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Technological change bears the promise of addressing environmental problems without reneging on economic development. However, taping its full potential requires an understanding of its drivers and barriers. The three chapters of this dissertation are a modest attempt at casting light on some of the factors that can foster technological change towards more environmental-friendly technologies. In Chapter One, I provide the first quantitative evidence that the Montreal Protocol, and its following amendments to protect the ozone layer, triggered a large increase in research and innovation on alternatives to ozone-depleting molecules. To do this, I use the full text of patents and scientific articles and implement a difference-in-differences strategy and a synthetic control method. To compare molecules’ chemical and industrial characteristics, I construct descriptive variables by applying machine learning techniques to the documents’ text. In Chapter Two, I investigate barriers to adopting solar lanterns in the context of rural Indian households. I design and implement a randomized controlled trial on people’s willingness to pay for such lanterns, and find that, despite the relative simplicity of the product, information barriers to adopting solar lanterns remain high. Chapter Three theoretically investigates firm-level barriers to green technological change. I outline a mechanism that explains why coordination at the industry level might be necessary. I argue that radical innovations (such as electric cars) require complementary innovations in interdependent components, and show that, when technological change requires investment by both suppliers and producers, coordination within an industry is needed and can be difficult to obtain.

University of Macau / Faculty of Science and Technology / Department of Computer and Information Science

With rapid development of technology in industries and aggressive globalization competitiveness, business operation success from the past does not guarantee present and future success, and the competitive advantages of enterprises may vanish after time or environment differences. Promoting new products and process innovation have becoming the main strategies for enterprises, and they also become the key points of the existence of enterprises. Therefore, enterprises should intake technological innovation when formulating strategies, and concentrate on their core resources and capabilities. Through the integrations, the enterprises will be able to react and get the sustainable competitive advantages when changes from outside and inside the organizations occurred. This research is using the Resource-Based View as foundation, and the high technology manufacturers and enterprises in Taiwan as our research objects. Exploring the characteristics of enterprise inner resources, capabilities and the impacts on creating sustainable competitive advantages through the interactions and effects when enterprises engage planning their technological innovation strategies. The obtained data is adapted by Pearson correlation analysis and regression analysis. The research result is hopefully to be able to provide with the high technology manufacturers and enterprises in promoting the competitive advantages in business operation and decision application. The result of this research is that, the technological innovation strategy is indeed affected by core resources and capabilities. The different core resource contents and characteristics have remarkable effects on enterprises technological innovation strategies. This research result is corresponding with resource-strategy paradigm by the Resource-Based School. Technological innovation strategy has outstanding impact on the sustainable competitive advantages. Different types of technological innovation strategies have effects on innovation performances, which shows the importance of applying technological innovation strategy to enhance the competitive advantages. However, the core resource contents and characteristics do not show the direct impact on the sustainable competitive advantages. The core resources and capabilities of enterprises will have contribution to the sustainable competitive advantages by strategy formulation and implementation.

Background Telehealth is a communication technology that allows exchange of data between patients and health care providers. Disease management is a structured multifaceted intervention to patient care that promotes self-management skills and improves patient-doctor communication. This systematic review aims to determine the effectiveness of “telehealth diabetes management programmes” for patients with type-2 diabetes (T2DM) in improving outcomes such as glycaemic control, diabetes related mortality, hospital admissions and overall cost-effectiveness of programme. Its applicability to Hong Kong will be reviewed. Methods A literature search of electronic bibliographic databases was performed to identify relevant articles. Both randomised control trials and observational studies on patients with T2DM published up to March 2013 were included in the analysis. Results A total of 14 articles were eligible (n=9708 subjects). Eight were randomised controlled trials and six observational studies. Ten studies reported on mean change in HbA1c level, three on health care utilization and three on cost-effectiveness of telehealth management programme. No studies had diabetes related mortality as their outcome measure. Across these trials, telehealth diabetes management programme resulted in an improvement in glycaemic control, likely reduction in health service utilization and a probable cost-effective programme. Discussions The current Hong Kong’s health care system faces challenges from long wait-list for medical consultations and rising health care costs. The applicability of the results from this review to the setting in Hong Kong, and feasibility of implementation will be discussed. Conclusion Telehealth disease management programmes had clinically modest but significant improvement in HbA1c among adults with T2DM and likely to be cost-effective. The results of this review have potential important implications for policy makers in the allocation of health care resources. / published_or_final_version / Public Health / Master / Master of Public Health

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The purpose of this study is to examine the work environment of research and development (R & D) subsystems and ascertain the relationship between technological innovation and the work environment. The focus of the study is the semiconductor industry, (SIC 3674), which is a prime example of a rapid growth, research intensive industry. The industry, in the past decade, has been characterized by very rapid technological advances with a subsequent high growth rate for most firms in the industry. Two instruments were developed to measure technological innovation. The first instrument, the innovation index, estimated the actual innovations developed by each company since 1970. The index consisted of a comprehensive list of technological innovations that could have been adopted and developed by the companies in the industry. The second instrument, the perceived innovativeness questionnaire, assessed company innovativeness as perceived by the R & D personnel. The R & D work environment was assessed with the work climate questionnaire which consisted of ten work climate dimensions, selected for their theoretical relevance and importance in the light of prior research on innovation. These dimensions were: autonomy, cooperation, supportiveness, structure, level of reward, performance-reward dependency, achievement motivation, status polarization, flexibility and decision centralization. Interviews were conducted as part of the research study to provide information on the development of innovations in the semiconductor industry and, secondly, to determine what changes, if any, had occurred in the nature of the work environment of the R & D subsystems of the semiconductor companies. Data for the study were collected from eight semiconductor companies (SIC 3674). Respondents included all the vice presidents for the R & D subsystems of the companies and a total of 136 research and development personnel from the eight companies. Content analysis of the interviews suggests that: (1) innovation development in the semiconductor industry is perceived as a multiphased process rather than a single event. This process consists of three stages: idea generation and evaluation (initiation stage); approval and adoption stage; and development and implementation stage; and (2) the work environment of the R & D subsystem is characterized by relative stability of work climate over a period of time. Statistical analyses of the data offer some support for the view that technological innovation is related to the R & D subsystem work climate. Significant positive relations were found between technological innovation and the work climate dimensions of performance-reward dependency, flexibility, achievement motivation, autonomy, cooperation, supportiveness and perceived innovativeness; significant negative relationship was found between technological innovation and decision centralization. Work climate differences between the high innovative group and low innovative group showed significant differences between the two groups in the work climate dimensions of autonomy, performance-reward dependency, achievement motivation, flexibility, decision centralization and perceived innovativeness. The results of the study suggest that: (1) technological innovation is related to R & D subsystem work climate; (2) the nature of work climate that characterizes the R & D subsystems of highly innovative companies is different from that which characterizes their less innovative counterparts.

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Thesis (M.S.)--University of Hawaii at Manoa, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 157-164). / x, 164 leaves, bound ill. 29 cm