Seminar – Resurfacing uncertainty and knowledge layering in multi-purpose technologies: How did lithium-ion batteries diffuse to electric vehicle applications?

Studies of industry emergence have often garnered insights from empirical contexts with a one-to-one correspondence between a technology and its downstream market. In parallel, studies of general-purpose technologies have documented the economic impact and versatility of technologies with broad downstream applications, although these studies often abstract away from the endogenous and gradual process through which a single technology underpins multiple downstream markets. To address the research gap at this intersection, this study leverages the applicability of lithium-ion batteries in several downstream markets of consumer electronics, electric vehicles, space missions, and utility grids. Using a longitudinal multi-level single-case analysis, this study proposes a conceptual framework about the role of actors’ strategic behavior in identifying different downstream markets, tackling application-specific uncertainties that resurface in each market, and layering different knowledge bases at the technology-application nexus.

REC M4.02