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Organizing the Electronic Century

Author

Listed:
  • Richard N. Langlois

    (University of Connecticut)

Abstract

This paper's title is an echo of Alfred Chandler's (2001) chronicle of the electronics industry, Inventing the Electronic Century. The paper attempts (A) a general reinterpretation of the pattern of technological advance in (American) electronics over the twentieth century and (B) a somewhat revisionist account of the role of organization and institution in that advance. The paper stresses the complex effects of product architecture and intellectual property regime on industrial organization and technological change. Whereas large research-oriented multi-divisional firms always played a crucial role in the industry's history, such firms proved most adept at systemic innovation, as in the case of television. But, as in the cases of early radio and of the IBM 360 mainframe computer, the multi-divisional firm was capable of bottling up within its boundaries (often through intellectual property rights) a relatively modular architecture whose "option value" such firms could not fully exploit. America's adherence to the model of industrial research within the vertically integrated corporation arguably contributed to the demise of American consumer electronics in the 1970s and 1980s. And America's subsequent relative success in semiconductors and personal computers --- and in today's converged digital consumer electronics --- owes much to the specialized and "fragmented" character of American industry, which could take fuller advantage of competitive global value chains and of the option value of modular architectures.

Suggested Citation

  • Richard N. Langlois, 2007. "Organizing the Electronic Century," Working papers 2007-07, University of Connecticut, Department of Economics.
  • Handle: RePEc:uct:uconnp:2007-07
    Note: Paper for the conference "Has There Been a Third Industrial Revolution in Global Business?" November 16-18, 2006, Bocconi University, Milan.
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    File URL: https://media.economics.uconn.edu/working/2007-07.pdf
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    Citations

    Blog mentions

    As found by EconAcademics.org, the blog aggregator for Economics research:
    1. Patent Pools and Innovation
      by rlanglois in Organizations and Markets on 2009-02-20 01:55:35
    2. Intellectual Steam
      by Dick Langlois in Organizations and Markets on 2010-05-19 23:38:49

    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Langlois, Richard N., 2013. "Business groups and the natural state," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 14-26.
    2. Batiz-Lazo, Bernardo & Maixe-Altes, J. Carles, 2008. "Organisational change and the computerisation of British and Spanish savings banks, circa 1965-1985," MPRA Paper 14479, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    electronics; modularity; product architecture; vertical integration.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • L2 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior
    • L63 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Manufacturing - - - Microelectronics; Computers; Communications Equipment
    • N62 - Economic History - - Manufacturing and Construction - - - U.S.; Canada: 1913-
    • O33 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Technological Change: Choices and Consequences; Diffusion Processes
    • O34 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Intellectual Property and Intellectual Capital

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