Technology management in China: a global perspective and challenging issues

One of the main challenges in technology transfer (TT) process is technology selection. Even though there are many researches that have focused on the technology selection, however technology selection remains a sensitive activity in technology management which there has not been much attention toward it by managers and scholars. Defining the position of technology selection in the technology transfer process, and considering technology selection through perspectives of technology management and a decision making problem, this paper presents a framework based on five professional workshops. In the mentioned framework, five technology selection criteria namely technological, technical, organisational capability, peripheral environment and supplier are identified and extracted by the exploratory factor analysis method. A real problem in automotive industry is also solved by using fuzzy TOPSIS method to explain how the framework is applied.

The relationship between economics and technology, as well as their interaction in production productivity, project management and in technology transfer processes are bere reviewed. Over the last two decades there has been an increasing interest by economists in the technologist's view of technical change and its mechanism . The author looks at the zone between technology and economics, the ‘technological economics’, and discusses the theory of innovation recently sketched out by Nelson and Winter. The relevance to project management and technology transfer of contemporary writing by economists leads to the view that there are welcome signs of a convergence of the conceptual models now emerging and tbe practical problems of technology management and movement.

Purpose– This paper sets out to review the literature of technology strategy, competitive advantage and sustainability of international business, in particular, the contribution that the enactment of technology strategy can make toward the effective implementation of business sustainability in the post-recession. It examines what kind of role technology strategy plays in Chinese business and how business sustainability could be leveraged through the implementation of appropriate technology strategy. This paper attempts to address various crucial issues in the establishment of a proper technology strategy for the sustainability of the business in the global market place based upon case study of five vanguard Chinese companies.Design/methodology/approach– This exploratory study primarily adapts a qualitative multiple-case-study method which attempts to understand how Chinese firms perceive the role of technology strategy in their business, to capture the practical terms and concepts underpinning technology strategy and sustainability, and to allow us to have an analysis of the relationship between technology strategy and sustainability of business. Finally, ten propositions concerning “technology strategy and sustainability of business” are to be developed and verified along the theoretical development of the paper and examination of five cases. The nature of the study results that the paper applies qualitative method with a multiple-case-study approach, including Geely, Haier, TCL, Huawei and Lenovo.Findings– This paper addresses the crucial issues – management of technology as basic function in international business and the close relationship between technology strategy and business sustainability. It showcases the Chinese business paradigm from “imitation to innovation” of how Chinese hi-tech firms built their core competence. This study provides fresh insights for multinational companies in creating competitive advantage through designing an appropriate technology strategy.Originality/value– Theoretically this research fills the gap of an area of technology management which has been rarely touched. This will have strong implication not only to Chinese companies but also non-Chinese multinational companies.

The article substantiates the conceptual foundations of technological management and its importance in the management of modern enterprises. It is investigated that technological management provides management of the technological development of the enterprise. To solve the goals and objectives of technological management, it is necessary to form an external environment with state support, technological innovative development of the enterprise, the introduction of innovation, investment, technological policy of the state, as well as the formation of a favorable scientific and investment environment. It was revealed that at the level of each individual enterprise, technological management requires the formation, adoption and phased implementation of the technological development strategy of the enterprise, with the development of an appropriate management system to achieve all the goals and objectives of technological development at the strategic, tactical and operational level of the enterprise. It is determined that the company has three main levels of technological management: strategic, tactical and operational, integrated into a single system of technological management. It is determined that technological management should be applied continuously, at all stages of the life cycle of an enterprise, since the change in technology determines, forms and directs the life cycle. It was revealed that technology management makes it possible to ensure continuous development and avoidance of stages of decline in financial economic activity and the development of crisis phenomena. It is generalized that technological management involves the active development, creation, introduction of innovations, the creation of new and improvement of existing technologies and the decision to abandon outdated technologies, and thus will ensure the technological renewal of products and technologies for its release, which will ensure high competitiveness of the company's products in the market, its effective implementation and profitability and will ensure dynamic technological and economic development of the enterprise in the future.

