Technology Foresight Activities in Korea and in Countries Closing the Technology Gap

This article discusses technology foresight in selected countries which were politically dependent (colonial) before World War II and considered as “under-developed” in the post-war period. Most of them show considerable economic dynamism in the 1990s, which is not always based on their own scientific and technological capability. For this group of countries, national exercises in technology foresight are likely to be an important tool in planning the strategic direction for science and technology development in order to catch up economically as well as socially. In Korea, which has recently become an OECD member, comparative advantage based on factors such as low wages and protected industries are no longer effective as the economy is now wide open to the world. Foresight is being used to look at comparative advantages based on Korea’s own knowledge-creating activities. In southeast Asian countries, foresight is still in an infant stage, but most of these have medium-term planning cycles and have undertaken longer-term vision studies. In South Africa, a national foresight project is running, as is an adapting foresight process to make the large national research organization fit. In Latin America, an agenda has been set up which indicates the desire of several countries to engage in foresight activities using different approaches.     

A challenge of integrating technology foresight and assessment in industrial strategy development and policymaking

Appropriate demand articulation of emerging technologies to social needs are vital to the economic and social productivity, and it is essential to grasp the future trends of social needs and technology advancement to promote the strategic technology policy. Japan embarked on technology foresight in the early 1970s and has since been conducting a regular Delphi survey approximately every 5 years. To explore a new intelligent methodology for integrating technological seeds and social needs by articulating future demands, this paper reviews the following two cases: the Delphi-scenario writing (DSW) method, which is applied in 1977 for the home/office small facsimile, and the method of general assessment applied in 1972 for informationalization, which focused on the rapidly advancing information society, with a matrix scoring and policy-simulation method. Those new approaches were proved to be a powerful methodology to integrate the technology forecasting and assessment for comprehensive understanding of the emerging technologies and their social impacts in the form of integrated technology road mapping, which supports the integrated strategic planning methodology for enhancing the future innovation system.     

Environmental technology foresight: New horizons for technology management

Decision-making in corporate technology management and government technology policy is increasingly influenced by the environmental impact of technologies. Technology foresight (TF) and environmental impact assessment (EIA) are analyzed with regard to the roles they can play in developing long-term strategies and policies for reducing the environmental impact of technologies. The methods for TF and EIA are quite well developed, but remain within a tradition of rational decision-making. However, recent studies of tecnology management and innovation have shown that technology development can be explained only to a certain degree by rational decision-making. EIA is usually presented as an objective and scientific method, based on normative underpinnings that usually remain hidden. Thus, systematic information-providing instruments such as TF and EIA can play only a limited role. We propose a procedure for environmental technology foresight. The case is made that environmental technology management will be most helped by a 'constructive' approach in order to stimulate incorporation of long-term environmental objectives.     

Foresight studies : A new approach in anticipatory policy making in the Netherlands

Selection and priority setting in technology policies become more and more urgent. Confronted with budget constraints, policy makers need planning methods for well-argued choices. But how can we assess technology fields of particular interest to our countries? Prospective analysis can help us. The author develops an empirical model for foresight studies as a tool in strategic decision making. It is based on a Dutch experiment in recent years and illustrates how several stakeholders in a nation can be mobilized to assess emerging technologies, develop a common field of reference in judging these technologies, and coordinate the joint actions of the actors in this field. Foresight seems to be a rather interactive planning method in which governments have to plan the process rather than the outcome. In reflection on action, the author makes clear that foresight can reduce complexity when it is a process of concerted action in which public and private actors operate as coproducers.     

