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Begin New Search Publishing Institution Berkeley Roundtable on the International Economy Author Martin Kenney

1. Building on Complimentary Assets in a Unified TCP/IP World

Author:
Martin Kenney and Timo Seppälä
Publication Date:
12-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Berkeley Roundtable on the International Economy
Abstract:
The contemporary competition in the smartphone industry is an ideal setting for studying Schumpeterian creative destruction, the role of the complementary assets, and the strategic use of technology platforms. This current creative destruction is particularly interesting because the current convergence from previously separate industries is pitting firms with differing business models from the old telecommunications world against the operating system winners of the old personal computer, and competitors from the new internet world. This paper utilizes insights from the literature on complementary assets and technology platforms to understand the completion in smartphones. This paper contributes a broadened understanding of the contemporary industry convergence occurring with Internet and cloud computing at its unifying center, and with intelligent communications devices at its edges. Furthermore, this paper extends the current academic discussion of the changes in the mobile telecommunications industry to consider the possibility that cloud computing will integrate a plethora of new devices that will include personal computers, smartphones, the internet-enabled television, and a nearly infinite number of other devices that will provide data to the cloud.
Topic:
Economics, Globalization, Industrial Policy, International Trade and Finance, Markets, and Science and Technology

2. Venture Capital and Clean Technology: Opportunities and Difficulties

Author:
Martin Kenney and Andrew Hargadon
Publication Date:
04-2011
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Berkeley Roundtable on the International Economy
Abstract:
In the last half - century, venture capitalists have financed many of the most important new U.S. technology-based firms and industries. Most recently, venture capital has been touted as a key investor and driver of a new clean technology future. This paper examines the characteristics of successful venture capital investing and the structure and dynamics of clean technology markets to predict whether venture capital is the best model for financing a clean technology transition. We identify the following three key characteristics of technologies and markets in which venture capital can be successfully invested. First, the firm's markets must be large and rapidly growing. Second, the firm's solutions must be scalable, with the particular characteristic that a firm's growth in revenue (and valuation) significantly outpaces the capital cost of achieving that growth. Third, there must be the potential for large and rapid payoff, as either a public stock offering or acquisition by another firm. In the U.S. clean technology market, with the exception of energy being a large market, in nearly all cases these characteristics do not hold. For these reasons, a venture capital model for funding clean technology innovation is unlikely to be successful and the imposition of venture capital goals on clean technology firms may even be harmful to their survival. The current Obama Administration's strategy of providing enormous loan guarantees to a few chosen venture capital ‐ financed firms is misguided because it is likely to truncate the chaotic business model search that characterizes the formation of new industries.
Topic:
Climate Change, Economics, Energy Policy, International Trade and Finance, and Markets

3. Structuring the Smartphone Industry: Is the Mobile Internet OS Platform the Key?

Author:
Martin Kenney and Bryan Pon
Publication Date:
01-2011
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Berkeley Roundtable on the International Economy
Abstract:
Until the introduction of the iPhone, cellular telephony and the Internet were essentially separate. The Internet was a PC-based service, while mobile telephony was conducted on a telephone. Though there were mobile products that provided communication services such as email, web access and other Internet services were either unavailable or inferior to those available on a PC. The “smartphone” category re defined by Apple meant the convergence of traditional mobile telephony, Internet services, and personal computing. As these sectors merge into a single device, formerly separate industry architectures and their constituent firms are being forced into direct competition. We test theories of industry architecture and technological platforms regarding their ability to explain the strategies of key entrants in navigating the transition. We analyze in detail the actions and strategies of four major competitors, including Apple, Google, Microsoft, Nokia, and, more briefly, Research in Motion and HP/Palm, from the framework of technological platform theory. Our analysis suggests that currently some competitors are following traditional platform strategies, but that Google and Apple appear to have adopted strategies at odds with platform literature. We examine how the dynamics of this convergence may lead to a reconsideration of certain tenets of platform theory.
Topic:
International Trade and Finance, Markets, Science and Technology, and Communications

4. Venture Capital Investment in the Greentech Industries: A Provocative Essay

Author:
Martin Kenney
Publication Date:
07-2009
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Berkeley Roundtable on the International Economy
Abstract:
In the first decade of the 21st Century there has been increasing awareness of environmental issues and recognition that these are now global in scope. This has occurred for many reasons and is perhaps best epitomized in the global warming discussion. The dramatic rise of China and India, in particular, has reoriented the debate about the sustainability of the current trajectory of fossil fuel usage and environmental degradation. Put quite simply, if the economic growth of China, initially, and then India were to follow the historical trajectory of fossil fuel energy usage and resource consumption that Japan, Taiwan, and Korea followed, the environmental impacts would be nothing short of monumental.
Topic:
Climate Change, Development, Energy Policy, and Environment
Political Geography:
China, India, Taiwan, and Korea

