Technology networks: the autocatalytic origins of innovation

TL;DR

This paper investigates the autocatalytic structure of technological networks derived from patent data, revealing how interconnected technological fields mutually reinforce innovation and evolve through core shifts and recombination.

Contribution

It introduces a directed network model of technological fields based on patent data, demonstrating the autocatalytic structure's role in innovation dynamics and core shifts.

Findings

Technological networks exhibit a growing autocatalytic structure.

Core fields in the network have higher patent counts, indicating positive spillovers.

Core shifts suggest ongoing recombination across different technological areas.

Abstract

We analyse the autocatalytic structure of technological networks and evaluate its significance for the dynamics of innovation patenting. To this aim, we define a directed network of technological fields based on the International Patents Classification, in which a source node is connected to a receiver node via a link if patenting activity in the source field anticipates patents in the receiver field in the same region more frequently than we would expect at random. We show that the evolution of the technology network is compatible with the presence of a growing autocatalytic structure, i.e. a portion of the network in which technological fields mutually benefit from being connected to one another. We further show that technological fields in the core of the autocatalytic set display greater fitness, i.e. they tend to appear in a greater number of patents, thus suggesting the presence of positive spillovers as well as positive reinforcement. Finally, we observe that core shifts take place whereby different groups of technology fields alternate within the autocatalytic structure; this points to the importance of recombinant innovation taking place between close as well as distant fields of the hierarchical classification of technological fields.