Start Date

4-1979 8:00 AM

Description

Technology transfer is the process by which important scientific and technological advance is translated into sociallydefined "benefits." Seen in this perspective, technology transfer may be regarded as the way the United States invests in the future, its own and that of other nations. With the President's current scientific priority list heavily studded with space-derived items, and the White House Fact Sheet on Space Policy's strong emphasis on application, the mandate is unmistakable. How it can best be implemented is not so certain. Even viewed in retrospect, most known innovations travel a tortuous road. In prospect, the path is almost completely unpredictable. What is clear is that there must be explicit recognition that technology transfer is in essence a social process, that it does not take place by itself, and that it occurs in a social environment, in which "success," however defined, depends on a complicated web of synergistic factors only tangentially related to the technology itself.

The notion of technology transfer is at least as old as fire and certainly as commonplace as the adoption of the wheel. This familiarity with the concept has probably contributed to the tendency toward underestimating its complexity. NASA's considerable experience with technological innovation and the dynamics of transferring space-derived knowledge and knowhow into terrestrial and perhaps more pedestrian channels serves as the basis for this paper. With Landsat the primary, but not the only, example, we analyze from the sociological perspective the factors implementing and impeding technology transfer.

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Apr 1st, 8:00 AM

Technology Transfer as Social Process -A Sociological Perspective

Technology transfer is the process by which important scientific and technological advance is translated into sociallydefined "benefits." Seen in this perspective, technology transfer may be regarded as the way the United States invests in the future, its own and that of other nations. With the President's current scientific priority list heavily studded with space-derived items, and the White House Fact Sheet on Space Policy's strong emphasis on application, the mandate is unmistakable. How it can best be implemented is not so certain. Even viewed in retrospect, most known innovations travel a tortuous road. In prospect, the path is almost completely unpredictable. What is clear is that there must be explicit recognition that technology transfer is in essence a social process, that it does not take place by itself, and that it occurs in a social environment, in which "success," however defined, depends on a complicated web of synergistic factors only tangentially related to the technology itself.

The notion of technology transfer is at least as old as fire and certainly as commonplace as the adoption of the wheel. This familiarity with the concept has probably contributed to the tendency toward underestimating its complexity. NASA's considerable experience with technological innovation and the dynamics of transferring space-derived knowledge and knowhow into terrestrial and perhaps more pedestrian channels serves as the basis for this paper. With Landsat the primary, but not the only, example, we analyze from the sociological perspective the factors implementing and impeding technology transfer.

 

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