read this and rememeber it, once you have read and rememeberd it type "done". here it is "CASE A – TECHNOCRACY AND ITS CRITICS:
R&D IN CORPORATE INNOVATION
HIST 2905
Prof. Lee
Gattaca (1997) film still
 Review (Taylor): Can scientific
objectivity and engineering solve
social problems?
 Recall Fritz Haber and WWI’s
military-academic-industrial complex:
Considering how technological
research functions as a system, is it
possible to separate military and
peaceful development of
technology?
TECHNOCRACY
• Who should decide how technology
develops?
• What is a technocratic approach to
innovation and, according to it, what should
be the relations between technological
experts, civil society, business, and the state?
• In enterprise: How should corporate R&D
lead product development?
Progress in the war against disease depends upon a flow
of new scientific knowledge. New products, new
industries, and more jobs require continuous additions to
knowledge of the laws of nature, and the application of
that knowledge to practical purposes. Similarly, our
defense against aggression demands new knowledge so
that we can develop new and improved weapons. This
essential, new knowledge can be obtained only through
basic scientific research.
 Vannevar Bush, Science—The Endless Frontier (1945)
Linear model of innovation =
basic before applied research
SOCIETY: PUBLICLY FUNDED BASIC RESEARCH
• National Science Foundation
• National Institutes of Health
• Atomic Energy Commission
• NASA
Mary Jackson, NASA engineer (recently portrayed in movie Hidden Figures)
• International
organizations, e.g.
International Atomic
Energy Agency
• Interdisciplinary projects representing collaborations
between military, academic, and industrial research,
e.g. Project Whirlwind
• Experts preferred to influence policymakers
from behind the scenes
Participants in the First Pugwash Conference, 1957
• Urban planning
• TVA dam
TECHNOCRATIC APPROACHES TO
SOCIETAL CHALLENGES
Tennessee Valley Authority Le Corbusier’s Radiant City, Marseille
“MILITARY-ACADEMICINDUSTRIAL COMPLEX”
• National Science Foundation, est. 1950 (1952: $15m
research budget)
• Office of Naval Research ($86m for contract research
program, 1946-1950)
• Atomic Energy Commission
• Department of Defense
• $500m on R&D in 1950 alone
• <10% to universities and nonprofits
• supplied 1/3 R&D funds in private industry, 1950s
• Hybrid institutions (civilian/military science)
• Applied Physics Laboratory, Johns Hopkins University;
Brookhaven National Laboratory; Semi-Automatic Ground
Environment (SAGE)
Above: Robert J.
Oppenheimer, scientific
director of Los Alamos lab
(Leslie Groves, US Army,
was director overall of
Manhattan Project)
Below: Godzilla
ENTERPRISE: GOLDEN AGE OF R&D
• High-tech industries in
electronics, computers,
aviation,
telecommunications
• Corporations heavily
funded R&D in-house…
• …And even in academic
disciplines (e.g. DuPont,
GE, AT&T)
Danisco’s Brabrand (Denmark) R&D
lab, est. 1964
HENDRIK CASIMIR –
PHILIPS R&D LAB (NATLAB)
• Universities: fundamental research
• NatLab:
• Fundamental research
• Target research (to make specific
discoveries, e.g. a material)
• Project research (making a prototype)
• Product divisions: factory research
• Factory engineering (“scaling up”)
• Application research (adapt to users)
• Who do you think should lead product
development?
1. Central research laboratory
2. Product divisions
3. User research
4. Other
EXAMPLES OF
INNOVATION IN
ENTERPRISE
1) Philips transistors
• Point-contact transistor
• Layer transistor
2) Unilever margarine
3) Philips microwave oven
• What role did the
Central Research
Laboratory play in
these 3 examples?
• Was the technocratic
approach successful in
these cases? Why/why
not?
Microwave ovens: 1947 Raytheon
commercial model and 1960s Litton
domestic countertop model
• MSG fermentation (1956)
• Example of creation of new product family
and product portfolio diversification
Udaka Shigezō’s laboratory notebook at Kyōwa Hakkō, 1956
“Bird poop”
On NPR’s All
Things Considered:
https://www.npr.org/202
2/05/02/1095988620/wh
y-it-took-nearly-100-
years-for-umami-to-beglobally-accepted-as-adistinct-fla
• Downsizing: divestiture
and outsourcing
• Applied research for
product divisions
• Calls for “user-centered
innovation”
CORPORATE INNOVATION: FLIPPING THE “LINEAR
MODEL” (1970S-1980S)
USER-CENTERED
INNOVATION (1970S
ONWARD)
• Criticisms by trade unions, managers,
specialists (e.g. automation in machine tool
manufacturing)
• User-centered design (e.g. Swedish trade union
federation – a locomotive repair shop’s computerbased planning system)
• User experience (UX) research
• Participative design"