The DOI matches its Crossref record; 4 of the 4 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Recombinant Uncertainty in Technological Search
Abstract
While the course of technological change is widely accepted to be highly uncertain and unpredictable, little work has identified or studied the ultimate sources and causes of that uncertainty. This paper proposes that purely technological uncertainty derives from inventors' search processes with unfamiliar components and component combinations. Experimentation with new components and new combinations leads to less useful inventions on average, but it also implies an increase in the variability that can result in both failure and breakthrough. Negative binomial count and dispersion models with patent citation data demonstrate that new combinations are indeed more variable. In contrast to predictions, however, the reuse of components has a nonmonotonic and eventually positive effect on variability.
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Cites
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Cited by
Dahlander, L., & Gann, D. M. (2010) · Research Policy · doi:10.1016/j.respol.2010.01.013 · Cited by 2,435
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Leiponen, A., & Helfat, C. E. (2010) · Strategic Management Journal · doi:10.1002/smj.807 · Cited by 1,341
Technology as a complex adaptive system: evidence from patent data
Fleming, L., & Sorenson, O. (2001) · Research Policy · doi:10.1016/s0048-7333(00)00135-9 · Cited by 1,315
Self-citationPapers and patents are becoming less disruptive over time
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Metadata
- Authors
- Fleming, L.
- Venue
- Management Science
- Published
- 2001-01
- Volume
- 47
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 117-132
- ISSN
- 0025-1909 (ISSN-L)
- 1526-5501
- OpenAlex
- W2100390860
- Cited by
- 2,873
- References
- 4
- FWCI
- 25.93
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
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Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).
Semantic Scholar’s data is described in: Kinney, R., et al. (2023). The Semantic Scholar Open Data Platform. arXiv:2301.10140.
