New methodological approach to the mechanism of technological convergence: patent network-based entropy and gravity indexes

Abstract

The volatility and uncertainty in the process of technological developments are growing faster than ever before due to rapid technological innovations. Such phenomena result in the integrations among disparate technological fields. At this point, the understanding of different roles and their propensity by each element technology in the technological convergence is a critical research topic. In particular, the network-centric approach provides a holistic view in terms of technological linkage structures. Furthermore, the development of new indicators based on the network visualization can reveal the mechanism of the technological convergence and provide insights for promising technological fields in the future. Because the printed electronic technology is clearly and well framed structure, we study the technological convergence by analyzing and patterning USPTO data of printed electronic technology in the patent code-level. To this end, we utilize the physical idea which is applied to interpret the technological convergence by element technologies of the printed electronic technology. More specifically, the concepts of Entropy and Gravity are utilized and applied to measure the activeness among patent citations and binding forces between heterogeneous technologies in the process of the technological convergence. The characteristic role of each technology is distinguished by the entropy and gravity index in the printed electronic technology. At the technological convergence stage, each technology exhibits characteristic dynamics which tends to decrease a technological gap. From this point, the disparity and asymmetry over the evolution of printed electronic technologies is decreased through total time period using Power law descriptive concept. Consequently, we explain the different role of each element technology for technological convergence in the printed electronic technology, and that results in drawing the implication of our study. In detail, we believe t...