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TRIFOLD - Technology Transfer in Tunisian Research Centers – the case for Technology Roadmapping
Abstract
TRIFOLD - Technology Transfer in Tunisian Research Centers – the case for Technology Roadmapping
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In the 30 years since technology roadmapping first became a topic of broader interest in aca-demia, business, and administration, it has rapidly evolved to a valuable technique for identi-fying new opportunities and addressing risk and uncertainty in the management of technolo-gy. In contrast to the variety of concepts proposed in literature and to many applications in various industries, however, technology roadmapping is rather used as a standalone technique, yet.
While roadmapping seems to become part of technology management affairs, at least to a certain degree, interaction with corresponding methods along innovation planning, product development, and project management are of greater importance today, in particular linkages with other instruments and tools of operational innovation planning need to be developed and established.
- For example, how can the potential of technology roadmapping to support operational innovation planning be exploited, e.g. for project planning and controlling, resource allocation, capacity scheduling, capability planning, and human resources planning, among others?
- How can the future outlook visualized in roadmaps be transformed into clear steps, and well defined activities with measurable indicators, while identifying critical system requirements and milestones for meeting targets?
- Which tools may provide help to break down roadmaps into alternate technology roads, and which concepts could bridge the gap to promising innovation plans?
Technology roadmapping approaches are increasingly being adopted (and adapted) around the world, at company, sector and national levels, since its first application in the late-1970s to support integrated product-technology planning. In the future, it is anticipated that roadmapping will be increasingly used as a core integrating mechanism for supporting strategic dialogue. This 'next generation' approach to roadmapping needs to be agile, responsive, scalable and flexible to meet the demands of an ever more competitive, global and dynamic competitive environment. In this paper, some of the design principles for next generation roadmapping are described, emphasising the need to position roadmapping at the heart of strategy and innovation.
The definition of an effective innovation policy is a major challenge in developing countries, a task that has become more complex as increasing attention is being paid in policy issues to inclusive development, raising quite different requirements for what an innovation system should deliver, and how it should therefore be organised.It is argued that foresight is an appropriate instrument to shape innovation systems and support policy-making processes, thus, foresight has attracted interest in developing countries. However, the ability to effectively exploit its results is hampered by the limitations of their governance systems to take into account the complexity in the definition of public policies. In such a context, foresight needs to be more thoroughly integrated into the policy making process to be effective.Attempts to engage excluded indigenous or poor peasant, communities in development plans have also been made and in this context, foresight activities in these communities have been conducted, but the consultations have not been strategic and forward-looking enough to connect to policy-making beyond the specific local settings.In this paper, we propose a novel interconnected multilevel approach containing two elements of policy making to support innovation for inclusive development: a) the close interplay between foresight and policy making, and b) the linking of local community-level to national level foresight. Such an approach is well suited for using foresight to inform and guide policy to frame the national innovation system that can attend both economic and social development goals.
Roadmapping in China and in Germany has different connotations, contexts, meanings and cultural backgrounds. In order to understand what is meant by roadmaps — and not to confuse roadmaps with foresight in general — a comparative analysis was jointly performed by the Beijing Research Centre for Science of Science (BRCSS) under the Beijing Academy of Science and Technology and the Fraunhofer Institute for Systems and Innovation Research (ISI). This joint project investigated several cases according to a set of criteria and compared the content. The aim of the project was mutual learning and the results revealed that the differences can be found on different levels like the understanding of the terminology (not only language), cultural understandings, the background of the innovation system and contexts of the roadmaps and the understanding of the objectives. The way the process is performed differed significantly whereas the differences in the processes themselves, the number of participants or the topic fields were rather similar. In the paper, some of the differences are discussed in context and lessons learned are explained.
For many years now, firms have managed their research and development (R&D) by applying various approaches drawn from the discipline of technology roadmapping (TRM). The underlying rationale of these roadmapping approaches is to align firms' product and technology developments with their business goals. By visually representing firms' technology strategy, roadmaps support intra-firm communication and facilitate the coordination of strategic decisions and activities within the technology management domain. Most previously published research on TRMs has focused on the design and implementation of roadmapping processes; that is, relatively few empirical or quantitative studies describe the use and evaluation of roadmapping techniques. This paper seeks to address this gap by conducting a survey of 186 different R&D units within stock market-listed companies in Korea that have implemented TRM. The paper attempts to identify the antecedent factors behind firms' successful use of roadmaps, further identifying correlations between these antecedent factors through an analysis of the R&D units. It also empirically highlights these antecedent factors by empirically analyzing and verifying correlations between roadmap utilization and R&D performance.