This thesis analyses innovation and technology strategy within a primary industry, notably the upstream oil and gas industry. Industries that exploit and produce finite natural resources are challenged by specific external risks that do not receive much attention from management literature otherwise, especially with regard to organizational innovation behaviour, and thus merit such research focus. On one hand, primary sector firms are confronted with exhaustible nature of finite natural resources. On the other hand, those finite natural resources are fixed to certain locations and companies have to operate in numerous countries in order to exploit resource deposits. In this context, they are often confronted with tremendous socio-political constraints that may have a negative impact on their businesses. This research work raises questions specific to natural resource based industries, notably (1) how can firms defend or even expand their competitive position when they are challenged by the depletion of their core resources? How can firms compensate for an exhaustible resource? (2) How do we evaluate contingencies like political risk for competitive advantage and what role does innovation play in this context? This dissertation takes the format of a "compilation thesis", in this case, three compiled articles. Within the first paper we focus on the resource based view (RBV), a central theoretical approach in management science, which explains how unique firm resources and capabilities contribute to value creation and lead to sustained competitive advantage. We1 apply the assumptions of RBV to the context of finite natural resources and ask if its analytical power is sufficient to explain competitive advantage of companies active in the primary sector, such as hydrocarbon and ore production. Paper 2 analyses how firms respond to geophysical constraints, such as natural resource depletion, and how these depletion issues affect organizational capability building and operational performance in terms of resource exploration and recovery. Paper 3 asks if political risk as external threat influences firm technology and innovation strategies. We find that time horizons of political risk play an important role and analyse why mid-and long term threats positively influence the development of technology and innovation strategies. The dissertation makes several important contributions. First, it contributes to our understanding of innovation and technology strategy within a natural resource based industry. Second, the idea that finite natural resources with their exhaustible nature are different than the "usual" resources investigated by RBV is novel. Third, the analysis also shows how RBV applies to natural resources extracting industries, and how RBV would gain in explicatory power if it was able to integrate factors like "geophysical constraints" and 'exposure to political risk' into the approach. Fourth, the thesis applies RBV and capability approaches to the specific context of primary industries, which is important as it helps to extend the frameworks' usefulness. Fifth, the current thesis combines political risk theory and research on innovation and technology management, and answers why political risk influences firm strategies, differentiation, and entry into new fields. ______________________________ 1 I am going to use the personal pronoun "we" to refer to first person's actions or opinions in this paper. I do so because I want to acknowledge the contributory effort of all who provided ideas and support. Nevertheless, any errors and omissions are completely my own responsibility.

The government of Malaysia has introduced several national policies to facilitate industrialisation and technology development in the country throughout the years. However, the effectiveness of this policy in facilitating technology transfer has never be measured quantitatively. The objective of this paper is to review the evolution of Malaysia's technology transfer model and process since Malaysia gained its independence. This paper will look into the past and current national policies that have facilitated the technology transfer process in the country. A literature review was conducted on various frequently used technology transfer model since 1940s and compare it to the technology transfer process evolution in the country. From the analysis, the national policies introduced over the years have a direct and indirect effect on the technology transfer process in the country. However, the effectiveness of technology transfer model that was facilitated by the policy was never measured quantitatively. Further study needs to be conducted in measuring the efficiency of the technology transfer process that facilitated by a specific policy introduced by the government. The factors and sub-factors affecting the technology transfer process facilitated by this specific policy also need to be identified so that further improvement can be proposed.

