Science, technology, and innovation policy timing and nanotechnology entrepreneurship and innovation

The timing of science, technology, and innovation (STI) policy initiatives is critical to the outcomes that they produce. This study examines the advantages and disadvantages of enacting STI policy investments early in a nascent domain of activity. Building on work across multiple disciplines, we propose a framework to better understand the temporal dynamics of STI policy. An examination of data on nanotechnology STI policy around the world shows that the timing and funding size is related to entrepreneurship and innovation in different ways. The findings reveal that countries that started funding national STI programs in nanotechnology later had a lower proportion of the total nanotechnology firms, patents, and publications in the world, which suggests some first-mover advantages to STI policy. However, this is only part of the story. Countries that had large programs after the technology had gained legitimacy had the opposite situation such that there was a higher proportion of the total nanotechnology firms, patents, and publication in the world and more nanotechnology-related patents per capita and firms relative to other firms in the country explicating some of the complexity of policy timing. We discuss how temporal considerations influence both the theory and practice of building systems of innovation.