Learning needs of technology transfer: coping with discontinuities and disruptions

Abstract

Technology and its transfer has become the main vehicle of human and economic development in the world today. This is especially true of discontinuous and disruptive technologies because of their special role in taking the economic activities and quality of life to new levels. The transferee’s benefits from Technology Transfer are quite obvious, as it is perceived as a means for them to develop their economies as well as quality of life. While this aspect of technology transfer is frequently being discussed in the literature (often under the “donor–recipient” paradigm), the transferor is often viewed as the giver of benefits. Such a perspective would be detrimental to the effective implementation of technology transfer. In other words, there has to be a focus on the transferor’s benefits as well (such as the expansion of market, generation of additional income, innovations in a different context, growth of the company, etc.) and therefore on their need for learning. Based on a review of literature on the subject, it was seen that both the transferor as well as the transferee need to learn new skills in order to implement international technology transfer (ITT) effectively. Such learning needs would arise primarily from four factors, namely: (a) the objectives, (b) the contents, (c) the process, and (d) the channels involved in the ITT, and are viewed from the different contexts of the transferor and the transferee. The larger objective (super-ordinate goal) of any ITT is to enable the transferees to create and rule a new world of theirs and the transferors to gain access to a new world. This can be accomplished only if the discontinuities and disruptions that lead to ITT and later emerge from it are managed using a learning orientation founded on a paradigm of equal partnership.