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Technovation Special Issue.

Call for Papers: Managing innovation with standardization

 

Special Issue Editors: Eric Viardot, Hashem Sherif, Chen Jin

Innovations and standardization are two facets of economic vitality and industry competitiveness. In networked technologies and services, standards are essential for manufacturers and service providers. In other sectors, standards are needed for the protection of consumer interests, control of new technologies (and their impact on health, safety, environmental and social factors) and governing commercial activities in public and ethical domains (e.g. natural resources, communications, security, advertising, entertainment).

Standards can be designed by Standards Development Organizations (SDO) or can become established within a market de facto, i.e., as a consequence of the market power of a single or dominant supplier (Utterback, 1996).  An SDO can be a body recognized by governmental authorities, in which case the standard is denoted as de jure, or it can be an ad-hoc organization (e.g. a consortium of companies, or a loose federation of individuals as in the open source movement). SDOs can be formed as a private initiative of interested parties. Ad hoc consortia might be formed for a specific technology.

Across this wide spectrum and concerning the effects of standards on innovation, two key questions still need to be addressed by research: 'How to manage standardization' (without impeding innovation) and 'How to manage innovation' (whilst introducing and maintaining effective standards). This Special Issue aims to address both these questions, and closely related topics.

Papers should present research-based evidence with information, conclusions and recommendations which will add value in management practice or policy design. They can focus on market-based or committee-based standards. A range of approaches will be considered (e.g. cases, comparative studies, particular technologies, standards systems in a policy context, regional variations in management practice, the internationalisation of standards, the impact of globalisation on standards). Some background to the theme and further topic suggestions are provided below:   

Active participation in standards development organizations (SDO) has been increasing in China and Korea; participation enhances technical expertise and develops industrial infrastructure (Sherif, 2013).

Standards feature significantly in the High-Tech Strategy for Germany (see www.Bundesregierung.de). This overarching strategy for innovation and competitiveness in Germany forms the basis of the European Commission Lead Market Initiative (Edler et al., 2012).

Clearly, the development of new standards for innovative technologies requires the allocation of significant human and financial resources. Textbooks on the management of innovation increased significantly during the period 1995-2008, but little attention was given to the specific relationship between innovation and standardization (Choi et al., 2011).

Specific research topics include the costs of standards development, revealing proprietary information, intellectual property protection and the “free ridership” phenomena (Soininen, 2007; Weiss and Toyofuku, 1996).

There is a gap in knowledge and understanding to help companies, policy makers and consumer groups involved in managing standardization processes.

According to innovation process models, standardization in companies can influence all stages from basic research through to product design, manufacturing and market introduction (Miller and Morris, 1999).

For the purpose of this Call for Papers, standardization is defined as a voluntary process for the development of specifications based around the consensus of firms, users, interest groups and governments (Sherif, 2006; Saltzman et al., 2008).

Standardization can constrain innovation in the marketplace (Swann and Lambert (2010). De facto standards can lead to monopoly power or at least market concentration if they raise costs for rivals, reduce choice for customers, and lock in old technologies. Similarly, badly conceived de jure standards can promote immature technologies.

Interface standards allow solutions from different suppliers to work together (a property known as “interoperability”), thereby encouraging new products, services and processes.

Standards provide legal security for innovative companies, creating larger-scale markets and building confidence among consumers (European Commission 2011) .

Standards help to build critical mass as well as economies of scale for emerging technologies (Blind 2013).

A combination of standards from different fields can be used as a key component in corporate innovation strategy to stimulate new methods, services and products (Miotti, 2009).

The following topics are also relevant to the theme of the Special Issue but the list is not intended to restrict the range or scope of submitted papers:

• Standards and innovation strategy 
• Structuring knowledge through standards
• The process of standards creation in developed and new economies
• Standards networks and strategic alliances (for technological innovation)
• Assessing the economic benefits of standards (management perspectives)
• Fitting standards to the type of innovation (product, process, service) and the technology life cycle
• Incompatibility of standards as market failure
• Standardization and the privatization of knowledge, specifically IPR
• Dynamics and effects of competing standards on innovation.

REFERENCES

Blind,K. (2013), The Impact of Standardization and Standards on Innovation, Report within the MIoIR-NESTA Compendium of Evidence on Innovation Policy, Manchester Institute of Innovation Research, Feb 2013,  http://research.mbs.ac.uk/innovation

Bundesregierung, High-Tech Strategy for Germany,  http://www.hightech-strategie.de/de/390.php

Choi, D. G., Lee, H., Sung, T., (2011). Research profiling for ‘standardization and innovation’. Scientometrics, 88 (1): 259-278.

Edler, J., Georghiou, L., Blind K., Uyarra, E. (2012). Evaluating the demand side: New challenges for evaluation. Research Evaluation, 21 (1): 33-47.

European Commission (2011), "Commission for better standards to boost European competitiveness and promote consumers' interest", IP/11/668, 1 June 2011

Miotti, (2009). The economic impact of standardization technological change, standards growth in France, (www.sis.se/pdf/Economic_impact_of_standardization_France.pdf)

Miller, J. M., & Morris, L. (1999). Fourth generation R&D: managing knowledge, technology and innovation. New York: John Wiley.

Saltzman, J., Chatterjee, S., & Raman, M. (2008). A framework for ICT standards creation: The case of ITU-T standard H. 350.Information Systems,33(3), 285-299.

Sherif, M. H. (2006). Standards for telecommunications services, pp. 183–205 in Advanced Topics in Information Technology Standards and Standardization Research, Vol. 1, K. Jakobs, ed., Idea Group Publishing, Hershey, PA.

Sherif  M.H, ( 2013 ) ICT standardizations Strategies and Interactive Learning Spaces (ILS)  in A New Wave in Global Standardization from Asia, International Workshop on Asia and Global Standardization, 19 April, Seoul, Korea.

Soininen, A. (2007)., Patents and standards in ICT sector: Are submarine patents a substantive problem or a red herring, J. IT Standards and Standardization Research 5(1): 41-83.

Swann G. M. P., Lambert, R.  (2010). Why do Standards Enable and Constrain Innovation?. 15th EURAS Annual Standardisation Conference "Service Standardization" , University of Lausanne, Switzerland, Jul 1 2010 ,  www.euras.org/uploads/2010presentations/Swann&Lambert.pdf.

Utterback J. M. (1996). Mastering the dynamics of innovation, Harvard Business School Press

Weiss, M. B. H., Toyofuku R. T. (1996). Free-ridership in the standard setting process: the case of 10baseT. Standard view, 4(4): 205-212.

Papers will be selected to form a coherent Special Issue focused on the above and other important topics. All selected papers will be double-blind reviewed.

Please submit abstracts before May 30th, 2014 or full papers before September 30th, 2014  via the Technovation submission system described at http://ees.elsevier.com/technovation. Authors should indicate that they would like their paper to be considered for the special issue on “Managing innovation with standardization”. All papers selected as suitable for the Special Issue will undergo a double-blind peer review process; some papers may be referred for regular issues. The recommended maximum word count is 7500.

To discuss prospective papers please contact:
Eric Viardot: [log in to unmask]
Hashem Sherif: [log in to unmask]
Chen Jin: [log in to unmask]

See also : http://www.journals.elsevier.com/technovation/call-for-papers/call-for-papers-managing-innovation-with-standardization/