Abstract.Nanotechnologies are often presented as breakthrough innovations, where technology transfer and knowledge-bridging will play a pivotal role in the industrial dynamics. This article investigates the model of knowledge transfer in the nanotechnologies in depth, by comparing it with the models of two recently emerged technologies: biotech and microelectronics. Our results show that the nanotechnology transfer model is very different from that involved in biotechnology evolution: while small-medium firms play a valuable technology-bringing role, the central function of "translating" new knowledge between public research and industry in carried by the larger firms, just as it was in the early stages of the microelectronics sector.

Introduction There are moves towards geographic concentrations of universities and firms involved in research, and both recent university mergers (as at Manchester and Helsinki) and the increasing numbers of large and diversified campuses testify to the importance of large groups of scientists being colocated. Knowledge creation and innovations are often cumulative, and tacit knowledge circulates within such scientific clusters through direct and repeated interactions between cluster members (

Nanotechnologies are reshaping the boundaries between industries, combining two aspects of innovation -both enhancing competences based on cumulative knowledge and experience and destroying competences by forcing the renewal of the firm"s knowledge base. To analyze how worldwide R&D leaders adapt to this new technology, we conduct an econometric analysis of about 3,000 subsidiaries of the largest R&D spenders. We find that large groups are creating medium size subsidiary companies to explore nanotechnologies. Knowledge circulates mostly amongst subsidiaries within the same group and scientific clusters do not affect their involvement in nanotechnologies. Nanotechnologies remain marginal within these subsidiaries" knowledge bases and are distributed within corporate groups, stimulating recombination between nanotechnology and other technologies.