Title: Firms' information sources and the technology life cycle

Authors: Gerhard Rosegger

Addresses: Department of Economics, Weatherhead School of Management, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio 44106, USA

Abstract: Revolutionary advances in technology have led to many exuberant assessments of the benefits firms could derive from having economical access to ever larger volumes of information. In most of these pronouncement no attention has been paid to differentiating among sources and types of information, or to examining under what conditions increased information flows, as against internally-generated knowledge, actually produce competitive advantages for firms. Unqualified approval of the |information revolution| has not, so far, been supported by many empirical investigations of its actual effects, especially with respect to firms| ability to generate and implement advances in their basic technologies. Such investigations may derive guidance from a taxonomic framework suggested here that recognizes differences among an individual firm|s sources for enhancing its technical capabilities, as well as changes in the relative significance of these sources over the technology life cycle.

Keywords: innovation; technical information; business strategy; technology life cycle; information technology; information sources; information flows.

DOI: 10.1504/IJTM.1996.025510

International Journal of Technology Management, 1996 Vol.12 No.5/6, pp.704 - 716

Published online: 22 May 2009 *

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