Crossing the Valley of Death?An Integrated Framework and a Value Chain for Emerging Technologies.

The paper develops an integrated technology-push and market-pull framework, a value chain model for crossing the valley of death (VOD—the gap between laboratory and market) for emerging technologies based on primary and secondary data analyses, and a survey conducted on European research and development projects. The study uses a case of micro- and nano-manufacturing technology (MNT), and confirms the existence of the VOD through the survey data analysis. A mixed-methods approach was adopted that investigated the business and technical challenges to the commercialization of MNT. A notable finding is that the emerging MNT often does not have a direct link with market demand, and the result suggests that an intermediary role between advanced technology and market demand should be integrated to act as a co-ordinator for overcoming the VOD. The paper also examines how an intermediary is crucial to escape the VOD within the value chain of the interdependent relationships between actors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]