A novel approach to Technology Foresight has been developed by BP and used to devise an R&D strategy embracing the core business areas of the company. It is based on the use of Roadmaps which are visual descriptions summarizing the outcomes of numerous discussions involving all the personnel responsible for procuring, planning, funding, monitoring, and implementing R&D. This emphasis on visual, easy-to-comprehend descriptions of customer needs, technology responses, and R&D programmes offers several benefits. It facilitates the structured dialogue essential to the Foresight process; it also greatly aids communication, both at the operational commercial and technical level, and with senior management too, as well as providing a practical means for ensuring R&D programmes are apposite, correctly prioritized, and adequately resourced. The essential differences from more conventional methods of developing strategies and plans are that 1. it places greater emphasis on, and provides practical assistance to facilitate the construction of the plan by enabling all the participants, whether technically expert or otherwise, to play a full part in the process, 2. it enables the overall impact and relevance of individual technology components of a business strategy to be assimileted repidly and reliably, and 3. it greatly facilitates identification of gaps and/or duplications of effort These advantages stem primarily from the combination of logical analysis, widespread construction and discussion, and use of graphical techniques, all of which are key features of this approach.
There are several tools in the literature that support innovation in organizations. Some of the most cited are the so-called technology roadmapping methods, also known as TRM. However, these methods are designed primarily for organizations that adopt the market pull strategy of technology–product integration. Organizations that adopt the technology push integration strategy are neglected in the literature. Furthermore, with the advent of open innovation, it is possible to note the need to consider the adoption of partnerships in the innovation process. Thus, this study proposes a method of technology roadmapping, identified as method for technology push (MTP), applicable to organizations that adopt the technology push integration strategy, such as SMEs and independent research centers in an open-innovation environment. The method was developed through action-research and was assessed from two analytical standpoints: externally, via a specific literature review on its theoretical contributions, and internally, through the analysis of potential users' perceptions on the feasibility of applying MTP. The results indicate both the unique character of the method and its perceived implementation feasibility. Future research is suggested in order to validate the method in different types of organizations
In recent years, many industrial firms have been able to use roadmapping as an effective process methodology for projecting future technology and for coordinating technology planning and strategy. Firms potentially realize a number of benefits in deploying technology roadmapping (TRM) processes. Roadmaps provide information identifying which new technologies will meet firms' future product demands, allowing companies to leverage R&D investments through choosing appropriately out of a range of alternative technologies. Moreover, the roadmapping process serves an important communication tool helping to bring about consensus among roadmap developers, as well as between participants brought in during the development process, who may communicate their understanding of shared corporate goals through the roadmap. However, there are few conceptual accounts or case studies have made the argument that roadmapping processes may be used effectively as communication tools. This paper, therefore, seeks to elaborate a theoretical foundation for identifying the factors that must be considered in setting up a roadmap and for analyzing the effect of these factors on technology roadmap credibility as perceived by its users. Based on the survey results of 120 different R&D units, this empirical study found that firms need to explore further how they can enable frequent interactions between the TRM development team and TRM participants. A high level of interaction will improve the credibility of a TRM, with communication channels selected by the organization also positively affecting TRM credibility.
The purpose of this paper is to report the integration studies of business modeling and roadmapping methods for the “Innovation Support Technology (IST)” and the IST's practical application to real-world cases. The IST is conducted for the purpose of offering a convenient tool for engineers and researchers in order to enhance corporate value from R&D outputs. “Japan's lost decade” has forced companies to change R&D management and R&D operation style, especially regional industries. We propose the framework for revitalization of regional industries by using the Strategic Technology Roadmap made by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI-TRM) with business modeling. We applied this IST method to several real-world cases to show its effectiveness. This study represents the result of over four years (fall 2002) of work with the value creation framework of the business modeling method for R&D outputs, done by a group of researchers from JATES (Japan Techno-Economics Society).
The Semiconductor Research Corporation (SRC) operates on the principle that pooling investment in basic, pre-competitive research
permits members to target a larger percentage of their research and development dollars towards devising technologies that
will yield a competitive edge. This benefit is mot effectively realized, however, when the research “product” is expeditiously
transferred from the research lab into the commercial environment. The product, in this case, may be knowledge, a design or
manufacturing tool, personnel who are trained in the use of the tool, or information about a research approach that should
be avoided. At the SRC, technology transfer is essential to the success of its cooperative research effort, and consequently,
during 15 years of managing this transfer across the university/industry interface, the not-for-profit consortiun has developed
and refined structures and methodologies to overcome transfer barriers. The paper written by Lynn Burnett, Gail Massari and
Richard LaScala discusses administrative and managerial barriers to technology conversion and transfer and the solutions developed
and practiced by the SRC to transcend those barriers.
This paper describes the Graphical Modeling System, a computer-based process for generating roadmaps. The system offers the
following advantages and capabilities: (1) Graphically portraying relationships between research and potential applications;
(2) Helping accelerate science conversion by promoting champion interest in further research development; (3) Showing the
node-link relationships of a project/capabilities/requirements network; (4) Treating nodes (projects/capabilities/requirements)
as multi-valued (multi-attributed) quantities which are allowed to exist in many different research-requirement pathways simultaneously.
