Technology Management
Chapter 1: Introduction a framework for understanding
TM activities and tools
The challenges associated with the management of technology are compounded
by a number of factors, including the increasing cost, complexity and pace of
technology advancement, the diversity of technology resources, the globalization
of competition and alliances and the impact of information technology.
Defnition TM includes planning, directing, control and coordination of the
development and implementation of technological capabilities so that frms can
shape and accomplish their strategic and operational objectives.
Dynamic capabilities theory: dynamic capabilities are the ability to
reconfgure, redirect, transform, and appropriately shape and integrate existing
core competencies with external resources and strategic and complementary
assets to meet the challenges of a time-pressured, rapidly changing world of
competition and imitation.
Capabilities:
- Dynamic: build, integrate or reconfgure operational capabilities
- Operational: High-level routine that, together with its implementing input
flows, confers upon an organizationss management a set of decision
options for producing signifcant outputs of a particular type.
Process: an approach to achieving a managerial objective through the
transformation of inputs into outputs.
Innovation: doing something new such as a product, process of service,
including newness in the frm.
Open innovation: in a world of widely distributed knowledge, companies aford to
rely entirely on their own research, but should instead buy or license processes
or inventions from other companies.
The Oslo Manual four main innovation types:
1. Product innovation is the introduction of a good/service that is new or
signifcantly improved with respect to its characteristics or intended uses.
2. Process innovation is the implementation of a new or signifcantly
improved production, service or delivery method.
3. Marketing innovation is a new marketing method involving signifcant
changes in product design/packaging, product placement, product
promotion to pricing.
4. Organizational innovation is the implementation of a new organizational
method in the frmss business practices, workplace organization or external
relations.
5. Eco-innovation is the creation of novel and competitively priced goods,
processes, systems, services and procedures that can satisfy human needs
and bring quality of life to all people with minimal use of natural resources
per unit output, and a minimal release of toxic substances.
, 6. Reverse innovation refers to product and service innovations aimed at
resource-constrained customers in emerging markets.
7. Design-driven innovation is user experience and meaning for products and
services.
TM and innovation management overlap when there is a technology innovation,
otherwise they have their own unique disciplinary body of knowledge.
TM framework advantages
- Allows us to conceive that TM activities might operate in any business
process, department or business system level.
- Valid for service frms and frms in manufacturing sectors
- Indicates that the specifc TM issues faced by frms depend on the context,
in terms of organizational structure, systems, infrastructure, culture and
structure, challenges and the environment.
- Is in line with the dynamic capabilities framework
- Applicability to all frms regardless of their size
- Considers technology as source
- Emphasizes the dynamic nature of the knowledge flows that must occur
between the commercial and technological functions in the frm, linking to
strategy, innovation and operational processes.
TM activities
1. Acquisition: how the company obtains the technologies valuable for its
business. Itss based on the buy-collaborate-make decision.
2. Exploitation: entails commercialization but frst the expected benefts
need to be realized through efective implementation, absorption and
operation of the technology within the frm.
3. Identifcation: includes market changes as well as technological
developments. Includes search, auditing, data collection and intelligence
processes for technologies and markets.
4. Learning: involves reflections on technology projects and processes
carried out within or outside the frm.
5. Protection: formal processes such as patenting and staf retention need
to be in place in order to protect intellectual assets within a frm, including
the knowledge and expertise embedded in products and manufacturing
systems.
6. Selection: takes account of company-level strategic issues, which
requires a good grasp of strategic objectives and priorities developed at
the business-strategy level.
Four disciplines which show he wide spectrum of TM:
1. Management of technology-centred knowledge: management procedures
associated with the exploitation of technological resources.
2. Knowledge of corporate functions: classis business functions such as
marketing, fnance, accounting, operations, management information
systems etc.
3. Technology-centred knowledge: topics that relate to specifc technology
felds or critical technology areas.
, 4. Knowledge of supporting disciplines: important supporting topics such as
national policy frameworks, economics, general systems theory, risk
analyses, ethics etc.
Tools include devices for supporting both action/practical application and
frameworks for conceptual understanding
In this book, we considers three criteria as the basis for delineating the six core
tools of TM:
- Simplicity and flexibility of use
- Degree of availability
- Standardization level
Key tools should be dynamic in nature and applicable in all TM activities. The key
tools will also be the prevailing ones across TM processes, which capture internal
and external dynamics. Tools: patent analysis, portfolio management,
roadmapping, S-curve, stage-gate and value analysis.
