CAREER: Architecting Products to Balance Innovation and Competition in Business Ecosystems

这项教师早期职业发展(Career)补助金将检验这样一个假设，即技术公司可以就系统和产品的架构和模块化水平做出战略决策，以便它们能够使用分布式创新网络，同时保持其在市场上的竞争优势。与由内部研发活动驱动产品开发的传统模式不同，如今许多科技公司的新产品开发依赖于分布式创新。在分布式创新中，大量自主的企业、个人和社区通过与底层技术系统的共同连接形成网络。这项研究的结果将显著提高工程师和产品开发人员做出关于系统架构的战略决策的能力，确定产品平台的开放和模块化程度，并做出设计决策，以触发或加强分布式创新的长期周期。这反过来将通过更明智的战略架构决策来增加设计的社会价值。这项研究建立在几个学科的基础上，包括复杂和社会网络分析、博弈论、工程设计和复杂适应系统。教育目标包括将复杂社会技术网络的科学与工程设计相结合，以创建活动，促进当前和未来工程人员的跨学科分析思维。为了模拟系统架构与创新和竞争的动力之间的相互作用，将开发一个三层模型。这项研究的一个独特之处在于，它探索了如何使用组件、知识和市场竞争的显式动态网络表示，以及它们之间的交互来改进架构决策，以实现交付价值的最大化。在这个意义上，该研究利用网络理论的最新进展来弥合工程设计与组织科学和创新管理之间的差距。将使用模块化的动态，作为这些层中每一层的结构变化的代理，并将应用嵌入网络的博弈论方法来创建将技术模块化与市场模块化联系起来的分析模型。还将创建风格化的模型，以探索刺激架构驱动的、自我强化的分布式创新的必要条件。理论主旨得到了一项实证研究的补充，该研究通过吸收CMOS技术实现了商业无线行业的快速转型，以及在导致智能手机商业化的十年期间，产品架构的作用和系统模块化在这种转型的每个阶段的变化。教育活动包括为高中生设计关于复杂网络系统的简短、互动的研讨会，并与纽约市的一家科学博物馆合作，将这笔赠款中关于多层次网络的研究部分的一些成果纳入他们为K-12学生提供的可视化、互动的基础设施。在大学一级，任务旨在将复杂网络方法和多代理系统的最新发展整合到本科生和研究生水平的工程设计中。

This Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) grant will test the hypothesis that technology firms can make strategic decisions about the architecture and modularity levels of systems and products, so that they can use distributed innovation networks while keeping their competitive advantage in the market. In a paradigm shift from the traditional model in which product development is driven by internal R&D activities, new product development in many technology firms today relies on distributed innovation. In distributed innovation, a large number of autonomous firms, individuals and communities form a network through their common connection with an underlying technical system. Outcomes of this research will significantly improve the ability of engineers and product developers to make strategic decisions regarding systems architecture, determine the degree of openness and modularity of product platforms, and make design decisions to trigger or strengthen long-lasting cycles of distributed innovation. This, in turn, will increase the social value of design through more informed strategic architecture decisions. This research builds on several disciplines including complex and social network analysis, game theory, engineering design and complex adaptive systems. The educational objectives include integration of the science of complex socio-technical networks with engineering design to create activities that foster interdisciplinary analytical thinking in current and future engineers.To model the interaction of system architecture with dynamics of innovation and competition, a three-layer model will be developed. A unique aspect of the research is that it explores how to use explicit dynamic network representations of components, knowledge, and market competition, and the interaction between them to improve architecture decisions in order to maximize delivered value. In this sense, the research uses recent advances in network theory to bridge the gap between the engineering design and organization science and innovation management. Dynamics of modularity will be used, as a proxy for structural changes in each of these layers and network-embedded game-theoretic methods will be applied to create analytical models that relate technology modularity to market modularity. Stylized models will also be created to explore necessary conditions for stimulating episodes of architecture-driven, self-reinforcing distributed innovation. The theoretical thrust is complemented by an empirical study of the rapid transformation of the commercial wireless industry via absorbing CMOS technology, and the role of product architecture and changes in system modularity at each stage of this transformation for the ten-year period that led to the commercialization of smartphones. The educational activities include designing short, interactive workshops on complex networked systems for high school students, and collaborating with a science museum in New York City to integrate some of the results of the research part of this grant on multi-level networks into their visual, interactive infrastructure for K-12 students. At the college level, tasks are aimed at integrating recent developments in complex network methods and multi-agent systems in engineering design at undergraduate and graduate levels.