This multiple perspectives capability provides a more accurate depiction of the multi-application nature of most research
and technology, and the software enables the user to highlight just those specific node-link subnetworks of interest (the
desired researchrequirement. pathways) without being overwhelmed by all possible node-links which constitute the larger network;
(5) Promoting communications; (6) Identifying science and technology gaps; and (7) Identifying obstacles to rapid and low-cost
technology development.
Roadmapping has gained acceptance by technology management practitioners as a key tool in planning and strategy development. Technology roadmapping workshops are essentially a socially facilitated mechanism that solicits a diverse group of participants for their pool of experience and expertise in order to explore the opportunities and challenges facing an organisation. The group collaboration is captured through the generation of a roadmap which provides a visual representation of their collective cognitive efforts. It must therefore be acknowledged that the actual practice of roadmapping involves numerous complex underlying cognitive factors and social interactions. In this regard, an initial framework for the exploration of the psychological and sociological aspects involved in technology roadmapping and roadmaps is presented. The postulation is that roadmapping/roadmaps provide a mechanism/vehicle to cogitate, articulate and communicate.
The paper begins by offering a process oriented description of industrial technology transfer. This is used as a basis for a brief review of the limitations of recent and current models of industrial technology transfer. In response to these limitations, an interactive model (and evaluative framework) is developed on the basis of three components: accessibility, mobility and receptivity (AMR). The deficiencies of identifying technology largely by its techno-economic attributes are discussed, and a multiple constituency approach is proposed.After definition and discussion of these concepts, the paper illustrates the application of the AMR framework and the development of the multiple-constituency approach in four contexts. Each context is explored through an applied study in which a researcher from the team has spent two or three years working with an industrial partner, a group of companies or a technology transfer intermediary.A final section gives the substantive applied conclusions from the four case studies and presents some general policy implications.
Recently, technology roadmap has received increasing interest from academics and practitioners alike, as it is a powerful and inherently flexible approach in terms of architectural structure and construction process. However, the potential benefit may not be fully exploited due to the difficulty in customizing roadmaps to fit specific needs and/or to accommodate unusual circumstances. In response, the main purpose of this research is to provide guidance for customizing roadmaps. Specifically, we adopt a modularization method for mass customization and suggest a set of different roadmaps for different purposes such as forecasting, planning, and administration. In addition, a web-based system is developed to facilitate the roadmapping activities, which in turn ensures the creation, dissemination, and upkeep of roadmaps. With the system having a customization function, a set of customized roadmaps can be generated simply by selecting the application purpose and then meeting the input requirements. The function helps prospective users design roadmap formats and contents.
Technology roadmapping is a flexible technique that is widely used within industry to support strategic and long-range planning. The approach provides a structured (and often graphical) means for exploring and communicating the relationships between evolving and developing markets, products and technologies over time. It is proposed that the roadmapping technique can help companies survive in turbulent environments by providing a focus for scanning the environment and a means of tracking the performance of individual, including potentially disruptive, technologies. Technology roadmaps are deceptively simple in terms of format, but their development poses significant challenges. In particular the scope is generally broad, covering a number of complex conceptual and human interactions.
The present paper derives lessons learned about effective technology transfer from research on the technology transfer process in New Mexico over the past several years. Technology transfer from national R&D laboratories and from research universities provides the main basis for economic growth by metropolitan regions in the United States. New Mexico is (1) technology-rich because of Sandia National Laboratories, Los Alamos National Laboratory and the University of New Mexico, and (2) entrepreneur-friendly. High-technology spin-offs are a particularly effective means of technology transfer. The process of technology transfer is a difficult type of communication, and demands trained and skilled personnel, adequate resources, and organizational and other reward/incentive structures.
Since the first application of technology roadmapping in the late 1970s to support integrated product-technology planning, roadmapping concepts and techniques have been widely adopted at product, technology, company, sector and policy levels. The roadmapping approach is flexible and scalable, and can be customized to suit many different strategic and innovation contexts. However, this demands careful planning and design, including consideration of roadmap structure, process and participation.This paper explores the issues of how to design and architect roadmaps and roadmapping processes, which is crucial if the approach is to provide a framework for supporting effective dialogue and communication within and between organizations. The structure of the roadmap, and the process for developing and maintaining the roadmap, should be designed to serve the purpose for which the activity is intended to satisfy, providing a ‘common language and structure' for both development and deployment of strategy.
In this article, we examine the use of visual representations for the business strategy process (from strategic analysis and strategy development to strategic planning and implementation). Starting with a review of literature, we show that visualization can address many of the cognitive, social, and emotional challenges of the strategy process, if visualization is understood as a participatory process and as interactive communication rather than as a static graphic rendering of outcomes. We categorise and position feasible methods that are based on the interactive visual representation of information along the strategy process and highlight their benefits. A conceptual framework and six corporate case studies illustrate how to use strategy visualization systematically. In the conclusion of the article we highlight the potential risks of visualization for strategizing and articulate a research agenda for this emergent domain.
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