Technology dynamics in urban innovation: development of a system structure, comparison between countries, analysis of technology interactions

Abstract

Nowadays, the increasing number of people moving from the countryside to cities leads to fast urbanization, along with its troubles, in several cities in the world. Fast urbanization and the way to deal with it, how urban innovation or smart city is applied to cope with issues of urbanization, technological drivers of urban innovation and movements of technologies in this field, etc. are motivations for this research. Furthermore, the difference in strategies for developing technologies between developed and leapfrogging countries is also another motivation for this research to observe the way urban innovation grows in such two different kinds of countries. By using patent analysis, a T-DNA approach and patent co-classification analysis, this research shows technological drivers in different system levels in urban innovation in two countries - the USA and Vietnam, and provides some insights into technology convergence in urban innovation based on the analysis of different system levels (vertical convergence) and within the super-system regarding city infrastructures (horizontal convergence). Therefore, the research may help urban planners, managers and analysts in companies in urban areas in both cases of two countries.