This dissertation consists of three essays examining the role of connectivity in the catch-up process of a nation primarily focusing on East Asian countries. Specifically, I investigate the sourcing of knowledge, especially tacit knowledge, on local innovation capability building and thus catch-up process of a nation. I argue that for any country, sourcing from the diverse pools of tacit knowledge available in different parts of the world is a crucial requirement in maintaining a robust innovation eco-system. This becomes much more important in the catch-up process of a less-developed or emerging economy that is attempting to build local innovation capability. In the first chapter, I lay the theoretical groundwork for the dissertation by reviewing how existing studies have contributed to our understanding of the catch-up process of an economy. Then, in the second chapter, I explore how the openness of an economy underpins contrasting economic outcomes by comparing the economies of South Korea and Brazil. The third chapter emphasizes that the connectivity to the global innovation system is equally important for a more advanced economy such as Japan. Lack of such connectivity could lead to systemic “lock-in” in the long term. This is done by investigating the national systems of innovation of Japan in four knowledge-intensive industries: automotive, electronics, robotics and pharmaceuticals. Using patent data, I demonstrate that compared to other advanced countries such as Germany and Denmark, the Japanese innovation system is quite closed. I speculate that closedness to global innovation systems could be one of the reasons for Japan’s prolonged economic recession and the underperformance of its once world leading firms. The fourth chapter proposes an alternative catch-up strategy by investigating the innovation catch-up processes in Korea and Taiwan. These two Asian economies achieved developed status in a remarkably short period of time. Surprisingly, I found that these two countries are not well-connected to the rest of the world when it comes to innovation networks. These two countries achieved innovation catch-up rapidly by focusing on specific technologies that inherently require less reliance on learning through co-inventor networks. These technologies are the so-called “short cycle” technologies, i.e., technologies where the time period between innovation and maturation is very short. Therefore, relatively advanced technologies can be obtained in an “off-the-shelf” manner through outright purchase, licensing, and other means that do not require in-house wholly-owned innovation systems. / Business Administration/International Business Administration
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:TEMPLE/oai:scholarshare.temple.edu:20.500.12613/1710 |
| Date | January 2017 |
| Creators | Lee, Ahreum |
| Contributors | Mudambi, Ram, 1954-, Choi, Jongmoo Jay, 1945-, Yoo, Youngjin, Winston Smith, Sheryl, Di Benedetto, C. Anthony |
| Publisher | Temple University. Libraries |
| Source Sets | Temple University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis/Dissertation, Text |
| Format | 123 pages |
| Rights | IN COPYRIGHT- This Rights Statement can be used for an Item that is in copyright. Using this statement implies that the organization making this Item available has determined that the Item is in copyright and either is the rights-holder, has obtained permission from the rights-holder(s) to make their Work(s) available, or makes the Item available under an exception or limitation to copyright (including Fair Use) that entitles it to make the Item available., http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ |
| Relation | http://dx.doi.org/10.34944/dspace/1692, Theses and Dissertations |
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