Current Foresight Activities inCentral Europe

During the early 1990s, technology foresight has become much more widespread. First pioneered in the United States and later in Japan, it has now spread to continental Europe. One of the first engagements in modern national foresight occurred in the Netherlands. The task is to identify the areas of strategic research and the emerging generic technologies likely to yield the greatest socio-economic benefits. The decentralized foresight approaches are less holistic than elsewhere and are concerned with selected areas. In Germany, parallel approaches have been adopted for looking systematically into the longer-term future of science, technology, the economy, and society. In an era characterized by ever fiercer global economic competition, and with the burden of unifying two different science systems and over-stretched public expenditure budgets, the German governments on federal and state levels and indeed the public are coming to expect more direct economic and social benefits from science in return to their investment. Decentralized types of foresight are also observed in Austria, whereas in Hungary the first attempts to arrive at a foresight program seem to be modelled after British experiences.     

基于集体主义的企业科技向善：逻辑框架与竞争优势

新冠疫情对经济及社会运行造成了重大冲击,除了履行慈善捐赠等传统社会责任行为,一些企业还通过科技创新与善意的产品供给抗击疫情,企业与社会的融合互动更加紧密,据此引出企业科技向善概念。通过厘清企业科技向善概念,梳理了企业科技向善与竞争优势的关系,讨论了企业科技向善的未来研究方向,从企业与社会关系角度丰富和扩展了企业战略管理研究,并为企业管理实践与政府监管提供了新视角。     

Foresight in corporate organisations

Strategy formulation is strictly intertwined with the analysis of the likely evolution of the business environment, in order to detect promptly the opportunities and the threats brought about by emerging trends and to deal with them properly (strategic foresight). Today many companies put much effort into strategic foresight, and also in the literature on strategy there is a growing attention to strategic foresight. However, it still seems there is a lack of a general framework of analysis that clearly defines how all the foresight activities should be carried out in a firm and should be integrated in an organic way, in order to support strategic decision makers at corporate, business and functional levels. This is the main issue we have taken into account through the study of some relevant European and US firms that have established foresight units, in order to deliver support for long term strategy formulation.     

企业技术多样性、实质性社会责任信息披露与创新扩散

技术多样性是企业创新能力的重要表征,但现有研究对于技术多样性与创新扩散的关系存在争议。对此,区分相关和不相关技术多样性对创新扩散的异质性影响,并检验实质性社会责任信息披露作为一种信号传递机制对上述关系的调节作用。基于2008—2017年中国研发密集型上市企业数据进行实证分析,结果发现：相关技术多样性能够积极影响创新扩散;不相关技术多样性对创新扩散的影响存在滞后效应;实质性社会责任信息披露正向调节不相关技术多样性与创新扩散的关系。结论丰富了创新扩散理论与实证研究,可为企业创新实践提供决策依据。     

Delphi analysis of national specificities in selected innovative areas in Germany and France

The increasing complexity of the relations between technologies and economics combined with more social pressure, global competition, technological change, as well as national budget restrictions, imply new challenges for public policies. Thus, to be able to forecast the development of knowledge and technological change in some well-known trajectories could be one of the major stakes for science technology and industrial policies. It is then not surprising that recent years have brought a significant revival of public foresight activities in many countries. The purpose of the paper is precisely to propose a new foresight method in order to obtain a taxonomy of the future technologies, and consequently to provide a better understanding of industrial dynamics. We present a statistical analysis of a Delphi investigation, based on scientific and technological knowledge complementarities, in order to obtain coherent clusters, which may be looked upon as a theoretical tool for political decisions. Our methodology is then applied to French and the German sectors of life sciences, elementary particles, energy, environment and natural resources.     

The role of scanning in open intelligence systems

Every month, SRI Consulting Business Intelligence (SRIC-BI) professionals assemble more than 100 short abstracts of developments that they perceive to be signals of change, discontinuities, inflection points, outliers, or disruptive developments. The effort is part of a continuous scanning process and Scan program that allows SRIC-BI to gauge the ongoing turbulent confluence of culture, commerce, and technology that defines today's business environment. For more than 25 years, scanning has played an essential role in SRIC-BI's and SRI International's foresight capabilities by providing a systematic means for surveying the broad external environment for change vectors. Traditional monitoring processes in most organizations are largely arbitrary, depending on what concerned individuals or leaders in the organization are reading, thinking about, and sharing informally with each other. But in today's world, arbitrary is insufficient. No foresight function can operate with confidence without a disciplined process for spotting new patterns of change and bringing those issues into the organization for early consideration and action. This article describes the scanning process as SRIC-BI practices it, the importance of open intelligence systems, what benefits the scanning process can provide to organizations, and what problems organizations typically run into when setting up scanning systems.     

