NBER Working Papers · 2026 · Daniel P. Gross、Maria P. Roche
中文摘要
大型使命导向的研发努力有时会带来重大的技术进步,但其商业影响各不相同。本文利用此类努力之一——美国二战雷达项目——探讨此类项目的产出如何促进后来的商业发展。利用档案记录以及关于企业进入、专利申请和技术劳动力流动的数据,我们重构了战时雷达研发的组织与产出,记录了战后一个民用产业的快速增长,并评估了哪些产出被用于随后的商业活动。编码化知识(以出版物和专利形式)扩散广泛,具身知识(受训人员)的扩散则更具地方性,而战时项目的"部件—系统"产业架构也在企业战后商业定位中得到反映。这些证据指出了协调型技术开发项目借以塑造新兴高科技产业的具体渠道。
Abstract
Large, mission-oriented R&D efforts sometimes generate substantial technological advances, but their commercial impacts vary. This paper uses one such effort—the U.S. World War II radar program—to explore how the outputs of such programs may contribute to later commercial development. Using archival records together with data on firm entry, patenting, and technical labor flows, we reconstruct the organization and outputs of wartime radar R&D, document the rapid postwar growth of a civilian industry, and evaluate which outputs were used in subsequent commercial activity. Codified knowledge (in publications and patents) diffused broadly, embodied knowledge (trained personnel) diffused more locally, and the component-system industrial architecture of the wartime program was mirrored in firms' postwar commercial positions. The evidence points to specific channels through which coordinated technology development programs can give shape to emerging high-tech industries.