies use a variety of technologies in their products, production, and services. Some of the technologies are core in the sense that they are uniquely necessary to the product, production, or services of the industry. Emerging technologies are the core technologies, which have not yet demonstrated potential for changing the basis of competition. A set of complex processes and sophisticated approaches are involved in transitioning the emerging technologies to key technologies. These technologies are then embedded in the enabled products and processes to have major contributions on value added streams and allow competitive positions of a set of newly established firms and industrial sectors. As such, the emerging technologies such as spin transistors, gene therapy, interactivity and electronic commerce, intelligent sensors, digital imaging, micro-machines and super conductivity are scientific research-based innovations that have the potential to create a new industry or to transform an existing one (Adner and Levinthal, 2002 and Day et al., 2000). In a world increasingly characterized by high uncertainty, change, and innovation, stimulating new industries from emerging technologies is central to successful economic growth, employment, competition and sustainability. The transition from emerging technologies to new industries is a complex process by which new firms enter into industrial markets, either grow and survive or exit from the industry (Audretsch, 1995). At the center of this process is commercialization with underlying knowledge conditions shaping the patterns of industrial evolution. The commercialization process, which links the technological discovery/acquisition to a worthwhile and dynamic market opportunity, plays a pivotal role in transitioning emerging technologies to new industries. It fits well within the broader public policy area of connecting research and innovation. In general, it involves orchestrating the overall organization in building the value of a new technology and mobilizing actors/stakeholders in the innovation chain. The process of commercializing emerging technologies, among others, is particularly complex, highly risky, costly, and prone to failures. To find greater uses for the emerging technologies, economies around the world are enacting measures to encourage commercialization as part of innovation. Finding a way to stimulate new technology-based industries has been a major challenge for both industrialized economies and catch-up economies, especially on how to devise public policies that would have significant impact in launching or speeding up the development of new technology-based industries. The role of government in technology commercialization, however, is not monolithic. From supporting basic research to building infrastructures and establishing regulations, government policy makers can define industries and affect the fortunes of individual firms. The Taiwanese experiences in developing new technology-based industries (e.g. integrated circuits, personal computers, notebooks, scanners, and TFT LCDs) illustrate some of the ways policy makers can shape the development of emerging technologies into new industries. These ways of actions are manifold, but at least policy attentions to three mechanisms are considerably critical to stimulating new technology-based industries. These mechanisms, discussed below, encourage partnership in the commercialization process, foster entrepreneurship and venture initiatives in the innovation system, and sustain the commercialization and the creation of new firms.

Speeding up the transition process from emerging technologies to new industries is central to successful economic growth, employment, competition and sustainability in economies. There are three key mechanisms in speeding up the process. The first mechanism speaks to the encouragement of partnership in the process of commercialization. Some of the issues of concern are incentives and regulations provided to support innovation and cooperative R&D, partial public funding of privately performed R&D, and the setup of effective public/private partnership mechanisms. The second mechanism in speeding up the transition process is related to the promotion of entrepreneurship and venture initiatives in the innovation system. Some of the issues of concern in the new economy are fostering the community dynamics of entrepreneurship, the effective support mechanisms for private innovation, incentives for entrepreneurship in the transition, and the international corporate entrepreneurship. The third mechanism addresses the sustainability of the commercialization process and the creation of new firms. Some of the issues of concern are the fostering R&D ventures and entrepreneurial capacity, establishing public support mechanisms targeted for sources of innovation market failures, mobilizing public support to enhance the post-entry performance, and designing an effective policy for stimulating technology diffusion and development of the industry sector. The three mechanisms are, however, neither isolated nor difficult to build up once they are initiated properly, as the case study of ITRI in biochips and nanotechnology demonstrates how the government can build a statutory body to effectively address the functions of the mechanisms as a whole.