Technology foresight for a vision of energy sector development in Poland till 2030. Delphi survey as an element of technology foresighting

The security of energy supply at national level is one of the most fundamental missions of every government. This task becomes especially vital in view of the current situation on global energy markets. The planning of technological development in the energy and fuel sectors is a relevant element of energy security strategies. This in turn leads to a more rational and efficient energy use in the future. Technology foresight, which emerged as a proven instrument of technology policy during the 1950s, becomes nowadays one of the essential tools for the creation of the future technological development worldwide. A project entitled: “The Scenarios of Technological Development of Fuel and Energy Sector for National Energy Security” was the first foresight project in the field of energy technologies and at the same time the first technology foresight activity in Poland. This project was being carried out in the period of 2006-2007 by a consortium of research and development institutes on the request of the Polish Ministry of Economy. The aim of the project was to indicate energy and fuel sector development directions in the time horizon up to 2030 and identify key energy technologies of strategic importance. As a result of the foresight activity, technology development scenarios in the energy and fuel sector in Poland as well as corresponding roadmaps for their implementation were formulated. The project results should be helpful in drafting national energy policies and they will indicate priority pathways of research and development (R&D) activities in the next years.The energy foresight project was based mainly on a Delphi method that is nowadays widely applied as a valuable foresight tool. This future-oriented intuitive method was engaged for the qualitative and quantitative assessment of probable developments in the future and for their time scale evaluation as well. In this article, the results of the conducted two-round Delphi survey were presented.     

Technology Foresight in Companies: From an Indicator to a Network and Process Perspective

Technology foresight is an important activity in companies to meet the challenges of a fast changing environment. The understanding and the concepts of technology foresight have changed during the last decades. Three generations of technology foresight are developed in this paper. In the third generation, technology foresight is an integrated part of strategic management, process-oriented, need- and value-driven and network-dominated. Although this model represents practices in companies, not all elements are included in one firm. This paper is based on interviews in large multinational corporations and a review of the literature.     

Technology Foresight in Companies: From an Indicator to a Network and Process Perspective

Technology foresight is an important activity in companies to meet the challenges of a fast changing environment. The understanding and the concepts of technology foresight have changed during the last decades. Three generations of technology foresight are developed in this paper. In the third generation, technology foresight is an integrated part of strategic management, process-oriented, need- and value-driven and network-dominated. Although this model represents practices in companies, not all elements are included in one firm. This paper is based on interviews in large multinational corporations and a review of the literature.     

Strategic foresight and organizational learning: A survey and critical analysis

Learning phenomena are a growing concern for strategic foresight, especially with respect to the question of integration of reflection and action. Although an agreement seems to emerge between practitioners and theorists about strong ties linking strategic foresight and learning (in particular organizational learning), the true nature of this link remains ambiguous. This article seeks to shed light on this link and to analyze the cognitive dimensions of foresight through a critical survey. The investigation follows the original ambivalence between foresight attitude and activity thus underscoring not only the virtues of foresight in learning phenomena, but also the limits of the usual literature.     

