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Too little, too early: California’s transient advantage in the photovoltaic solar industry

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  • Joel West

Abstract

Throughout its brief history, California has established itself as a national or international leader in key industries—such as aerospace, computing and entertainment—through early mover pre-emption and strong clustering effects. California firms were the initial world leaders in producing photovoltaic (PV) solar cells and dominated the initial aerospace niche market. However, these early efforts failed to create a durable cluster, and when the U.S. market lost interest in renewable energy during the 1990s, California firms were largely surpassed by Japanese, German and Chinese producers that focused on the mass market of using PV to displace fossil fuels for electricity generation. This paper reviews the history of the California PV producers in three phases: aerospace niche markets of the 1950s and 1960s, a brief policy-induced effort at electricity generation in the 1980s, and a twenty first century resurgence fueled by Silicon Valley venture capital. It then discusses why the early entry of the California firms failed to translate to sustained advantage for the firms or the region. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media New York 2014

Suggested Citation

  • Joel West, 2014. "Too little, too early: California’s transient advantage in the photovoltaic solar industry," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 39(3), pages 487-501, June.
  • Handle: RePEc:kap:jtecht:v:39:y:2014:i:3:p:487-501
    DOI: 10.1007/s10961-012-9291-6
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Bruce Fallick & Charles A. Fleischman & James B. Rebitzer, 2006. "Job-Hopping in Silicon Valley: Some Evidence Concerning the Microfoundations of a High-Technology Cluster," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 88(3), pages 472-481, August.
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    4. A J Scott, 1999. "The US Recorded Music Industry: On the Relations between Organization, Location, and Creativity in the Cultural Economy," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 31(11), pages 1965-1984, November.
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    6. Wustenhagen, Rolf & Bilharz, Michael, 2006. "Green energy market development in Germany: effective public policy and emerging customer demand," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(13), pages 1681-1696, September.
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    Cited by:

    1. Wolfgang Albrecht & Martin Steinrücke, 2020. "Continuous-time scheduling of production, distribution and sales in photovoltaic supply chains with declining prices," Flexible Services and Manufacturing Journal, Springer, vol. 32(3), pages 629-667, September.
    2. Graf, Holger & Kalthaus, Martin, 2018. "International research networks: Determinants of country embeddedness," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 47(7), pages 1198-1214.
    3. Marina Van Geenhuizen & Pieter Stek, 2015. "Mapping innovation in the global photovoltaic industry: a bibliometric approach to cluster identification and analysis," ERSA conference papers ersa15p697, European Regional Science Association.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Industry clusters; Pioneer advantage; Renewable energy; Industry emergence; L22; L26; L52; O31; R30;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • L22 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Firm Organization and Market Structure
    • L26 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Entrepreneurship
    • L52 - Industrial Organization - - Regulation and Industrial Policy - - - Industrial Policy; Sectoral Planning Methods
    • O31 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives
    • R30 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Real Estate Markets, Spatial Production Analysis, and Firm Location - - - General

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