Quantifying The Resilience of Industry Innovation Ecosystems: The Impact of Manufacturing Offshore on Firm Technology Trajectories and the Institutional Locus of Innovation

今天的政府政策针对的是企业，而不是企业生态系统。鉴于过去20年来公司活动日益分散，以及这些公司在技术上的相互依存度增加，这种决策模式可能已经过时。这项研究利用融合的电信和计算行业中的一个自然实验来检查移除一组关键的创新公司对创新生态系统的影响。利用这些结果，研究人员试图定义能够提供抵御未来冲击的弹性的创新生态系统的特征。尽管进行了广泛的研究，但学术界、工业界或政策界对于将公司活动转移到海外对美国创新的影响几乎没有达成一致。P.I.之前的工作表明，将制造业转移到海外会改变技术发展动机。具体地说，她的结果表明，当美国公司将生产从美国转移到东亚发展中国家时，美国开发的最先进技术不再有效。国外的生产特点不同，在发展中国家的环境下，较早的技术可能更具成本效益。在这些结果的基础上，该项目试图了解离岸制造对(1)将制造业转移到海外的公司的创新活动，以及(2)在美国同一或其他机构内先进技术的持续进步的影响。在研究的第一部分，结果表明，将制造转移到海外的公司是否遵循了与仍在美国制造的公司不同的技术轨迹。在研究的第二部分，结果揭示了在研究生态系统的情况下，制造离岸转移是否转移了制度创新轨迹。更广泛的影响：近年来，人们越来越担心美国能否在全球经济中保持竞争力。了解创新生态系统对一系列创新公司将活动转移到海外的反应，对于重新定义美国的科学和创新政策以及提高此类系统的弹性至关重要。这项研究的结果揭示了机构位置的重要性--小公司与大公司、大学或政府实验室--对创新的数量和方向。利用这些结果，该项目描述了创新生态系统的关键指标，这些指标可能有助于它们抵御冲击，例如一大批创新公司将制造转移到海外。衡量标准可以包括诸如制造地点和创新产出之间的耦合强度、制度流动性、公司-大学专利-出版相互依赖等单位，以及从研究结果中出现的其他衡量标准。政策制定者可以立即使用这些指标来评估生态系统的弹性，并将使学者能够在未来描述行业生态系统的工作中以这些指标为基础。最后，特定的研究技术--光电子学--对于推动通信、计算和传感领域的发展至关重要。了解继续发展光电子技术的政策杠杆，可能对美国的经济和军事领导地位至关重要。

Government policy today targets firms rather than firm ecosystems. Given the increased fragmentation of firm activities and increased technological interdependency of these firms over the past 20 years, this mode of policy-making may be outdated. This research leverages a natural experiment in the converging telecommunications and computing industry to examine the impact on the innovation ecosystem of removing a critical set of innovating firms. Drawing on the results, the researchers seek to define characteristics of innovation ecosystems that could provide resiliency against future shocks.Despite extensive study, there is little agreement within the academic, industrial, or policy communities on the impact of moving firm activities offshore on innovation back in the U.S. Previous work by the P.I. has shown that moving manufacturing offshore changes technology development incentives. Specifically, her results show that when U.S. firms shift production from the U.S. to developing East Asia, the most advanced technologies that were developed in the U.S. no longer pay. Production characteristics are different abroad, and earlier technologies can be more cost-effective in developing country environment. Building on these results, this project seeks to understand the impact of manufacturing offshore on (1) the innovative activities of the firms that moved manufacturing offshore, and (2) the continued advance of the advanced technologies within the same or other institutions in the U.S. In the case of the first part of the study, the results demonstrate whether firms which relocated manufacturing offshore are following a different technology trajectory from those firms still manufacturing in the U.S. In the case of the second part of the study, the results shed insight into whether the relocation of manufacturing offshore has, in the case of the ecosystem of study, shifted the institutional locus of innovation. Broader Impact: In recent years, there has been rising concern over the ability of the U.S. to remain competitive in the global economy. Understanding how innovation ecosystems react to a set of innovating firms moving activities offshore is critical to redefining U.S. science and innovation policy and to improving the resiliency of such systems. The results of this study shed insights into the significance of institutional location -- small versus large firms, universities, or government labs -- on the quantity and direction of innovation. Leveraging these results, the project characterizes critical metrics of innovation ecosystems that may aid in their resiliency against shocks such as a large set of innovating firms moving manufacturing offshore. Metrics may include such units as coupling intensity between manufacturing location and innovative output, institutional fluidity, firm-university patent-publication interdependency, and other metrics that emerge from the result of the study. These metrics can be used immediately by policy-makers to assess ecosystem resiliency, and will enable academics to build on them in future work characterizing industry ecosystems. Finally, the particular technology of study -- optoelectronics -- is critical to advance in communications, computing, and sensing. Understanding the policy levers to continue technology development in optoelectronics may be essential to U.S. economic and military leadership.