我国沿海发达城市的跨越式现代化发展战略

加快现代化进程是我国新世纪发展的基本战略任务。本文在分析新世纪初期现代化基本特点的基础上，明确提出我国沿海发达城市应当实行跨越式的现代化发展战略，并论述了跨越式现代化发展战略的基本内容、战略步骤、发展重点。     

Constructing and mobilising futures knowledge in an organisation: foresight as a catalyst of dynamic strategic practice

The paper discusses foresight as a dynamic strategic practice and theorises the connections of foresight and strategic management. The paper argues that organisations have a rising need to foster relevant future-oriented knowledge in a continuous process that builds on the systemic understanding of the operational environment. For this purpose, the paper outlines a conceptual framework for continuous organisational foresight practice. The framework is based on two conceptual bedrocks. The first is the idea of continuity, referring to the long-term accumulation of organisational practices. The second bedrock is the notion of discontinuity as an organisational transformation factor. Furthermore, the framework builds on the notion of four knowledge spaces in an organisation, and it is constructed through six layers depicted in detail. The paper demonstrates this framework through a case study of a Finnish research and technology organisation, VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland.     

Managing technology intelligence processes in situations of radical technological change

For established companies, radical technological change is not only a challenge, but it also constitutes a major source of failure. By establishing effective technology intelligence processes, companies may react to radical trends in time which is a prerequisite for coping with technological change. Therefore, this study analyzes the technology intelligence processes in 25 multinational companies in the pharmaceutical, telecommunications equipment and automobile industries in the context of radical technological change. In the three industries, the technologies combinatorial chemistry, dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) and fuel cell are used as settings to analyze these processes on the technology level against the background of the company-level perspective. By applying this complex view, which allows to take into account interactions between different organizational mechanisms and between different hierarchical levels inside a firm, three types of organizing technology intelligence processes can be identified: the participatory, the hybrid and the hierarchical technology intelligence process. The organization of the technology intelligence process according to the three types is influenced by the corporate culture and the decision-making style of the companies. Furthermore, industry differences are identified which may be explained by different rates of radical technological change in the industries. This study suggests that more complex and differentiated views on radical technological change, on corporate technology intelligence processes and on the variety of organizational structures involved in these processes are required.     

路径依赖对公司数字创业的抑制及免疫机制研究

路径依赖是在位企业实现数字创业面临的必然挑战，而对企业如何有效利用内外部资源克服路径依赖，现有研究并未形成明确的观点。基于组织免疫理论，遵循抑制—免疫分析思路，从战略联盟和资源拼凑内外视角探究公司数字创业中克服路径依赖的免疫机制。实证结果表明，路径依赖对公司数字创业具有显著抑制作用；战略联盟与资源拼凑均能够对路径依赖的抑制作用产生免疫效应，但针对路径依赖的3个表现维度，战略联盟与资源拼凑发挥的免疫效应存在显著差异。     

技术董事、股权激励对企业创新效率的影响

随着知识经济时代的到来，创新在企业经营中的地位越来越高，董事、监事及高管团队对企业创新战略的方向、组织和实施具有重要影响，研究他们对企业创新的影响变得必要和迫切。以2012-2017年沪深两市上市公司为研究对象，运用DEA-Tobit两阶段模型，分析企业技术董事比例和股权激励（分为高管股权激励和核心员工股权激励两个维度）对中国上市公司技术创新效率的影响。结果显示，公司技术董事的比例越大，上市公司技术创新效率越高；对核心员工的股权激励授予比例越高，上市公司技术创新效率越高；然而，高管股权激励授予比例与上市公司技术创新效率并无显著联系。     

技术董事、股权激励对企业创新效率的影响

随着知识经济时代的到来，创新在企业经营中的地位越来越高，董事、监事及高管团队对企业创新战略的方向、组织和实施具有重要影响，研究他们对企业创新的影响变得必要和迫切。以2012-2017年沪深两市上市公司为研究对象，运用DEA-Tobit两阶段模型，分析企业技术董事比例和股权激励（分为高管股权激励和核心员工股权激励两个维度）对中国上市公司技术创新效率的影响。结果显示，公司技术董事的比例越大，上市公司技术创新效率越高；对核心员工的股权激励授予比例越高，上市公司技术创新效率越高；然而，高管股权激励授予比例与上市公司技术创新效率并无显著联系。