Innovation processes in services remain under-researched, but recently large-scale surveys have been conducted which allow for a more systematic appraisal of the level and scope of innovation in services. To date, much of the literature on innovation in services focuses on the adoption and use of information and communication technologies (ICTs). Innovation in services, and services innovation, should, however, be understood in broader terms, and this understanding should extend to non-technological innovation. This paper presents evidence from a recent large-scale survey of innovation amongst German commercial service firms. It shows that services are much more active with respect to innovation than is widely thought. They are innovative in terms of being producers of service and process innovations. From our broader perspective, we examine the pattern of innovation as it relates to the standardisation-particularisation of service products, across a range of service sectors and across firms of various sizes. The production of bespoke or customised services shaped by client inputs has long been considered a defining characteristic of many services, and one that has affected their innovation potential. The present analysis reveals a pattern of diversity in behaviour, which reflects the diversity amongst service firms, and demonstrates the need for more subtle and differentiated analyses of services and services innovation.

This paper introduces the evolutionary process of technological innovation and technology management in Chinese enterprises since 1949. First, the transition of corporate management and technology management in China is introduced in comparison to Western-style management. Then, based on the historical description and case studies, the typical technology development process, especially the processes of technological acquisition, learning and secondary innovation in Chinese enterprises, is analyzed. The integration between technology acquisition and in-house design and R&D is emphasized. The authors suggest that "assimilation and self-design upon imported technology" (3-I policy) is the suitable and vital technology development avenue for most Chinese firms. To accomplish such a technological avenue, coordination, which exists between product innovation and process innovation, corporate strategy and technology strategy, and technology evolution and organizational change must be organized well and dynamically. As Chinese firms face more severe competition than ever, more attention should be paid to the development of indigenous capabilities for technological innovation. The firms' innovation system (FIS), which emphasizes the infrastructure support for a firms entrepreneurship, R&D system, and organization, as well as high-talent personnel, should be established or improved. Thus, technology strategy and the technological innovation system are currently the two key issues of management of technology (MOT) in China and will continue to be into the coming century.

SUMMARY “Technology Management” is a dynamically evolving discipline that integrates the technology-dominated “world of the engineer” with management. The field is distinguishable from its neighbor disciplines through characteristic research questions, specialized periodicals, and more than 200 educational programs. Currently, the field changes its face and increasingly focuses on the service industry. It thus reflects the blurring boundaries between “services” and “goods” companies and the service sector’s growing dependency on (information) technology. This paper describes these changes and presents contributions of Technology Management to SSEM. Based on these findings and a survey of industry needs in the “silicon forest”, it outlines an agenda for education and research. Technology Management Defined Technology Management (TM), also referred to as “Engineering management” has been characterized as the link among “engineering, science and management disciplines to plan, develop and implement technological capabilities to shape and accomplish the strategic and operational objectives of an organization” [12]. It thus encompasses two sets of activities (see fig. 1): (1) activities related to the innovation process, leading to new technologies (research, product and process development and commercialization), and (2) the activities that define a company’s “strategic make up” – the strategic integration of its technology strategy (definition of the technologies to engage in, including timing and resource commitment), its business strategy (markets to serve, and needed resources and organizational structures), and its financial strategies. Modern technologies are usually developed in industry, but the underlying scientific research is predominantly performed in universities. TM therefore researches efficient means for transferring technology from the research into the development domain (see (1) in fig. 1) that range from the design of educational programs to the creation of strategic research alliances. Research Development Commercialization Technology Strategy Business Strategy Financial Strategy Strategic Integration Innovation Process 1

Technology analysis (TA) is an important issue in the management of technology. Most R&D (Research & Development) policies have depended on diverse TA results. Traditional TA results have been obtained through qualitative approaches such as the Delphi expert survey, scenario analysis, or technology road mapping. Although they are representative methods for TA, they are not stable because their results are dependent on the experts’ knowledge and subjective experience. To solve this problem, recently many studies on TA have been focused on quantitative approaches, such as patent analysis. A patent document has diverse information of developed technologies, and thus, patent is one form of objective data for TA. In addition, sustainable technology has been a big issue in the TA fields, because most companies have their technological competitiveness through the sustainable technology. Sustainable technology is a technology keeping the technological superiority of a company. So a country as well as a company should consider sustainable technology for technological competition and continuous economic growth. Also it is important to manage sustainable technology in a given technology domain. In this paper, we propose a new patent analysis approach based on statistical analysis for the management of sustainable technology (MOST). Our proposed methodology for the MOST is to extract a technological structure and relationship for knowing the sustainable technology. To do this, we develop a hierarchical diagram of technology for finding the causal relationships among technological keywords of a given domain. The aim of the paper is to select the sustainable technology and to create the hierarchical technology paths to sustainable technology for the MOST. This contributes to planning R&D strategy for the sustainability of a company. To show how the methodology can be applied to real problem, we perform a case study using retrieved patent documents related to telematics technology.

