INDICATORS OF DISCONTINUOUS TECHNOLOGICAL-CHANGE - AN EXPLORATORY-STUDY OF 2 DISCONTINUITIES IN THE MACHINE-TOOL INDUSTRY

The objective of this paper is to explore the extent to which a set of indicators of technological and industrial change can act as warning signals for technical change, A particular kind of technical change ca n give a new substitute such price/performance attributes that it is t aken into the reach of mass market segments, Two processes of disconti nuous technical change in the machine tool industry are analysed using patent data, bibliometrics, data on new entrants, relative price chan ges and diffusion data. In the first case (the transition from convent ional to CNC machine tools) relative prices and new entrants were the first indicators to react whilst patents and bibliometrics increased i n activity in parallel with the large scale diffusion of CNC machine t ools, In the second case (the transition from CNC machine tools to fle xible manufacturing systems) new entrants and publishing preceded the large scale diffusion by some years, The different patterns between th e two cases and between these and what can be found in the literature, suggest that more work needs to be done to understand the conditions under which changes in each of the indicators can be used as a warning signal. The paper is concluded by a brief discussion which may form t he basis for some further work in that direction.