5. Reconsidering the Bayh-Dole Act and the Current University Technology Licensing Regime

Author:
Martin Kenney and Donald Patton
Publication Date:
05-2008
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Berkeley Roundtable on the International Economy
Abstract:
The Bayh-Dole Act of 1980 has been hailed by policy-makers and scholars as a critical policy innovation for ensuring the commercialization of inventions resulting from results of federally-funded research. This paper suggests that the current implementation of Bayh-Dole through university ownership of all researchers' inventions is not an optimal system in terms of economic efficiency and social interests regarding the rapid commercialization of technology. The current regime, within which the university owns researcher inventions, is plagued by ineffective incentives, information asymmetries, and contradictory goals for the university, the inventors, potential licensees, and university technology licensing offices (TLOs). These structural uncertainties lead to licensing delays, misaligned incentives among parties, and delays in the flow of scientific information and the materials necessary for scientific progress. For the very best TLOs these difficulties can be overcome, but for the average TLO this misalignment of incentives creates suboptimal outcomes in terms of technology transfer. The institutional arrangements within which TLOs are embedded are so perverse that it has encouraged a number of them to become income maximizers and operate in a manner similar to what pejoratively have been termed patent “trolls.”
Topic:
Economics, Education, Government, and Science and Technology

6. Digitizing Services: What Stays Where and Why

Author:
Rafiq Dossani and Martin Kenney
Publication Date:
06-2006
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Berkeley Roundtable on the International Economy
Abstract:
The spatial extension and deepening of capitalism has been a topic of interest to geographers, other social scientists, and activists since, at least, Lenin. This topic has reappeared on the public agenda recently under the rubric of “globalization.” Once again, the spatial redistribution of economic activities is sparking enormous controversy and opinions from nearly every philosophical position. This paper considers two dimensions of this enormous topic and argues that neither dimension has received sufficient attention from geographers. The first dimension is the role of technological advancement in transportation and communication technologies in a capitalist system. The second dimension is the development of a global division of labor in service provision.
Topic:
Emerging Markets, Globalization, and International Political Economy

7. Is the Food Model Changing?

Author:
Martin Kenney
Publication Date:
05-2006
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Berkeley Roundtable on the International Economy
Abstract:
Consumers offered mediocre quality food – Supersized with chemicals, sugar and lipids Provide ever more highly engineered foods – e.g., Pork with Omega-3 engineered into it Ignore consumer's desires for safety such as BSE testing Government run for the food and chemical industry -- little regulation, low standards – US government welfare keeps this alive.
Topic:
Government, Health, and International Political Economy
Political Geography:
United States

8. The Next Wave of Globalization? Exploring the Relocation of Service Provision to India

Author:
Rafiq Dossani and Martin Kenney
Publication Date:
09-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Berkeley Roundtable on the International Economy
Abstract:
The rapid increase in the ability and desire of multinational corporations to offshore services or, what are commonly termed “business processes” to developing nations is becoming a significant international development issue. This paper utilizes a case study of India, the largest recipient of offshored services, to explain the dynamics of offshoring from the perspective of the firm and the recipient nation. The explosion of offshoring is placed within a historical context. The technologies enabling offshoring and the corporate environment are discussed. Finally, the organizational forms involved in offshoring are discussed. The conclusion considers the implications of the offshoring of services for developed and developing nations and possible policy initiatives for developing nations interested in the possibility of entering the ITES sector.
Topic:
Development, Globalization, International Trade and Finance, and Science and Technology
Political Geography:
South Asia and India

9. The Mexican Internet after the Boom: Challenges and Opportunities

Author:
Martin Kenney, James Curry, and Oscar Contreras
Publication Date:
06-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Berkeley Roundtable on the International Economy
Abstract:
The Internet will be the defining technology of the first decade of the 21st Century. It is redefining boundaries of all sorts in new and unforeseen ways. As with many previous disruptive technologies, the Internet can be a double-edged sword for developing countries such as Mexico. For example, the Internet has the potential to dramatically lower barriers to cross-border trade. This will enable international retailers to penetrate the Mexican market potentially undermining domestic retail businesses. On the other side, the Internet could provide opportunities for Mexican firms to enter the global market, particularly Spanish-speaking Latin America and the huge U.S. Hispanic market. But this is only the tip of the iceberg of change. For example, in a country such as Mexico in which information has not been readily available and public libraries are relatively few in number and poorly stocked, the free and low-cost information available on the Internet provides a powerful new distribution medium – it provides inexpensive access to global information sources.
Topic:
Industrial Policy, International Trade and Finance, and Science and Technology
Political Geography:
United States, Latin America, Central America, North America, and Mexico

10. Supporting the High-Technology Entrepreneur: Support Network Geographies for Semiconductor, Telecommunications Equipment, and Biotechnology Start-Ups

Author:
Martin Kenney and Donald Patton
Publication Date:
04-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Berkeley Roundtable on the International Economy
Abstract:
Using a unique database derived from U.S. initial public stock offering prospecti, the authors examine the location of four actors (the firm's lawyers, the venture capitalists on the board of directors, the other members of the board of directors, and the lead investment banker) of the entrepreneurial support network for start-up firms in three high-technology industries: semiconductors, telecommunications equipment, and biotechnology. We demonstrate that the economic geography of the biotechnology support network differs significantly from the networks in semiconductors and telecommunications equipment. Our results suggest that generalization about the economic geography of high-technology industries drawn from a single industry study can be misleading. We find that biotechnology has a far more dispersed network structure than the two electronics-related industries. We suggest that the case of biotechnology suggests that if the source of seeds for new firms is highly dispersed, then an industry may not experience the path dependent clustering suggested by geographers and economists. Also, we argue that contrary to common belief biotechnology and its support network does not exhibit as great clustering as does either semiconductors or telecommunications equipment. Suggesting that for economic development planners, it may be easy to encourage biotechnology start-ups, but the synergies from the industry may not be as powerful as in other high-technology fields.
Topic:
Economics, Industrial Policy, and Science and Technology
Political Geography:
United States