The article substantiates the conceptual foundations for implementing measures to ensure security in implementing the technological management strategy in agricultural enterprises under modern dynamic conditions. It has been researched that an essential prerequisite for guaranteeing the effectiveness of the technological management strategy in agricultural enterprises is identifying and leveling threats to its provision and implementation. Hence, the prevention and mitigation of the consequences of the dangers is the primary condition for ensuring the security of an enterprise. A threat to the safety of an economic entity in the agricultural sector under current conditions is an actual or potential possibility of manifestation of the destructive impact of various factors in its development, which leads to certain losses and negative consequences. It is determined that the goal of technological management is to ensure the technical development of an enterprise in the agricultural sector, i.e., a purposeful, continuous process of changes in the technological revolutions of the enterprise's economic activity, which determine the development of resources, and together makes it possible to ensure the technological competitiveness and sustainability of an enterprise in today's dynamic business environment. Attention is focused on the need to implement the main practical measures to ensure the security of the implementation of the technological management strategy in an agricultural enterprise, which would include the development of a strategic plan to strengthen the protection of business entities, the creation of a separate structural unit responsible for ensuring the security of the enterprise, the development of a mechanism for monitoring and assessing the state of external and internal markets and the formation of recommendations for possible ways to increase the level of competitiveness. Keywords: management, enterprise, security, threat, strategy, technological management.

In the context of globalisation and liberalisation, technology is considered as one of the main sources of competitive advantage. The requirements of technology management, including its education, are different in developing countries compared to those in developed countries. Developed countries emphasise exploitation of technology and introduction of new products and processes. They give high priority to the management of R&D and commercialisation of new technologies. On the other hand, developing countries rely heavily on technology transfer from abroad, as well as indigenous technological innovations based on local needs and resources. Developing countries therefore require technology management capabilities that are relevant to local conditions. This paper presents the status of technology management education and training in both developed and developing countries. It discusses the role and linkages of three key institutions contributing to human resource development in the area of technology management. The objective is to present a conceptual framework and suggest a repository of courses that could be used in designing and establishing technology management programs in developing countries.

This case study researched organizational factors that affect the university-industry technology transfer (UITT) processes of a private university, chosen by its success and uniqueness in the Brazilian context. Stood out as factors: innovation among pillars of management; valuing of research and intellectual property; qualified students, teachers and managers; multidisciplinary research groups; stability of governing body; performance of the TTO, Technology Management Agency and Technology Park. Difficulties highlighted were: reconciliation of time between activities of professors-researchers, bureaucracy and centralization of administrative and legal support; valuation of research results; approach and negotiation with companies. Among suggestions are: granting greater independence to the structures in charge of UITT and making them self-sustainable; training agents in technology marketing, sale, and negotiation skills.

Technology management is managing technological knowledge to sustain competitive edge in an uncertain and competitive business context. This paper developed a framework for analysing technology management issues by combining the knowledge management concepts and ecosystem theory concepts. Technology strategy can be conceptualised as a process of aligning knowledge search, knowledge envisioning, knowledge creation and knowledge evolution with a view to meeting changing customer needs, competitive threats and the future technology trajectory.

This paper discusses the inter-relationship between strategic planning, business process reengineering (BPR) and the management of technology. Using BPR as an intermediary approach, an IDEFO model is illustrated to link business strategy and technology strategies in a firm.