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

这项教师早期职业发展（Career）资助将测试一个假设，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，以便他们可以使用分布式创新网络，同时保持他们在市场上的竞争优势。从产品开发由内部研发活动驱动的传统模式转变为今天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联系形成一个网络。本研究结果将显著提高工程师和产品开发人员制定系统架构战略决策的能力，确定产品平台的开放性和模块化程度，并制定设计决策以触发或加强分布式创新的持久周期。反过来，这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、工程设计和复杂的自适应系统。教育目标包括将复杂的社会技术网络科学与工程设计相结合，创造活动，培养当前和未来工程师的跨学科分析思维。为了模拟系统架构与创新和竞争动态的相互作用，将开发一个三层模型。该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，从而最大化交付的价值。从这个意义上说，本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。模块化的动态将被使用，作为每一层结构变化的代理，网络嵌入式博弈论方法将被应用于创建将技术模块化与市场模块化联系起来的分析模型。还将创建程式化的模型，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。通过吸收CMOS技术，对商业无线产业的快速转型进行了实证研究，并对导致智能手机商业化的十年期间，这种转型的每个阶段的产品架构和系统模块化变化的作用进行了补充。教育活动包括为高中学生设计复杂网络系统的简短互动研讨会，并与纽约市的一家科学博物馆合作，将本基金关于多层次网络的部分研究成果整合到K-12学生的可视化互动基础设施中。在大学阶段，任务旨在将复杂网络方法和多智能体系统的最新发展整合到本科和研究生阶段的工程设计中。

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.