Chapter 1: Introduction a framework for understanding
TM activities and tools
The challenges associated with the management of technology are compounded
by a number of factors, including the increasing cost, complexity and pace of
technology advancement, the diversity of technology resources, the globalization
of competition and alliances and the impact of information technology.
Defnition TM includes planning, directing, control and coordination of the
development and implementation of technological capabilities so that frms can
shape and accomplish their strategic and operational objectives.
Dynamic capabilities theory: dynamic capabilities are the ability to
reconfgure, redirect, transform, and appropriately shape and integrate existing
core competencies with external resources and strategic and complementary
assets to meet the challenges of a time-pressured, rapidly changing world of
competition and imitation.
Capabilities:
- Dynamic: build, integrate or reconfgure operational capabilities
- Operational: High-level routine that, together with its implementing input
flows, confers upon an organizationss management a set of decision
options for producing signifcant outputs of a particular type.
Process: an approach to achieving a managerial objective through the
transformation of inputs into outputs.
Innovation: doing something new such as a product, process of service,
including newness in the frm.
Open innovation: in a world of widely distributed knowledge, companies aford to
rely entirely on their own research, but should instead buy or license processes
or inventions from other companies.
The Oslo Manual four main innovation types:
1. Product innovation is the introduction of a good/service that is new or
signifcantly improved with respect to its characteristics or intended uses.
2. Process innovation is the implementation of a new or signifcantly
improved production, service or delivery method.
3. Marketing innovation is a new marketing method involving signifcant
changes in product design/packaging, product placement, product
promotion to pricing.
4. Organizational innovation is the implementation of a new organizational
method in the frmss business practices, workplace organization or external
relations.
5. Eco-innovation is the creation of novel and competitively priced goods,
processes, systems, services and procedures that can satisfy human needs
and bring quality of life to all people with minimal use of natural resources
per unit output, and a minimal release of toxic substances.
, 6. Reverse innovation refers to product and service innovations aimed at
resource-constrained customers in emerging markets.
7. Design-driven innovation is user experience and meaning for products and
services.
TM and innovation management overlap when there is a technology innovation,
otherwise they have their own unique disciplinary body of knowledge.
TM framework advantages
- Allows us to conceive that TM activities might operate in any business
process, department or business system level.
- Valid for service frms and frms in manufacturing sectors
- Indicates that the specifc TM issues faced by frms depend on the context,
in terms of organizational structure, systems, infrastructure, culture and
structure, challenges and the environment.
- Is in line with the dynamic capabilities framework
- Applicability to all frms regardless of their size
- Considers technology as source
- Emphasizes the dynamic nature of the knowledge flows that must occur
between the commercial and technological functions in the frm, linking to
strategy, innovation and operational processes.
TM activities
1. Acquisition: how the company obtains the technologies valuable for its
business. Itss based on the buy-collaborate-make decision.
2. Exploitation: entails commercialization but frst the expected benefts
need to be realized through efective implementation, absorption and
operation of the technology within the frm.
3. Identifcation: includes market changes as well as technological
developments. Includes search, auditing, data collection and intelligence
processes for technologies and markets.
4. Learning: involves reflections on technology projects and processes
carried out within or outside the frm.
5. Protection: formal processes such as patenting and staf retention need
to be in place in order to protect intellectual assets within a frm, including
the knowledge and expertise embedded in products and manufacturing
systems.
6. Selection: takes account of company-level strategic issues, which
requires a good grasp of strategic objectives and priorities developed at
the business-strategy level.
Four disciplines which show he wide spectrum of TM:
1. Management of technology-centred knowledge: management procedures
associated with the exploitation of technological resources.
2. Knowledge of corporate functions: classis business functions such as
marketing, fnance, accounting, operations, management information
systems etc.
3. Technology-centred knowledge: topics that relate to specifc technology
felds or critical technology areas.
, 4. Knowledge of supporting disciplines: important supporting topics such as
national policy frameworks, economics, general systems theory, risk
analyses, ethics etc.
Tools include devices for supporting both action/practical application and
frameworks for conceptual understanding
In this book, we considers three criteria as the basis for delineating the six core
tools of TM:
- Simplicity and flexibility of use
- Degree of availability
- Standardization level
Key tools should be dynamic in nature and applicable in all TM activities. The key
tools will also be the prevailing ones across TM processes, which capture internal
and external dynamics. Tools: patent analysis, portfolio management,
roadmapping, S-curve, stage-gate and value analysis.
