Diffusing New Technology Without Dissipating Rents: Some Historical Case Studies of Knowledge Sharing

Authors

James Bessen, Boston University School of LawFollow
Alessandro Nuvolari

Author granted license

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

1-10-2019

ISSN

0960-6491

Publisher

Oxford University Press

Language

en-US

Abstract

The diffusion of innovations is supposed to dissipate inventors’ rents. Yet in many documented cases, inventors freely shared knowledge with their competitors. Using a model and case studies, this article explores why sharing did not eliminate inventors’ incentives. Each new technology coexisted with an alternative for one or more decades. This allowed inventors to earn rents while sharing knowledge, attaining major productivity gains. The technology diffusion literature suggests that such circumstances are common during the early stages of a new technology.

Comments

Updated with published version of article on 9/15/2023

Draft available as supplemental content

Recommended Citation

James Bessen & Alessandro Nuvolari, Diffusing New Technology Without Dissipating Rents: Some Historical Case Studies of Knowledge Sharing , in 28 Industrial and Corporate Change 365 (2019).
Available at: https://doi.org/10.1093/icc/dty068