Productivity Challenge: the Role of Technology Standards in Innovation and Internationalisation

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Technological innovation is a key driver of productivity. The apparently weaker productivity growthexperienced in the UK (and some European countries) vis-à-vis North America has been linked to slowerdiffusion in Information Communication Technologies (ICT) and the lack of uptake of digitisationopportunities uniformly across economic sectors.Technology standards play a significant role in technology diffusion with important implications forinnovation, internationalisation and attendant productivity growth. A recent study commissioned by theBritish Standards Institution (BSI) and the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS)suggests that standards supported 37% of UK annual labour productivity growth over the 1921-2013 period(i.e., approximately 28% of annual GDP growth). Recent academic research has also highlighted theimportance of developing open technology standards as a spur to productivity, innovation and firmprofitability. However, business-level mechanisms underlying the standards-productivity relationshipremain a black box - a gap this research seeks to address by considering two predominant channels wherebylearning from standards can enable performance gains, viz. by catalysing innovation and internationalisationactivities.This PhD project will offer novel insight into standards and technology-led productivity growth, which is acomplex interplay between many distinct influences including innovative inputs, knowledge diffusion,market incentives, economic geography and institutional governance. Working closely with Dr Li and ProfBattisti, the PhD candidate will conduct a comprehensive literature review and econometric analyses,drawing on large-scale secondary firm-level datasets such as the UK Innovation Survey (and other microbusiness datasets via the Secure Research Service by ONS). This project will also use the Searle CentreDatabase on Technology Standards and Standard Setting Organisations - the most comprehensive dataseton standards and firm participation in standards development collected by the Northwestern University (US)(Baron and Spulber, 2018), as well as data on intellectual property such as patents and trademarks. Finally,this project will be carried out in close collaboration with BSI, the UK's national standards body, to yieldsignificant governance or policy implications for designing effective standards which expedite the diffusionof technologies to boost firm performance.The PhD project will provide a significant contribution to the academic literature. It is also anticipated toachieve high impact and wider engagement with business practices (via a deeper understanding ofefficiency gains through learning from standards) and policy bodies (via productivity growth andgovernance of standards development).