Group items tagged

It sounds obvious, but it is always appropriate to remember, that public policy can have a strong role in nudging the market towards technological solutions, especially during transitions times between paradigms. The case of electric vehicles is interesting, since you can find both issues related to regulation (e.g. emission-based standards, and traffic rules), taxation (e.g. fuel tax, tax incentives) and infrastructure (e.g. recharging stations )

Small high-tech firms are universally considered to be key for stimulating innovation and economic growth. But what if these companies do not grow, due to limited entrepreneurial ambition, premature acquisitions, limited access to market? This is a key problem for policy-makers, but also for the stakeholders of these firms.

An interesting paper on the future of mobility, merging transportation science with computing. Maybe mobility will not rely that much on cars (i.e. the product) as much as on the intelligent trasport infrastructure of the future (i.e. the service)

Interesting article on the coming technological paradigms, on the role that modularity will have within them, and on its implications on industrial policy. 

Article on the complemetary role of public and private financing in supporting technology in the early phases of its lifecycle. Financing is a mixed blessing, since it is necessary to make technology viable, but it risks supporting the "wrong" technology or dominant design

Interesting discussion on the diffusion of solar energy around the world and especially in the US. The main point is: is solar energy a valid energy source, and is just in need to have some economies of scale and learning to kick in? If so, government subsidies may be helpful... but don't they bring the risk of locking us into a wrong technology, or simply the wrong technological generation?

Bloomberg takes a look at Apple's spate of corporate acquisitions over the past six months, which has seen the company reverse a long-standing policy of making very infrequent deals with its recent purchases of Quattro Wireless, Lala Media, Intrinsity, and Siri. In particular, the report points to the growing rivalry between Apple and Google, stoked in large part on the acquisitions front by Google reportedly swooping in to snatch mobile advertising firm AdMob just as Apple was looking to finalize a deal to do so. "The pace has really picked up, there seems to be a strategic shift," said Charlie Wolf, an analyst with Needham & Co. in New York. "It looks like there's an acquisition frenzy going on between Google and Apple in the sense that there's an increasing urgency on Apple's part to stay even if not ahead of Google in the phone space and apps space. One interesting tidbit included in the report is evidence that Apple has sometimes moved very quickly when looking to make an acquisition, even giving targets as little as three hours to agree to a deal. To avoid publicity and possible rival bids, Apple in some cases has offered a target only a three-hour period in which to accept the terms of a sale, according to one executive with knowledge of the situation.