Roberto Fontana

Mapping Technological Trajectories as Patent Citation Networks: An Application to Data Communication Standards

We use patent citation networks to study the dynamics of technical change in Ethernet, a standard for data communication. We first consider the evolution of the broad technological system of local area networks (LANs) and we identify the most significant inventions within the specific subfield of Ethernet. Then we analyse the structure of connectivity of patent citation networks to reconstruct the main technological trajectories in this subfield. Our results suggest that these technological trajectories are characterized by the presence of a number of interconnected technological environments which cluster following an engineering logic. These clusters include the most significant patents related to ‘milestones inventions’ in the evolution of the LAN technology. Thus, our analysis of the structure of connectivity in patent citation networks seems appropriate to capture both the cumulativeness associated to the development of a specific technology and the significant discontinuities that punctuate the trajectory, as well as the technological interrelatedness characterising large technical systems.

The Impact of Academic Patenting on University Research and Its Transfer

This paper contributes to the ongoing debate on the impact of academic patenting. On the basis of CV information and two separate surveys, we provide the first empirical evidence for a sample of UK academics in physics, chemistry, computer science and a subset of engineering. The main contribution of this paper is twofold. First, our econometric results suggest that academic patenting is complementary to publishing at least up to a certain level of patenting output after which we found some evidence of a substitution effect. Second, our analysis of the potential impact of patenting on the other channels of knowledge transfers seems to indicate that patenting does not have a negative impact on the other channels of knowledge exchange. We have found some positive correlation between the stock of patents and other channels of knowledge transfer, however, also in this case, we have found that a substitution effect sets in indicating a inverted U shape type of relationships between patenting and other knowledge transfer channels.

What drives the emergence of entrepreneurial academics? A study on collaborative research partnerships in the UK

We study the patterns of engagement in collaborative research among university researchers. We investigate how frequently researchers engage in collaborative research with third parties, as well as the factors that affect the probability of interacting with industry as compared to other types of partners. By focusing on a large sample of recipients of collaborative research grants, we examine how environmental and individual characteristics impact on both the size of the network set up by academic researchers, and the type of partner chosen. Our results demonstrate that individual characteristics matter both for the size and the type of the network, while department-level characteristics are particularly important for the type of the network set up by the researcher. Copyright , Beech Tree Publishing.

User-Industry Spinouts: Downstream Industry Knowledge as a Source of New Firm Entry and Survival

Recent scholarship on entrepreneurship suggests that the pre-entry know-how of start-ups, embodied in their founders, affects not only entry, but also performance. Although prior work focuses on new entrants from the focal industry (i.e., employee spinouts) and academic organizations (i.e., university spinoffs), this study identifies and examines a hybrid category of start-ups from downstream user-industries, which we call “user-industry spinouts.” We draw from the literature on evolutionary theory, user innovation, and industrial dynamics to propose that, given the unique combination of knowledge inherited by these entrants, their choices at entry and their ability to survive in the focal industry will differ with respect to other start-ups. We do this by extending existing work on new firm creation to investigate entry and performance in different product markets. Our findings, based on a dataset of start-ups in the semiconductor industry over a 10-year period (1997–2007), show that user-industry spinouts are more likely both to enter and to survive in market-specific product categories. We suggest that the pre-entry knowledge resources of spinouts may support entry and survival across industry boundaries. However, the specific nature of these resources will influence which product markets they choose to enter. Our results have theoretical implications for the literatures on entrepreneurship, industrial dynamics, and strategy.

User knowledge in innovation in high technologies: an empirical analysis of semiconductors

As the knowledge boundaries between producer and user firms shift, so do the loci of innovative activity. This study focuses on semiconductors as a case of a high technology industry in which application-specific knowledge became increasingly important in research and design and semiconductor devices were increasingly customised to meet the needs of diverse user markets. The study consists of an empirical analysis of firm-level patent data over two decades. The findings show that user companies innovated extensively and patented their innovations in semiconductors in the two decades between 1984 and 2003. The findings also reveal that major differences existed in the patenting behaviour of various categories of user firms.

Drivers of diffusion of consumer products: empirical evidence from the digital audio player market

ABSTRACT We empirically study the factors affecting the timing of adoption of a consumer technology. We account for four possible effects (epidemic, probit, stock, and order effect) in relation to the diffusion of portable digital audio players (DAPs) using an original dataset of several hundred potential adopters from eight European countries and Japan. Our findings suggest that each one of these effects, which are often incorporated into competing models of diffusion, contribute to explain the diffusion of DAPs. Thus while researches informed by a specific approach to the study of innovation diffusion could lead to important results, they also run the risk of accounting for only a part of the phenomenon. This consideration highlights the quest for a more comprehensive approach to diffusion studies.

'…Then Came Cisco, and the Rest is History': A 'History Friendly' Model of the Local Area Networking Industry

We study the role that switching costs, compatibility, and mergers and acquisitions, play in influencing the evolution of a multi-market industry. By looking at the case of the Local Area Networking industry, we propose a ‘history friendly model’ to replicate its evolution during the 1990s. Our model explains how a firm can start from a dominant position in one of the existing markets and exploit switching costs and compatibility to enter a new market when it opens. Mergers and acquisitions also play an important role as the new market is pioneered by a new start-up, which is soon acquired by the dominant incumbent. As a result of the acquisition, the acquiring firm becomes leader also in the new market.

Pre-entry experience, technological complementarities, and the survival of de-novo entrants. Evidence from the US telecommunications industry

ABSTRACT We investigate the effect of pre-entry experience on firms’ performance in terms of survival. In particular we focus on entrants from a related upstream industry – semiconductors – into a downstream industry – telecommunications. We examine a sample of 336 de-novo start-ups in the US telecommunication industry and we estimate a discrete time hazard model of firm exit. Our findings show that, after controlling for both firms and founders’ characteristics, firms whose founders had prior experience in a related upstream industry such as semiconductors enjoy a relatively lower hazard of exit with respect to intra-industry spinoffs and other types of start-ups. Additionally, background heterogeneity of the founding team is an important determinant of survival for the firms in our sample. Our results point to the role of interdependences and technological complementarities between two vertically related industries in affecting the performance of new entrants.

Determinants of Adoption of Standards for Local Area Networks: Empirical Evidence from a Sample of Firms in Italy

In this paper we analyse the determinants of adoption of new technologies for local area networks (LAN). By considering a sample of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) operating in Italy, we focus in particular on the determinants of their decision to adopt Fast Ethernet. The empirical evidence shows that both expectations and network effects significantly affect the probability of adoption.