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Patenting activities and technology commercialization in nanotechnology are being increasingly driven by international collaboration. These collaborative arrangements are often based on patents' portfolio complementarities requiring managerial capabilities in terms of searching for external partners and assessing the patents portfolio. To support technology transfer within or across countries, this study examines a sample of 28,895 patents filed in carbon nanotubes to assess key players, their technology domains and which commercialization strategies Italy-based organizations may deploy since the dominant position of Chinese organizations. Our findings show that significant linkages of the Italian nanotech system appear as being highly centralized around key players within their own cluster. Overall, the results suggest that strengthening the linkages between scientific and corporate actors may eliminate many barriers and accelerate nanotech commercialization by rethinking teaching and training programs for young researchers. Implications for policy-makers are also highlighted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study we compare the nano-patent landscapes of China and Japan in order to assess how their structures (type, fragmentation and concentration of patent ownership) affect the organization of the nanotechnology industry. We also analyze the technology policies pursued by the two countries in order to assess how policy interventions support technology transfer and nano-exploitation through university-industry collaboration and technology entrepreneurship. Drawing upon 20,365 patent families related to carbon nanotubes from 1994 to present, we found that two dissimilar technology policies boosting national innovation system emerged: China is more focused on forging an anchor-tenant model, while Japan exhibits a more industry-oriented model through demand-side policy intervention. Implications for firms' strategies and policy makers are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to examine how patent analysis can provide useful information in support of commercialization strategies to firms operating in emerging fields, such as carbon nanotubes, which represents the most promising sub-field of nanotechnologies. Specifically, the study focuses on the technology exploitation, when firms decide to transfer the outcomes of their innovative processes to third parties. Under these circumstances, firms need to assess actual commercialization opportunities, which ultimately depend on the relative technological strength of the actors operating in that market (Arora, Fosfuri and Gambardella 2001). In order to unveil the characteristics of the market for technologies and to as-sess the competitive conditions thereof, firms may make use of methodologies of patent analysis (Bonino, Ciaramella and Corno 2010; Daim et al. 2006; Lee, Yoon and Park 2009). By and large, the main purpose of patent analysis is to enable firms to monitor and assess technological developments and other areas of concern. As there are no comprehensive reviews on this emerging sector, this paper provides a descriptive overview, identifying what types of firms are entering, from what knowledge base, where they are located, and their strategic choices in terms of technological diversity, and R&D strategy. These findings only represent the starting point of deeper examinations of the technological landscape aimed at assessing the real intention of existing players in the field. Nevertheless, they offer to the management of potential technology providers a first suggestion of which directions to deploy and which others to exclude, thus saving time and effort in trial and error attempts. In turn, managerial implications are then drawn from the study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]