From the Special Issue Editors: Technology Commercialization and Entrepreneurship *

F or more than 40 years, it has been well understood that, at least for economies at the technological frontier such as the United States, technological advances have been the most important driver of economic growth. But technological improvements by themselves do not contribute to growth unless they are somehow commercialized, whether in the form of new products and services, or integrated as part of the production or service delivery process. Commercialization, in turn, can be accomplished by existing firms or by new entrants. Anecdotal evidence suggests that the different matters, confirming an insight of Joseph Schumpeter nearly a century ago: Entrepreneurs, with little or no stake in the status quo, seem to be responsible for a disproportionate share of ‘‘radical’’ innovations (i.e., those that substantially disrupt the way things are currently done), whereas large, existing firms seem to have a comparative advantage in introducing more incremental innovations that refine what already exists. Both types of innovation (radical and incremental) as well as both types of firms (existing and new) are essential in modern economies (Baumol, 1992; Baumol, Litan, and Schramm, 2007). The articles in this volume seek to advance our understanding of how technological advances are commercialized. The first three do so in a developed country context, primarily the United States; the latter two examine this question in the Chinese context. The comparison between United States and China is deliberate. The United States is a frontier economy; China is an up-and-coming challenger, thought by many to be on the leading edge of change in the 21st century. The contrasting experiences should be useful to practitioners and researchers alike. In the balance of this introductory chapter, we summarize the main insights of each of the papers.